Through the Aesthetic Realism Teaching Method, Knowledge Opposes Anger – and Students Learn

by Christopher Balchin

November 1, 2007

--Part Two--

The town Matewan was actually the real-life beginning point for what is known as the great Coal Wars of the 1920's when poor, non-unionized miners—-native West Virginians, Italian immigrants, and African Americans--fought passionately to organize a union so they and their fellow workers could get a decent, living wage for their wives and children. The film is narrated by Danny, now an older man, who, at the time of these events, was a young boy, already working as a coal miner even though, as one student exclaimed, “He's only fourteen!” My students were affected by the fact that like some of them, he already has the weight of knowing that his family depends on his income in order to get by.

The film opens in the depths of the Stone Mountain coal mine.

A man, bent and coughing, is setting an explosive charge in the coal face. We learn that many men have already died in this mine because, as the widow of one of the miners tells, the coal company officials said it was too expensive to wash down the walls to prevent fires. “How could they do that? That's so COLD!” one student called out.

In the film, we see everything in the town is owned by the company, including the miners' homes, and in one scene a family is being evicted. The attitude of the company owners to the miners is described by Joe Kenehan, organizer for the national union,

the United Mine Workers of America , as he asks them:

You want to be treated like men? You want to be treated fair ? Well you ain't men to that coal company, you're equipment, like a shovel or a gondola car, or a hunk of wood brace. They'll use you till you wear out or break down or you're buried under a slate fall and then they'll get a new one, and they don't care what color it is or where it comes from.

I said, “This took place in the 1920's in West Virginia , but is this the same attitude of contempt that makes people cruel in ordinary life today in New York City ?” One young woman, Denise Williams, said, yes, it was like how certain young men treated girls—like they owned them, and then could just dump them. “Sometimes it gets me mad how they be playin' (two-timing). But I'm not going to lie, Mr. Balchin. I know I've been mean too.” She got everyone's respect when she said this. In the film, the miners' tonnage load is increased, while their pay remains hideously low, and they decide to strike. The owners bring in replacement workers and hire thugs from the Baldwin agency to intimidate and if necessary kill any man who dares to strike. And the mine-owners also try to set the men against each other: Italians against African-Americans, West Virginians against both.

Meanwhile, Joe Kenehan, played movingly by Chris Cooper, goes to each group of workers, talks to them straight, encourages them not to fight each other, but to work together. “From now on,” he says “ Stone Mountain don't move one piece of coal unless it's a union man that moves it!” His words have an effect, and all the men put down their shovels and picks and leave the mine, setting up tents in the woods for their families. This is an instance of many men working together for one ethical purpose—and it thrilled my students. Fernando Ortiz—earlier so dangerously angry—now was very attentive, and was so moved by the way Joe Kenehan uses his strength to fight for good, he shouted out his approval and raised his fist in triumph!

One scene my students cared for which shows oneness and manyness working kindly together, takes place at night in the woods. An Italian immigrant, playing a melody on a mandolin, beckons to two white West Virginian miners who've been playing a fiddle and banjo, to come over and join him. We hear their different-sounding instruments come together and add to each other as they play that same melody. Then we see an African-American man playing a harmonica, joining in too. The young narrator of the film, Danny, says with wonder, “I've never seen everyone all together like this. The company don't stand a chance.” “Does Danny feel that way because he's seeing the power of ethics?” I asked. “This scene brings up the question, are we stronger through making less of other people or by wanting to know and strengthen them? Unions are based on the second.” Students were seeing that what they cared for in the movie is about a question every person has all the time.

Joe Kenehan was the character all my students loved. He is strong, standing up, unarmed, to the guns of the hired company thugs. And he says to the striking miners:

How come [the bosses] waste more food in one day than a poor worker's family has on their table in a week? And let me ask you, whose sweat was it that went into building those mansions, whose work was it . . . that put that food on the table? It's the workers – that's who!

I asked “Is Joe Kenehan's anger in behalf of justice or selfishness?” The entire class agreed that it was the first. I told them what I've learned from Aesthetic Realism—there are two kinds of anger; one in behalf of fairness and one in behalf of narrow selfishness and contempt. Joe's anger is different from anger that is just personal. I asked “Have you ever been angry and taken it out on someone else?” Many students nodded. And Fernando Ortiz spoke self-critically about how, after getting into trouble with his father, he terrorized his younger brother and made him cry. The class was seeing that this fight between respect and contempt was not only in history, but in them too. At the end of the film, the narrator, Danny, looks back and describes how Joe Kenehan inspired them:  

We moved out into Mingo County . . . spreading the word about the union, spreading like wildfire,… all up and down the Tug Fork River, bringing the union out to all the folks that needed help, putting the spirit into them and trying to shut down the whole South West face. Joe Kenehan said how there was a new day coming, sometimes I could just about see it.

My students were seeing something about how unions arose from a beautiful anger and a beautiful hope--and fighting like anything against the contemptuous anger of owners bent on profits for themselves no matter what the cost to human lives. They were better able to see which kind of anger looked good to them and make choices accordingly for themselves.

These young people were passionate as they researched and presented class reports on people and events important in the history of unions, such as Eugene V. Debs, the Triangle Fire, “Big Bill” Haywood, the Homestead Strike, and the woman known as Mother Jones, who suffered greatly in her early life, losing her husband and children and experiencing awful poverty, but who had a beautiful anger on behalf of working people. One comment of hers they liked and quoted was “Pray for the dead and fight like hell for the living.” And the entire class did very well on the examination at the end of this unit. Here are some of their posters. (slides)

Nilda Castillo, whose family had to move because they couldn't afford the rent and Luz Pichardo, who had to wait for a vital operation on her eye because the insurance company wouldn't approve it, gave their report last, and the whole class waited after the bell to hear them.

Fernando Ortiz, who had earlier punched the wall, became less angry and more respectful. One day when there was a melee involving two sports teams at the school, he was brought into the dean's office and put in handcuffs. But no charges were brought against him because the security camera showed he was not instigating or throwing punches but trying to break up the fight !

Denise Williams, who had muttered and threatened to fight Fernando, came to class early every day in order to straighten the desks and set up the room, and they became friends. Diangelo Estevez, who early in the year started every lesson with a complaint, said “This class inspires me! I feel like I'm getting a whole new perspective on the world.” I can't think of anything more important.

Go back to Part One