September angst!

“Patriotism is not short, frenzied outbursts of emotion, but the tranquil and steady dedication of a lifetime” -Adlai Stevenson

As the few students doing history know, a good chunk of the curriculum concerns our Indigenous people. And well, that’s a good thing, because the theme for Amerindian Heritage Month, ‘Embracing Our Identity, Celebrating our Culture’ – is exactly what we should all be doing as Guyanese.
Not too coincidentally, this month is also “Education Month”, which was probably chosen because September marks the beginning of the school year. Two weeks on, we’re probably groaning and moaning to tumble out of beds in the morning, but the commemorations of this month draws attention to something that’s a bit of a deficit in our education system.
As I’ve written before, not enough people do Caribbean History in school. It’s mandatory to do a foreign language but it’s totally your choice whether you want to do History.
In fact, they place hurdles in your path since most schools schedule History, Geography and Social Studies in the same period. So guess how many students choose to do all three and spend most of their free time catching up on the classes they missed? Not many. Surprise!!! So this is really giving young Guyanese a horrible mindset for going out in the world. Because the system’s like, ‘Hey, we know we have a ridiculously high migration rate, but let’s teach you a foreign language so you can survive abroad. And (LOL) we won’t even bother teaching you anything about your heritage so that maybe you’ll develop some patriotism and not even bother to emigrate!’ Ironically it’s the U. S. that most Guyanese will give their right arm to live in – but they won’t need a foreign language to survive there. Unless they plan to live in the South Bronx among the Puerto Ricans.
I do believe that if more of our youths had any idea about the struggles of our ancestors to build this land, they would have such a strong sense of patriotism that they wouldn’t even want to leave Guyana in the first place. Or if they do… they’ll probably return to help develop our country.
But no, they traipse over to the states and are ready to adopt George Washington as their hero and ancestor even. They learn all about dear young George confessing he chopped down the cherry tree. The father of the country couldn’t tell a lie!! They know about Geronimo and not Old Kaie.
Because guess what? In the states, they actually make a big deal about their history. They celebrate their Independence Day with spectacular fireworks and patriotic parades, it makes them patriotic, unlike the ‘dutty wine-fest’ our Republic Day has morphed into. How many of us know about the Ruimveldt Riots? Previously when I had written about History not being given enough importance in schools, I was upset that more people at Queen’s weren’t writing the subject at CSEC, but the other day, I learnt that at other schools, some of the kids don’t even do History at third form.
They don’t ever do History. Now that’s simply unacceptable.
So this September, as we celebrate our Indigenous Peoples’ heritage and as we celebrate Education Month, let’s not get too carried away patting ourselves on the back for doing such a good job appreciating stuff. Because we actually know precious little about our Amerindian citizens much less the history of all our other peoples whose ‘navel strings are buried in this land’. How can we appreciate and honour that which we do not even know?