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Book Review of A Class Divided, Then and Now, Expanded Edition

A Class Divided, Then and Now, Expanded Edition
PIZZELLEBFS avatar reviewed on + 331 more book reviews


I liked this one a lot. Jo

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This is the second edition of 'A Class Divided', the first having been published soon after the original documentary 'Eye of the Storm' was made in 1970. It contains the original nine chapters unedited. The new material consists of describing a reunion with 11 of the 16 students from Jane Elliott's 1970 class, and also details the blue eyes-brown eyes experiment as a workshop for adults, this particular one being with people who work in the Iowa Department of Corrections.
Having seen all of the documentaries made on Jane Elliott's famous lesson on discrimination, I found this book very interesting, especially to read excerpts from interviews with her on the inner moral struggle she went through in trying to work out whether she was doing the right thing by these children, and the heartache and stress it caused her knowing that she was lying to them about eye colour being an indicator of superiority. She talks openly about her fears that she could have been doing them more harm than good, and the fact that the children's reactions to the experiment and to one another taught her much more than she was either expecting or wanting to know about discrimination.