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Jonathan Kozol, Savage Inequalities (Crown, 1991) Reissued by Harper Perennial in paperback in 1992 Jonathan Kozol delivers a searing blow to the perceived efficacy of the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision in Savage Inequalities. Kozol argues in his introduction that the current state of American public education is far more similar to that at the time of another court decision - the 1898 Plessy v. Ferguson decision, which decreed that schools could provide separate schools for blacks and whites as long as they offered equal educational opportunities. Visiting schools in Chicago, New York, New Jersey, Washington, D.C. and San Antonio, Kozol demonstrates through interviews with administrators, teachers, and students that urban, poor, minority students are receiving a distinctly separate and entirely unequal to the education received, in many cases, mere miles away by suburban, white, middle- and upper-class students. The separation Kozol sees is not merely psychological but physical. Elementary-school children in the South Bronx attend classes in an old roller-skating rink that has no windows, while children in the ritzy Riverdale neighborhood just a few blocks north thrive in a building outfitted with a planetarium and fully stocked library. High school students in urban Chicago use cut-up soda bottles as Petri dishes while those in the city's prosperous southern suburbs - a quick train ride away - have fully-stocked science labs. Distinctly separate and inherently unequal - that's what Kozol argues American public schools have become and what they, as a result, have made American children's opportunities. Savage Inequalities received the New England Book Award for nonfiction and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award in 1992. Alex Haley, the author of Roots, called the book "a must-read for every parent, every educator, and every relevant policy maker." Ruth Sidel of The Nation called it, simply, "heartbreaking." MORE: 1992 interview with Jonathan Kozol from Educational Life 2000 interview with Jonathan Kozol from Christian Century 2000 Salon.com interview with Jonathan Kozol on the 2000 election and its impact on federal education policy |
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