The University of Kansas is hosting a summer seminar program to formulate ideas on how to teach about the history, causes, and impact of the series of riots that plagued several major American cities in the summer of 1967, a half century ago. The seminar, entitled “Teaching the Long Hot Summer of 1967 and Beyond,” was made possible by a $180,000 from the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Clarence Lang, professor and chair of the department of African and African American studies at the University of Kansas, is one of the organizers of the three-week long seminar. He notes that the Kerner Commission, set up to investigate the riots, came to the famous conclusion that “our nation is moving toward two societies, one Black, one White – separate and unequal.” Professor Lang says that the conclusion remains “a stark indictment of racial inequality in all its manifestations.”
Participants in the seminar will go on a field trip to the site of riots that took place in Kansas City. They will develop web-based portfolios that will allow them to use what they have learned to make lesson plans for teaching their own students about the Long Hot Summer of 1967.
Clarence Lang! My man fifty-grand!!!