Rant Part 2 -

If one wanted to examine other literary sources for culture and heritage - there are significant Polish, Russian, Czec and Hungarian writers that are simply ignored. I would not mind one little bit if "The Song of Amerigin" was presented alongside with Homer.

Music studies are long gone in most elementary and high schools except for band, orchestra and choral programs. Expanding these to include "non-European" genres would be a challenge - so most do not.

"Special" inner-city school programs making an effort to educate minority students (who tend to be "majority" students at these schools) in their cultural heritage can sometimes go in the exact opposite direction. I remember one year my band was making a presentation on St. Patrick's Day ("Irish culture is NOT green beer...") when I was told point blank, that "everybody knows that all Irish people in America owned slaves before the Civil War."

As a general rule, one should not point out obvious exceptions to the teacher, like, the 69th New York Vol. Infantry - the Irish Brigade, or my relation, Great-Grandfather's brother, who served with the 24th Michigan and died at Gettysburg with some 80% of his regiment.

There.