Almost every semester of my time here at NYU, I’ve had the opportunity to watch Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s TED talk on the Danger of a Single. It’s a beautiful video that articulates how we create a “single story” of particular groups of people and characterize them by x number of traits. A single story is dangerous because it cheapens the individual experiences of a diverse group of people and it’s also hurtful to be identified by just a single stereotype.

While Linda Prieto never explicitly brings this up in her piece, I think a lot of what Prieto writes about resonated with the point Adichie was trying to make.

“The guide began to recite a story of how a grape becomes a raisin. Her version did not include my experience, it skipped over the work of the Mexicans and Filipinos in the fields and spoke only of the cleaning and packaging that takes place in factories. Her story was void of human bodies, experiences, and dignity. Unlike the unravelling vineyards that caught me off guard, this slap left a permanent sting.” (Prieto 4)

The guide only knew one specific story of how the grapes become raisins, whether she chose to turn a blind eye to the reality of migrant workers or was simply uneducated on the topic, she perpetuated a single story to the class which negated Prieto’s personal experiences. As a future social studies teacher, it’s really hard to piece together a multifaceted story because often times there’s only one type of story being reflected in the history books – the story of the victors. Thus, the victor’s story and their motives become normalized such that any story that deviated from the victor’s seems mythological. Therefore, I think an important trait we have to teach our students is to not take things at face value and to be critical of everything they read. To do this, I think as teachers we have to make sure that we serve as models of critical readers. In our lesson plans we can make sure to incorporate stories of both the victors and the losers and stress the importance of context. As educators, I think it’s also important to validate the experiences of our students. Prieto’s teacher was quick to shut her down and while we can only surmise what her intentions were in doing so, we internalized Prieto’s pain and make sure we actively try to hear our student’s stories. Only then will we avoid the danger of a single story.