Final blog entry

What I have most learned in this class is the effect essentialism has had on our culture. We are all guilty of making essentialistic statements about each other, whether it concerns race, class, gender or demographics. These statements create stereotypes, which then becomes part of our vernacular and ideology. African-Americans have especially been victims of this type of treatment throughout history. Essentialism is very destructive and has no basis in reality or true understanding of each other.
What would I most like to know more about? I have taken "American" history classes and now have studied African-American history. I now would like to take an integrated history class. In this way I could understand the important historical events and people in context to what is most familiar to me. In fact, the teaching of American history neeeds to change so that only one history class is needed. They say history repeats itself. In this way, we could understand the events and each others reaction to those events and maybe understand how we got to where we are. Thereby, breaking the cycle of making the same mistakes.