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| Author: Ann Arnett Ferguson
Publisher: University of Michigan Press
Category: Book
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Avg. Customer Rating:  9 reviews
Sales Rank: 339581
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 272
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.9
Dimensions (in): 8.8 x 6 x 0.8
ISBN: 0472088491
Dewey Decimal Number: 370
EAN: 9780472088492
ASIN: 0472088491
Publication Date: August 28, 2001
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| Showing reviews 6-9 of 9 | | « PREV | | |
 "Bad Boys" April 18, 2006
1 out of 5 found this review helpful
Bad Boys, by Ann Arnett Ferguson is a story about black children in public school who are treated differently by other students and their teachers because of their race. It is a book about a group of eleven and twelve year old males as they attempt to create a sense of "self" under unpleasant circumstances.
Through out the book Ferguson demonstrates a vision of how society builds some black youth as "bad boys." Stereotypically blacks are seen as troublemakers, especially males. In the book, Ferguson continually refers to the "Punishing Room." It is where the "bad" kids are sent when they do something wrong, like not follow the rules. She states that the vast majority of the students are African American. Of those students, most are males. This is where disciplinary action takes place and judgment is passed. It seems like a place to put children to occupy space where they do not have to be closely watched. I personally think that the "Punishing Room" puts a bad reflection on the teachers. It is just a way for teachers not to have to discipline the children themselves, but put the weight on someone else. When I did my field observation I noticed that race and gender were key components together in dealing with discipline.
Ferguson then moves to gender and how race as a whole is affected. The level of an "achiever" a student falls under also influences the level of discrimination which is received by a teacher to the student. Ferguson states, "...kids who were seen as smart we called on for the right answers because teachers expected them to know more, while lower achievers were not called on often "because she knows they don't know the answer," or were called on to "give them a chance," or because "they goof off"' (98). I feel as though this is just a horrible statement to be made by a child. For a student of any race, gender, class, or ability levels, to feel that they are only called on to participate in class out of discrimination or prejudice, I think is ridiculous. I was always considered on of the "smart kids" and although many students would have wanted to be labeled as that, I hated it.
For most of the book now I felt as though it was all about how blacks need to prepare themselves for society, how they are always going to be discriminated against, and that people have a perception of them because of their skin color. I dislike that blacks think that whites think the worst of them. Ferguson goes on saying about how these black children feel discriminated against by the whites, but can't blacks ever discriminate against whites? It seems like no one ever talks about that, just how bad African Americans have it. Another thing that upset me in this book was how blacks view themselves and how they get treated. Ferguson talks about how once a black kid gets in trouble they get into a tracking system and then are trapped. How is that different from whites? One of the students talk about how if ever a black person is stopped by a policeman, especially a white one, to be as courteous as possible because otherwise the cop will think "here we go again" (111) just because they are black. I just do not like how blacks think that everything they go through is so bad and that they have it so horrible, or that whites never go through anything hard like prejudice or discrimination. For example, one of the father's states, "...it is crucial for black kids to learn how to take care of themselves. "I try to teach them, you go out of my door, reality hits. I'm not going to baby you up in here because life is not goin'ta baby you out that door."... "...you going to be filled with prejudice in your life. Prepare yourself. There's no way around it"' (112-113). I guess I just do not understand how that is different than if they were white. Whites are prejudiced against as well. It is just that no one ever talks about that. To some whites are seen as rich kids who get whatever they want and who have mommy and daddy to pay for everything. Whites are not seen by some other groups of different races as living in hard times. All people can live in hard times, whether it is as a single parent, someone living in poverty, or unemployed. All those things can happen to anyone. I do not care if a person is black, white, green, or blue, it can happen to anyone. It is just how hard one's willing to work that makes the difference I think. Perhaps I am just biased because I am a white female and do not see African Americans having more of a difficult time then other people of all races, especially now. In the past I do believe that African Americans had a difficult time, but how are people going to ever overcome it if no one wants to let it go?
Overall, at first I was excited to read the book. It was slow getting into, but then once I really started getting into it, more feelings and frustration was raised due to the arguments discussed. I defiantly see it as a controversial book. I wonder though as to whether or not I view it as controversial because I am a white female. Is that wrong to view it as that? Overall I had mixed emotions about the story and its context. By far the second half of the book was more interesting and controversial than the first half. I did enjoy hearing other people's views; I guess I just can not help getting defensive because I do not agree with much of what the book states.
 A must read! April 18, 2006
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
Being in the education field, I had very high expectations for the book, Bad Boys: Public Schools in the Making of Black Masculinity by Anne Ferguson. My expectations were met with great success. I went at this book with a very critical standpoint looking to argue as much as I could and to find faults in the writing. I fell short on many accounts. To take such a broad topic as to why African American males had a higher rate of being labeled as troublemakers and research it was a great feat. Ferguson does a wonderful job of backing up all of her observations and arguments with specific events that she witnessed throughout the duration of her study. She goes on to give even greater credibility to her arguments by listing amazing footnotes with many other studies and books that back up her statements.
The main reoccurring topics throughout the book were the way that African American males' actions were very quick to be adultificated and different attempts at normalizing various actions. The boys were split up by administration as "Troublemakers" and "Schoolboys". The "Troublemakers" were the ones that faculty members would say were going nowhere accept to jail. These are the students that Ferguson set out to understand. The book does a wonderful job of taking each chapter as a separate argument. Ferguson uses the initial chapter to tell what point it is that she is attempting to convey, what her reasons were to look at the topic, a detailed writing of what the exact message is and leaving no loose ends. She then follows up any forms of doubt or argumentation by using field notes to give exact events and conversations that prove her argument.
For example, in chapter five titled The Real World, Ferguson begins by discussing how African Americans quite often get in trouble for actions that they learn from how they live in certain neighborhoods or home settings. While I started out thinking this chapter was going to be searching for an excuse for African Americans and not realistic, I was wrong. Ferguson described occasions where children lived in poor homes to the extent that the punishment for selling candy in school was worth the very little money they made. The one story in particular, a little boy who wanted to get his mom a birthday cake and made the money to do so by selling his lunch, touched me. However, due to this boy being a "Troublemaker", he was punished.
In the chapter Getting in Trouble a subcategory titled Schoolwork was ready to argue in the teachers favor when Ferguson validated everything I had questioned about her argument by listing not just one but several events that she had witnessed that I had no rebuttal for. For example, a young white boy is allowed to sit on the couch when he is done with his work, when the African American boy goes to do the same, he is reprimanded for breaking the rule of not sitting on the couch during reading time. The African American boy argues and is then in more trouble then when he first started. The event goes on and the teacher continues that she is unbiased by race. This among many other examples knocked down my argument.
Perhaps the best thing about Ferguson's study results, is that she goes from both the perspective of the institution and system as well as the way the young men see it as well. Through very interactive and detailed interviews, tutoring sessions, home visits, and many other resources, Ferguson hits the whole agenda by not just studying the African American male, but breaking it down to analyze males in general, African Americans in general, and finally configuring it all to reach a conclusion on African American males.
The way that Ferguson gives all the theories behind each topic and is unbiased about them is a strong point. In chapter three, I found that her detailed description of both the Radical Schooling Theory, Foucault's Theory of Disciplinary Power, and Individualized Instruction prior to the actual content of the chapter was very helpful in creating an opinion and then both signifying it or altering it. Also, the way in which she warms you up to the material by starting out with a chapter on the setting, the students and the administration was very helpful. It makes the book very easy to follow and refer back to.
I feel that Ferguson did an excellent job of deciphering a problem that is very touchy and difficult to study. The only part I was unhappy about was the lack of detail in the closing chapter where Ferguson gave little to no idea as to how she would change the problem or what she feels should be done. Other then that, I would recommend this book to everyone for the fact that racism is still here even though most people deny it. Specifically, anyone in the education field should study the results of Ferguson's research.
 Excellent book June 11, 2004
10 out of 13 found this review helpful
Bad Boys by Ann Arnette Ferguson was an amazing book. I appreciated the ways that the theory that I have been reading flowed out of it. The book reminded me of the experiences that I have had teaching, in particular the school I taught at last year. Last year I taught at a school which was attended by predominately African American students. Many of the children?s experiences that Ferguson described were extremely familiar to me. I thought that she did an excellent job of illustrating the ways that cultural and social reproduction is espoused in schools.
The descriptions of the forms of discipline within schools and the ways in which teachers are expected to regulate discipline were very familiar to me. In fact this book addressed the very reasons that it was hard for me to be a teacher within our current education system. The job description of ?normalizer? did not fit my personality. The pressure that I felt from the principal of my school was very much in line with the following quote from page 43.
One of the systemic pressures making for more oppressive, punitive relations for African American children is the fear that white middle-class families will increasingly pull their children out of the public school and send them to private schools. Pressure is felt by the student specialist and ?Jail Keeper? to contain, suppress, and conceal damaging behavior that could contribute to the school?s reputation as a hostile environment.
This pressure in my school was not limited to the people who had the specific job description of disciplinarian (which there were three of, not including the principal), it was put onto every teacher within the school. From an outside perspective everything had to have the appearance of running smoothly, even if that meant that children were not learning in the most effective manner.
The discussion of student?s resistance was interesting and slightly hilarious to me (in an ironic way). Some of the descriptions reminded me of students in my classroom and things that happened both in my classroom and in my school. Ferguson spoke of ?the rewards that children might actually gain from getting in trouble? (92) and reputations. In my second grade classroom I had a student named Diandre who was significantly below grade level standards in all academic subjects. In fact he wrote his first and last name backwards. Diandre was like Horace in the book who had a reputation that preceeded him. Students talked about the things he did, as well as teachers. Diandre had learned before he entered my classroom that if he ?acted out? he didn?t have to do his school work. My goal was to help him. However, other students understood my behavior in a way that I gave Diandre more attention because he was?bad?. As a result one student in particular started ?acting out?. When I sat down to talk to her I came to understand that she was doing what she was doing so that she could get my attention.
Overall I felt that the book was powerful and motivating. I also think that this book is an important piece of work in that it gives these African American male students an outlet to speak about their experience that they would not have had access to. I appreciated what Ferguson said at the end of the book on page 234,
My hesitation to propose solutions comes from a conviction that minor inputs, temporary interventions, individual prescriptions into schools are vastly inadequate to remedy an institution that is fundamentally flawed and whose goal for urban black children seems to be the creation of ?a citizenry which will simply obey the rules of society?. I stand convinced that a restructuring of the entire educational system is what is urgently required.This book gives an excellent account of the ways in which our society uses our education system to reproduce our children to fit the molds assigned to them. It specifically speaks of the experience of Afrian American male students and the systemic things that cause this. This book will either reinforce what one knows about this experience or open ones eyes to what is going on in our schools for African American students. I recommend this book to everyone!
Bad Boys, Good Book! March 30, 2001
18 out of 22 found this review helpful
This is an excellent book and anyone interested in the future of not only black children but all children in the public school system must read it. Ferguson reintroduces us to a world many of us have long left behind and almost forgotten-elementary school. But more importantly she gives us a new perspective on the plight of young black men. Looking specifically at how the public school system constructs and imagines young black boys as troublemakers, Ferguson reveals how well intentioned educators contribute and reinforce negative and racist stereotypes about black men. Fegerson, however, is at her best when she demonstrates how young black boys through daily resistance (understood by teachers as making trouble) attempt to challenge a system that devalues their ways of knowing and expressing themselves. Read this book and give it to to a teacher, a mother, a father, a grandparent, anyone who is interested it making sure that all children get a quality education.
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