Checking Out Me History
Study notes in a reading layout. Choose the text size and page colour that work for you.
What happens?
A speaker challenges a selective education and reclaims neglected historical figures.
The main idea
Identity develops through questioning the histories that institutions choose to make visible.
1. “Dem tell me”
Method: Refrain
Repeated instruction becomes evidence of an imbalance of authority.
2. “Blind”
Method: Metaphor
Selective education is presented as an obstruction to self-knowledge.
3. “healing star”
Method: Metaphor
Seacole becomes a source of guidance as well as medical care.
4. “carving”
Method: Creative verb
The ending presents identity as an active, ongoing achievement.
Form and structure
A performance-oriented poem with contrasting stanza shapes, rhythms and typography rather than a fixed metre.
Development, voice and tone
Repeated teaching — Mocking and frustrated. An imposed curriculum is made audible through recurrent reports of what is taught.
Alternative histories — Celebratory. Distinct verse passages give neglected figures the imaginative space denied to them.
Ending — Self-assertive. The speaker moves from receiving a history to actively shaping an identity.
Context
Agard challenges a colonial education and celebrates histories of Black resistance and care. His chosen voice asserts cultural authority.
Comparison links
The Emigrée: protecting identity. London: institutional power.
Recall question
How does the form enact the act of resistance?