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Recent essays

• February 2 2012 : The First American Freedom Fighter
  

  This February 2nd stands as the 500th anniversary of the death of Hatuey, an Indigenous American fighter for independence from colonialism not mentioned in the same breath as Patrick Henry, George Washington, and Thomas Jefferson. However, Hatuey deserves recognition as their earliest ideological ancestor and great forerunner. Little is known about Hatuey, a Taino Cacique [leader], not his date of birth, nor exactly when he first led his forces into battle. But key elements of his story have come down to [...]

• January 31 2012 : Rethinking Columbus banned in Arizona: Katz essays included
  

  The following is a response to news that Rethinking Columbus, a textbook aimed at critically engaging the legacy of Christopher Columbus in American and Indigenous history, is no longer approved for use in Tuscon public schools. The banning is a result of new laws that have shut down Mexican [American] Studies programs in the area. I was informed that on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day the book "Rethinking Columbus," designed to make pupils and teachers think about how this county was [...]

• January 24 2012 : Gingrich Confronts History in South Carolina
  

  “It's not that I'm a good debater. It's that I articulate the deepest-felt values of the American people,” announced the victorious Newt Gingrich in South Carolina. Republican voters [only 2% were African Americans] saw his tough, angry, racial language as straight talking. He eagerly strummed racial themes—Black urban pupils serve as assistant janitors to learn what is really needed in school which is how to stick to a job, make and spend money. And then he suggested the urban poor [...]