Read the transcript
Steve Fouts 00:02
Hey everybody, Steve and Dan Fouts here, and we are teaching different with American civil rights activist, Audre Lorde with a quote about self-expression. Here’s the quote, “Your silence will not protect you.” A really thought-provoking quote about how silence is somehow linked to protection and whether you say something or not will affect your safety. What claim would you say that it’s making?
Dan Fouts: 00:37 – Claim
Yeah, very thought provoking and she’s saying, hello people silence is not going to protect you. In other words, speak up. Your voice in the world is never going to be heard if you don’t have the courage to speak up.
Steve Fouts 00:54
And that sounds like something a Civil Rights Activist would believe.
Dan Fouts 00:56
Yes, and she spoke out against racism and sexism in the context of civil rights and so it totally fits her background.
Steve Fouts 01:09
Now, when it comes to the students and getting the conversation going, I think asking them to talk about a time when they were silent, because they felt like they needed to protect themselves would be a really good storytelling prompt. You’re going to get some interesting stories from that. They’re going to talk about their friends that they may have had to protect them. That’s going to be a good way to get this conversation going. Now, about the counterclaim. What is the push back to this one?
Dan Fouts: 01:43 – Counterclaim
Well, sometimes being quiet is the right thing to do. Sometimes not speaking out is the appropriate response, because you really do need to protect yourself or a friend. At least you think it’s the right thing to do.
Steve Fouts 02:00
Right. Again going to the storytelling. Bullying might be an interesting theme to bring up, because when bullying happens there are witnesses at times and sometimes they remain silent and don’t speak up.
Dan Fouts 02:16
This is interesting because there are a lot of examples where students won’t say anything, and they would probably argue that they don’t want to ruffle feathers.
Steve Fouts 02:29
They’re minding their own business.
Dan Fouts 02:30
I don’t want to make a situation worse by speaking up. I have myself to protect and I’m not going to go around…
Steve Fouts 02:38
It’s not worth it.
Dan Fouts 02:39
…regulating other people’s behavior. Which, of course, Audrey Lorde would bristle at because as a civil rights activist she would want the opposite behavior.
Steve Fouts 02:52
It is situational. Getting the students to talk about how they reacted to those environments – did they speak up, did they remain silent, did they regret it later, are they happy they did it – is going to be interesting.
Dan Fouts 03:08
Definitely. After they share their stories, follow them up with how did it work out in the end. If it worked out well, then you can go a little farther and say, because it worked out okay, to not say anything in that situation, does that make it the right thing to do?
Steve Fouts: 03:32 – Essential Question
Exactly, and then when they get to hear from other students about how it did work out or didn’t, that’s when it’s going to get interesting. That’s going to inform their position when you ask the essential question, which could wrap this up very nicely. How do we know when to be silent? That’s going to get some great responses. You’ll enjoy reading where the students are coming from, because it’s not clear when the best time is to be silent or speak up. It really depends on the situation and the person.
Dan Fouts 04:14
Right, and what a great little writing assignment you could have them do after this conversation with that essential question leading the way.
Steve Fouts 04:20
Yeah.
Dan Fouts 04:21
I think that this would get them to become more self-aware, and most importantly, aware of the ethical decisions that they’re making every day.
Steve Fouts 04:34
Exactly. Most people, I would say, don’t think being silent is an ethical decision.
Dan Fouts 04:42
Right.
Steve Fouts 04:45
But it is, and it’s okay to know that. This will be great. This conversation is going to light up the classroom.
We hope you enjoyed Audrey Lorde. Make sure to go to our Conversation Library where we have all kinds of resources you can use to get these great conversations going in your classroom. We’ll talk to you soon.
Dan Fouts 05:13
Okay, take care.
In this episode
When does staying quiet become a choice, and what protects us when we finally speak? Steve and Dan Fouts take up a line from the civil rights activist Audre Lorde, "Your silence will not protect you," and find the claim is a call to courage. For Dan, Lorde speaks against racism and sexism, insisting that no voice enters the world without the risk of being heard. For Steve, the question turns to the classroom, to students who watch bullying and say nothing, believing silence keeps them safe. The counterclaim is harder. Sometimes being quiet is the right thing to do, and sometimes speaking makes things worse. The brothers ask students to tell the story of their own silence, then press one question further: because it worked out, does that make it right? The episode closes with one question for any room. How do we know when to be silent?
Episode chapters
About the quote
Audre Lorde (1934 to 1992) said this in a paper called The Transformation of Silence into Language and Action in 1977, delivered while she was waiting to learn whether a breast tumour was malignant.