Allow our children to read

Cornel West, American philosopher, academic, and social activist, heavily cites W. E. B. Du Bois in some of his essays and works about race, black intellectuals and inequality. His writing is obviously excellent, engaging and complex. I have tried to follow up on his ideas by reading Du Bois's original text. 

This has been without much success. I have also struggled to read more than ten pages of Achille Mbembe's work. This is painful. I am sure I'm not alone in this struggle. It has everything to do with our education background and government policy. Instead of pushing for an inclusive economy, we have seen the widening of the gap between the rich and the poor. Public schools, especially in rural communities, remain neglected. The ill distribution of resource continues. 

As one observer put it, "the emergence of few black capitalists, rather than inclusive economic emancipation, means that cleavage between the haves and the haves not will continue. To avoid this, the masses have to reduce the ANC monopoly by voting for other parties. Not only does their policies increase socio-economic inequalities but they also have big cracks that allow those connected to government to milk the public purse - sometimes by flouting laws with impunity. Because they want to retain power in the next election they will tell you that they will create million jobs. But after the election they will show you the middle finger - that is, business will continue as usual." 

If you attended a good primary school, reading Bois's work won't be a problem. You would have developed cognitive abilities to read complex from an early age. But does our society provide opportunities for such development to take place? We can only imagine.

And this struggle is two-fold.

Firstly, it's painful to read something written in a foreign langauge. Secondly, growing up, no one encouraged you to read for pleasure and the curriculum in your basic education was poorly designed - it did not consider the characteristics of a learner as a cultural being.

It is something symbolises the impact of colonialism, and apartheid in many ways. 
Nothing has rarely changed today.

We did not have access to both social and economic capital to position ourselves in a society that rejects our being. We remain excluded.

At worse, some people are excluded because they have a raw accent. I don't want to talk their general linguistic capital.