Why aren Fosters songs sung in the schools anymore?
Removing Foster from the context of his times has led to many misinterpretations of his songs. While standardized versions of his lyrics exist eliminating those terms that would be considered inappropriate (and it is only in a very small number of Foster’s songs that the inappropriate words appear), people continue to associate Foster with a culture that permitted slavery and advocated a racist, segregated society. Some schools do continue to use Foster’s songs as part of their music education, but there are many educators who shy away from the songs out of fear of what their association with them could be interpreted to mean and out of reluctance to contextual the songs for their students and their audience. Renewed interest in Foster and awareness of his role in both American music history and American cultural history may help to bring him back into the classroom where his work would not only be exposed to new generations of music students, but might provoke important dialogue about
