The Power of the Word

A few years ago, I taught at an "alternative" school in rural North Louisiana. I've grown to dislike the term "alternative," but that is what it was. While there, I continually dreaded going to work, for various reasons. However, I grew to understand, even more than I already did, that my role as a teacher involves much more than just presenting students with facts and figures. It involves helping students navigate the paths laid out before them. This isn't always easy, especially if I never had to navigate the same paths myself; however, that is where books come in. Books, specifically fiction, provide an escape from reality and also a connection with it. They provide opportunities to learn about the world around you and maps to help you navigate that world. 

Words have power. In a 1983 interview, Gaines said, "I love words, I love looking at words, I love those 26 letters. In my writing, I try to develop character. That way I can learn something about your own character from reading. Millions of people have read Miss Jane or seen the movie, and whether they know it or not, I think that little old lady has done something to their lives" (New Wings, January 1983). In fact, after the publication of The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, news outlets and others kept asking to interview Miss Jane. Gaines' character became a "real" person to the readers. They connected with her in a way that made her come out of the graveyard and live. 

Now, back to that school in North Louisiana. I brought books from home to the school, and one of those books was Gaines' A Lesson before Dying. Looking at most of the students there, I could see that they wanted something. What that something was, I don't know. One student in particular, a student who thought deeply, provided the others with a sort of compass for the period he was there. At some point, I gave him a copy of A Lesson before Dying. Soon after, I asked him if he had read it. He said he was really enjoying it.  The next day, however, he received a second infraction then left the school. for good If a student had multiple infractions, he or she would be removed from the school and expelled for the year.I don't know what effect, if any, Gaines' book had on this young man. I'd like to think that it had some effect, but I can't be sure.

Teaching can be both a rewarding and heartbreaking endeavor at the same time. I've experienced both of these poles on numerous occasions. While I don't know what happened with the student at the school in North Louisiana, I do know what happened to a student I taught in college. A group of middle school student from Shreveport came to the center. The students were taking the day to visit three universities in Louisiana and UL Lafayette was one of them. While touring the center, one of the chaperons approached me and asked if I remembered her. I told her I didn't. She went on to inform me that I had taught he in her freshman composition class at UL Monroe. In that class, I asked the students what there major was and why. Hers was pharmacy. After seeing her writing, I asked her if she ever thought about going in to English as a major. She said she remembers thinking at the time, "This guy doesn't know me. Why would he suggest that?" The next semester, she changed her major to English. Now, she has her MA in English, teaches at the university, and  may pursue her PhD. Even though it was a writing class and not a literature class that affected her, I would say that the overall idea of words as power holds true.    

I'll conclude with this quote from James Baldwin on books, and I would add writing as well. I think it encapsulates the way I feel about them and the way we should view them. "You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read. It was books that taught me that the things that tormented me were the very things that connected me with all the people who were alive, or who had ever been alive."