Teacher reads N-word essay 'like a black'

A white literacy coach is under fire for reading a black man's essay on the N-word at a Brooklyn seminar and using African-American diction and mannerisms in her performance.

According to a report in Newsday, Jill Bloomberg read "The 'N' Word: It Just Slips Out" at a local high school, hoping to stimulate discussion among several high-school literacy coaches in attendance at the Oct. 10 event.

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Instead, her performance caused several black attendees to walk out.

"It was like watching Al Jolson do 'Mammy,'" Cathie Wright Lewis, a 21-year teacher and literacy coach, told the paper. "It was like getting stabbed in the heart repeatedly.

"I couldn't believe she was sitting there using the N-word with no regard for anyone's culture," continued Lewis.

The essay was written in 1997 by an 18-year-old black man, Allen Francis. According to the report, Francis hoped to analyze his own use of the N-word, as well as discuss its broader use in society.

Newsday reports Bloomberg leads the literacy session each Friday for her region. Though Lewis called for Bloomberg's dismissal, New York City Department of Education spokeswoman Margie Feinberg says that won't happen.

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Regional superintendent Carmen Farina has been visiting groups to discuss the incident, the paper said.

"This was an unfortunate isolated situation that resulted from one person's poor judgment," she said in a statement. "It will not happen again."

Lewis says she and several others confronted Bloomberg after the session about her action, quoting the offending coach as saying she didn't mean to insult anyone and that she was "looking for shock value."

The report included an excerpt from Francis' essay: "There's still the question of why black people use [the N-word] to begin with. Maybe we have decided to take control of this otherwise bad word to use for our own purposes. Maybe we want to give it a new meaning. Or maybe we cling to the word so as to never forget what the black race went through. Maybe it makes us feel good to have become the users of the word and not the victims of it."