#534: Haitian Prejudices: Antoine replies to Wilentz

[Robert Corbett <bcorbett@netcom.com>]

From: Guy Antoine <GuyAntoine@windowsonhaiti.com>

> From:Amywile@aol.com
>Well, they do work hard, and their poor students try to study, but I still
>must say  that in the classrooms I've visited, the teachers certainly
>did not know how to WRITE French; they may have spoken it fluently,
>although that was not in evidence either. This was only a few classrooms,
>but it was a sorry sight: hungry listless little guys spotlessly dressed,
>sitting on a backless bench and the teacher writing mistakes onto the
>blackboard.

Certainly, if they did write perfect French, that would not lessen the
children's hunger, and the situation would not have been less sorry.
A good part of the sorrow comes from the fact that the children hardly
learn anything relevant to their lives or their future, whether is it taught
in perfect French or with mistakes on the board.  The real tragedy is
that those children are forced to sit in schools with empty stomachs.
If those bellies were full, who knows, enough of those students might
be able to challenge the teachers... who would perhaps begin to see
the futility of teaching a foreign reality in a foreign language.