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what's lit

‘Bel-Air’ Shows How a Black Teacher Could Be Punished for Expanding Book Access

"Compromised" Episode 203 -- Pictured: (l-r) Akira Akbar as Ashley, Tatyana Ali as Ms. Hughes -- (Photo by: PEACOCK)

⚠️ Spoilers ahead! Watch the series on Peacock.

Peacock’s Bel-Air not only united the original Ashley Banks with the new Ashley Banks, but the reboot drama united them in a storyline highlighting the near erasure of Black literature in the classroom.

The show is a serious portrayal of the 1990s NBC sitcom The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air that brought rapper Will Smith to the silver screen. The new version stars Jabari Banks, who has an uncanny resemblance to Will and holds the fictional last name of the TV family in real life. It’s still the same story of a Black teen boy from West Philadelphia who must move to the upscale Los Angeles enclave of Bel-Air with his aunt and her immediate family to stay out of trouble. 

Tatyana Ali, who played Ashley in the sitcom, made a guest appearance in the second season of Bel-Air by playing teacher Ms. Hughes to the reimagined version of her former character Ashley, played by Akira Akbar. 

At the elite Bel-Air Academy, Ms. Hughes gives Ashley a book, The Revolution Has Come: Black Power, Gender, and the Black Panther Party in Oakland, by Robyn C. Spencer, in the premiere episode “A Fresh Start.” Ms. Hughes asks for a two-page summary, which is an extra credit assignment since the book is outside of the curriculum. 

In the second episode “Speaking Truth,” Ms. Hughes hands Ashley another book after class. This time, it’s I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness by Austin Channing Brown. A White classmate glares at their exchange in the background. The look of disgust on the classmate’s face shows the concern that Ms. Hughes is showing Ashley more preference because they’re both Black. Soon, we learn a complaint has been filed against Ms. Hughes. And it’s not the first.

When Ashley later bumps into Ms. Hughes in the hallway with a box of her effects inside, she asks why the teacher is leaving. Ms. Hughes gives Ashley words of encouragement, but Ashley is obviously devastated that her favorite teacher, one of the very few Black teachers in the school, is gone. 

Ashley tells her parents Vivian, played by Cassandra Freeman, and Phil, played by Adrian Holmes, about Ms. Hughes’ firing. They discover that Ms. Hughes was let go over providing books outside of the approved curriculum at a parent advisory committee meeting. Vivian even lists the authors Ashley is now exposed to because of Ms. Hughes’ influence, such as James Baldwin, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Toni Morrison, and Paula Giddings.

Will, Ashley’s cousin, and Carlton, Ashley’s brother played by Olly Sholotan, get involved by bringing the issue to the high school’s Black Student Union in an effort to keep Carlton elected as class president by maintaining the Black student vote. A protest comes up as the best response to Ms. Hughes’ firing. Except Carlton has a chance to win the school’s highest student award and be the first Black student to win the award. The BSU adviser, who is Black, dissuades Carlton to plan the protest; it’s not worth sacrificing the award over a fired teacher who wasn’t following the rules. 

The third episode “Compromise” shows the BSU dealing with the administration’s threat to suspend them all if members and allies walk out during classes. Then Carlton and BSU president strike a deal with the administration: Students can walk out but can’t make speeches or hold signs. The middle school students like Ashley are already barred from participating in the walkout. 

On the day of the walkout at 11 a.m., Carlton leads participating students to the quad in protest of not only Ms. Hughes being fired but also in support for a more inclusive curriculum. The pressure to go against the compromise made with the administration revs up Carlton’s anxiety. Will says he has Carlton’s back as he takes a large sign and runs up staircases to end up on the roof. He unrolls a sign that reads “Black Teachers Matter.” With a raised fist, he starts the chant “Black Teachers Matter.” Students below join in the chant. 

According to Tatyana’s Instagram post, this episode is her last appearance, so the Ms. Hughes storyline may end there. But how students are walking out in protest over demanding inclusive curricula is an example of art imitating life. 

Students in Virginia walked out last fall due to Governor Glenn Youngkin’s transgender student policies. Last month, students across Florida walked out to protest Governor Ron DeSantis’ plans to defund diversity, equity, and inclusion programs at colleges and universities. 

At the root of the issue in Bel-Air is that a Black female teacher mentored a Black female student by giving her books that would never be read in the classroom or approved for a syllabus at a predominantly White upper-crust school. But the mentorship was severed by complaints from other classmates not getting the same attention. 

To be fair, unfairness should be reported in situations like classroom settings where teacher favoritism could affect your grades, but that part of the conversation is not discussed. The repercussions of firing a Black teacher over providing Black stories go deeper with dismantling a literary mentorship that had already opened a student’s mind.

One in five Black or African American private school teachers worked at schools with less than 25% enrollment of students of color, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. That shows how rare a relationship is between a Black teacher and a Black student at a predominantly White private school. 

Out of 3,420 children’s books in 2021, 36% were “books by and about Black, Indigenous and People of Color,” per data from the Cooperative Children’s Book Center at the School of Education, University of Wisconsin–Madison. As books by authors of color seem to see higher rates of bans and attempts at bans, students of all backgrounds may not know about those books if they’re not available to them at school or the public library. Hence, Ms. Hughes giving Ashley books on the side to read that explore the experiences and identities of people of African descent is viewed as an act of defiance.

Although the storyline is rooted in students demanding a more inclusive curriculum, the issue of approved literature impacts many educators who are currently witnessing conflicts with some of their local and state regulators restricting what is taught in classrooms. 

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book reviews

Book Review: ‘Most Likely’ by Sarah Watson

Most Likely by Sarah Watson follows a group of four friends who lean on each other to make sure they excel in their senior year of high school as one of them is destined to become president of the United States.

The story starts in 2049 the morning of the inauguration for the president-elect, except her identity is not revealed. We see her bemoaning the decision to take her husband’s surname, Diffenderfer. Her advisers had told her it would be the traditional thing she can do to please the masses. Then we’re teleported back to 2019 Cleveland, Ohio, where a Logan Diffenderfer rounds the corner of William McKinley High School track that leads us to a group that’s been focused on sisterhood since pre-kindergarten without the traveling pants: Ava, CJ, Jordan, and Martha, their names listed alphabetically for fairness. 

Ava Morgan wants to be an artist with her eye on the Rhode Island School of Design, better known as RISD, but her workaholic lawyer mother keeps begging her to choose a more stable career path and a more well-rounded institution. But with the argument over what she wants to do with her life and her life morphing into adulthood, she wonders about the identity of her biological mother. She feels like she can’t agree with her adoptive mother, who’s White, since she’s seen as the “moody Latinx girl.” It doesn’t help that she misses her advanced placement classes due to anxiety and depression. She also can’t stand the arrogant Logan Diffenderfer, her art class project partner, but when she ignites the search for the woman who birthed her, Ava may need Logan’s research expertise to fill out her family tree questions. 

CJ, short for Clarke Jacobson, feels like Stanford University is in the cards for her if only she can bring up her SAT scores. After being disappointed with her previous scores on the first and second times taking the exam that determines college placement, CJ is preparing to take the exam for a third time. In the meantime, the cross-country runner is adding other activities to her résumé such as volunteering with an after-school sports program for kids with physical disabilities. Spending time with her boss Wyatt, who uses a wheelchair, is making her feel like she never felt, but she has to focus on the SATs. Logan Diffenderfer earned schoolwide recognition for his high SAT score, so maybe CJ can get help from him to stay on track. 

Jordan Schafer, who is half-Black and half-White, knows she has to insert extra energy and determination in everything she does with the added pressure of racism. Already an award-winning journalist for her school newspaper, she’s trying to sniff out the answers for why the city has decreased opening hours for their beloved community park. The more she gains the trust of a legislative aide named Scott who works for a councilman, the more she risks revealing her hidden identity as a high school student reporter. And the line between source and reporter is getting murkier as Jordan presents herself in work dresses as an older, freelance reporter. She dated Logan Diffenderfer briefly since they work on newspaper activities like the exclusive story she’s hunting down. 

Martha Custis worries she might not be able to afford college. Her single father just received a promotion in his warehouse job that grants him a regular work schedule but not health insurance. Though Martha is named after her distant foremother the first First Lady Martha Washington, her family blood doesn’t mean anything for her family finances as she juggles a job at an independent movie theater nobody goes to. She finds herself befriending her coworker Victoria, a rich girl with a European accent who’s only working at the theater because her uncle owns it. The socioeconomic divide between them irks Martha. When Logan Diffenderfer comes to the theater one day, he seems to be getting close to Martha’s coworker, and this intrigues Martha more than she would like to admit. 

This young adult novel takes a more positive route by giving us college-bound female characters who are so ambitious that one of them assumes the U.S. presidency. We see all four girls working hard to stand out in their college applications but also helping each other through the pressures. The course of actions they are going through in the story is making them realize some of their goals are not exactly what they want. 

Author Sarah Watson is accustomed to boosting supportive female friendships with her experience as the creator, executive producer, and writer of the former Freeform series The Bold Type. The five-season series focuses on three twenty-somethings in New York City trying to climb the hierarchy within a storied women’s magazine. In the show, the characters stand by each other through thick and thin to make sure they each succeed despite professional and romantic hurdles. The same formula is followed in a simpler setting like Cleveland where most girls’ ambition starts: high school. 

The Bold Type also received backlash from star Aisha Dee, who played the third and lone Black and queer friend Kat on the show, for its lack of true diversity storylines for the character. The author takes that lesson through her novel to emphasize the girls’ diversity markers and the obstacles they present such as Ava being a transracial adoptee with mental disorders, CJ being academically challenged while working with the physically challenged, Jordan being biracial standing out in predominantly White spaces, and Martha being low-income raised by a single father. 

Another factor is we meet the First Gentleman Diffenderfer in the beginning then realize each girl has their own complicated relationship with a boy with that last name, who is also smart and ambitious but seems breezy about his capabilities. Each girl is annoyed to some extent by Diffenderfer, his surname purposely full of syllables to let us know he feels like a handful to the friend group. The girls’ feelings toward Diffenderfer change throughout the story as we see them struggle to overcome their obstacles. Diffenderfer’s expertise always seeps into each of their situations. Though it seems like Diffenderfer is central to the story, the boy serves as the supporter they need, the supporter a female president would need to get to that history-making level of power. 

Overall, Ava, CJ, Jordan, and Martha are a breath of fresh air when it comes to reading about ambitious girls and seeing their adventures of trying to shine for their dream schools and dream careers. These stories seem to fall behind in the young adult genre with the marketability and consumer appeal for the fantasy and romance subgenres that entertain teenage readers with stories that are largely unrealistic. This novel was published in the beginning of 2020, so it seems to have fallen behind in its media attention due to the COVID-19 pandemic. If you’re looking for a book for a high schooler aiming for the stars, this book is for her. If you’re looking for a reminder that children are our future, this book is for you. 

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what's lit

How Lisa Turtle Was ‘Slighted’ As a Black Teen Girl TV Character

Seven years after People reported she had bipolar disorder, Saved by the Bell star Lark Voorhies revealed this week on The Dr. Oz Show that indeed the diagnosis is somewhat true—and that she felt “slighted and hurt” over being left out of reunions and the upcoming reboot. As a 90s kid who paid attention to any Black girl who came across the TV screen, I noticed how Lark’s character Lisa Turtle as the lone Black girl character in the high school sitcom ensemble was also slighted on screen.

In the Dr. Oz interview, Lark clarified she has schizoaffective disorder, which the National Institutes of Health defines as “a mental health condition that includes features of both schizophrenia and a mood disorder such as bipolar disorder or depression.” She noted it may be the reason why she’s not included in the Saved by the Bell casual and formal reunions and the reboot expected on the NBCUniversal streaming service Peacock launching in April. The original show ran on NBC as a part of its TNBC teen-friendly Saturday morning programming from 1989 to 1993.

When Dr. Oz asked Lark about her feelings on the offscreen and onscreen cast reunions, Lark said, “They have the right to do that, and they’re happy in their element. They can have it.”

Treating her with kid gloves, Dr. Oz then asked if Lark would like to be a part of those reunions. She answered, “Oh yes, what family isn’t kept complete without its lead.”

Lark was the only girl brought onto the new reincarnation of Good Morning, Miss Bliss, a 1987-1989 sitcom also starring her Saved by the Bell castmates Mark-Paul Gosselaar as Zack Morris and Dustin Diamond as Samuel “Screech” Powers about middle schoolers in Indianapolis. The show reformatted with moving the setting to the fictional Bayside High School in the upscale Los Angeles neighborhood of Pacific Palisades and adding three new kids: Tiffani-Amber Thiessen as Kelly Kapowski, Mario Lopez as AC Slater and Elizabeth Berkley as Jessie Spano. This rounded out the most well-known Saved by the Bell cast.

But Lisa became overshadowed by Kelly and Jessie, who were presented to the audience as the hotties. Lisa became the fashionista, though the other female characters had more crises, e.g. Jessie’s drug addiction and Kelly’s college boy tryst, on top of steady boyfriends. The lack of love interests for Lisa solidified she wasn’t considered a hottie and that as a Black girl she didn’t deserve love, which mirrors the alleged reactions from her former castmates now.

While the two white girls had boyfriends, Lisa never had one—and only nerdy Screech was interested in her.

Lisa and Screech

Why did Kelly have popular blond guy Zack as her boyfriend? Why did Jessie get muscly football player AC? Because they’re white. Lisa Turtle weirdly could only attract Screech, the annoying nerd who eventually attracted a girlfriend, Violet, played by pre-Beverly Hills 90210 Tori Spelling.

Lisa received a bit of attention, most memorably a Black guy who magically turned up at their high school (Pacific Palisades’ Black population is 0.4%) who turned out to be a freshman. She was a senior. Or the other Black guy who was very studious that Lisa tried to impress him, but he didn’t like her brainless friends, so he was dropped.

Lisa kissed Zack in “The Bayside Triangle” episode before her fashion show in season five, but only because Tiffani-Amber and Elizabeth had left the show. Kelly was out of the picture. The episode poised to make Lisa the star girl where she had the star guy, but that turned to mud soon when producers introduced us to biker chick Tori, played by Leanna Creel. More on that in the next point, but the show couldn’t let Lisa get any love as if because she’s a Black girl at a white school she getting it wouldn’t be believable.

Zack and Lisa

Seeing how Lisa wasn’t able to get a guy with her beauty and fashion didn’t add up correctly for a Black girl viewer. It was offensive, knowing in real life she could have any boy she wanted at the average Los Angeles area high school.

This contrast was to let viewers know Lisa is not ideal girl-next-door material because she’s Black. Comparing Lisa to another iconic Black girl TV character of the era, Laura Winslow of Family Matters. Played by Kellie Shanygne Williams, Laura had the undying devotion of another infamous nerd, Steve Urkel, but she still had her share of romantic interests. It was a Black show with a more interracial production team that understood the popular girl regardless of race can get a boyfriend if she wants.

The only original girl from the show’s previous incarnation, Lisa was pushed to the side to make room for Kelly then Tori.

Back to forgettable Tori. Again, a stereotypical biker chick that Zack suddenly falls for, obviously due to her whiteness. Knowing the character arc of Zack and the type of females he prefers, Tori was not it.

The show evolved into another incarnation with Saved By the Bell: The College Years. Lisa went to the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising, so Lark wasn’t a series regular. The show moved to prime time, but when Tiffani-Amber returned, the producers kept the two new white girls and kicked off the Black girl named Danielle Marks, played by Essence Atkins, to make room for Kelly. The removal of the Black girl probably led to the show’s demise after one season since they not only killed the successful recipe but told us a Black girl can’t be a part of the ensemble.

Lisa was an independent single girl but was that due to the strong Black woman stereotype?

The superwoman complex many Black women in the U.S. experience is associated with the shield we wear to present ourselves as strong and stoic. From Lisa’s demeanor, she is the fun-loving girl who also seems boy crazy yet can’t have a boyfriend while her white friends can.

Lark and Mark-Paul dated in real life for three years, but the romance was only placed in the storyline after the other actresses left the show. At the time, interracial teen relationships weren’t there yet. For example, heartthrob white actor Jonathan Brandis and Fresh Prince of Bel-Air Black actress Tatyana Ali dated for three years, but we didn’t hear much about that relationship until years later.

And producers allegedly created Lisa as a rich Jewish girl from New York before Lark aced her audition. Slater was supposed to be Italian until Mario, who’s Latino, stepped into the role (Pacific Palisades’ Latinx population is 3.2%). These characters, originally white, had to be altered to fit their race and culture, but it seems this led to watered-down storylines for Lisa.

In real life, Lark was a part of a TV family, but as a Black woman with a mental illness, she’s out.

Kelly, Lisa, and Jessie

Would the white actresses be treated the same if they had a health condition? Along with Lark, Dustin Diamond has been missing from reunions, possibly due to his sex tape in 2006, subsequent legal trouble, and unauthorized tell-all about the years on the sitcom.

Most of the YouTube commenters on the Dr. Oz videos of Lark’s interview support Lark but also question why her cast family hadn’t reached out to her. One commenter mentioned how the cast supported Elizabeth after her adult role attempt in the 1994 cult classic Showgirls.

In the interview, Dr. Oz mentioned how Lark had been MIA in Hollywood almost immediately after Saved By the Bell. She interrupted him and said she went to college. She also had two soap opera roles in The Bold and the Beautiful and Days of Our Lives. After growing up on a white teen sitcom, she actually transitioned into Black Hollywood.

In the mid-90s, she was engaged to Martin Lawrence at the height of Martin fame and even appeared on an episode. She starred on movies that went into rotation on BET such as Civil Brand and straight-to-DVD films such as Fire and Ice. She had roles in How To Be A Player and How High. She also appeared in several music videos, such as Kenny Lattimore’s “Never Too Busy,” Dru Hill’s “These are The Times,” and Boyz II Men’s “On Bended Knee.”

Lark has said no to reunions in the past like in 2015 when her rep told The Hollywood Reporter her work schedule didn’t permit her to participate in a Jimmy Fallon sketch tribute to the sitcom. She told Dr. Oz this week that it was a triumph for her to leave the house.

The alleged estrangement Lark feels from her ex-castmates shows mental illness can mean unintentional isolation. Friends, even longtime ones, may not know how to cope with the effects and don’t want to add the burden of knowing how to cope, especially when juggling their own families and other friendships. To witness Lark speaking her truth on being left out of the Saved By the Bell‘s ongoing get-togethers, it strikes a chord on how she feels left out and how in reality her character should’ve felt the same way, too.