Pradana_Polished Critical Book Review_Spring 2021

CRITICAL BOOK REVIEW MUHAMMAD ALI A CHAMPION INSIDE AND OUTSIDE OF THE RING WISNU A. PRADANA LLED 8020 JUSTICE AS PRAXIS ES €2.50 IT €3.00 FR €6.00 GB €3.00 USA $6.99

CONTENTS PAGE 3 SUMMARY Muhammad Ali: A champion is born is a children’s biography book of a legendary boxing athlete... PAGE 5 CRITICAL EVALUATION This book caught my attention from its first page; the author uses the reverse chronology, which is a non-... PAGE 11 TEACHING CONSIDERATION While most of the popular Black children’s book available on the market feature prominent political... PAGE 14 REFLECTION I chose this book by coincidence. About a month ago, my department had a book fair where everyone... PAGE 16 RESOURCES FOR TEACHERS Quotes, interviews, videos, pictures...

SUMMARY ‘Muhammad Ali: A champion is born’ is a children’s biography book of a legendary boxing athlete in the twentieth century named Muhammad Ali. The book was written by an award- winning author, Gene Barretta, and illustrated by Frank Morrison in 2017. The story is opened by featuring four important winning moments of Muhammad Ali, including the match with Sonny Liston in 1964 where his famous expression, “I shook up the world!” was from. The winning of Muhammad Ali. did shake the world and made all eyes turned to this young Black underdog athlete that was later known as a role model both inside and outside of the ring. Following the winning moments, the story backs up to 1954 when Muhammad Ali was a teenager living in Louisville in the Southern hemisphere of the United States. Born as Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr., Muhammad Ali learned firsthand what skin colors was equal to in the U.S. as a result of Jim Crow laws. His interest to boxing began when his bike was stolen at an annual bazaar for Black people. This event brought him to Officer Joe Martin, a police officer and a boxing coach that saw Cassius’ forte at his first sight. The meeting turned into hundreds of hours of trainings. For years, Joe Martin together with Fred Stoner helped Muhammad Ali improved each of his techniques and endurance. At the end of his career, Muhammad Ali was noted as an important boxing athlete in history by winning fifty-six out of sixty-one professional flights, including three times heavyweight champion. “I SHOOK UP THE WORLD!” PAGE THREE | WISNU

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CRITICALEVAL motivating, but they also signal Barretta’s UATIONCRITI attempt to keep the voice of Muhammad Ali CALEVALUATI present in the story. ONCRITICALE VALUATION As someone that is not a fan of boxing and knows little about Muhammad Ali, I found the Muhammad Ali: A champion is born’ is a story flashback strategy and the quotations to be of Muhammad Ali’s grit and tenacity in an effective invitation to find out more about pursuing his dream as a world-famous boxing Muhammad Ali and his legendary athlete. This book caught my attention from championships before reading further. In my its first page; the author uses the reverse first attempt of reading the book, I ended up chronology, which is an uncommon story flow watching some videos of Muhammad Ali’s in children’s literature, to highlight some interviews on YouTube, which I found useful important winning moments of Muhammad as a background knowledge to excavate some Ali. I especially love the famous quotations possible reasons behind words and that Barretta features for each of the featured illustrations in the book. It gave me a different victories, e.g., “I shook up the world” and “I am reading experience when hearing the greatest (I said that ven before I knew I Muhammad Ali said his quotation himself on was)!” In my opinion, those quotations are the videos that I watched. powerful and \"I AM THE GREATEST.\" PAGE FIVE| WISNU

Another benefit of the flashback strategy is it With their own talents in storywriting and allows Barretta to present more stories on illustration, Barretta and Morrison make sure Muhammad Ali's teenage life. This is that the issue of segregation is not rendered important given that this book is primarily by the victories of Muhammad Ali. Barretta written for young readers. The story of young intentionally interweaves a short explanation Muhammad Ali allows young readers to relate on what segregation means into the story, and reflect themselves easier to Muhammad which I found very smooth as it did not make Ali and his struggles. However, I have to note me feel ‘detached’ from the story. One of the that the reverse strategy can be confusing for strategies that he uses is by using an imagery some early readers who are used to stories word of “rain” from the previous page to that are written in chronological order. describe the intense segregation of Black and Therefore, it is important for adults to give a white people in 1950s (Barretta, 2017, p. 12). clear transition of time (and story) when He further explains segregation by relating it reading the book to the children. to the context of the bazaar that Muhammad Ali visited, which is an important setting that Besides storying the life of Muhammad Ali, leads him to meet his phenomenal coach the author and the illustrator of the book also named Joe Martin. Barretta explicitly states highlight the issue of segregation that that the bazaar “was held for all the black Muhammad Ali experienced during his merchants, who were not allowed to attend teenage year. Barretta and Morrison seem to or sell their products at the white bazaars” be aware of how this issue affected (Barretta, 2017, p. 11). As a former children’s Muhammad Ali’s life and how it had and young adult literature editor for a journal, motivated him into working on the social I appreciate Baretta’s attempt to talk about justice issue surrounding the people of color. segregation explicitly in the book. Many of the children’s books that I read in the past tend to keep the notes about ‘big terms’ at the end of the book or at the side of the page, which are primarily intended for caregivers or teachers’ references in case their children ask about them. Interweaving such an important topic with the story shows Barretta’s commitment to center the social justice issue in the book and to bring the conversation to home, which is the place where most of the children spend their time. I imagine that this book will help establish meaningful dialogue between the adults and the children on the topic of racism that many people may think ‘too early’ or ‘too abstract’ for the young ones. \"SEGREGATION WAS AS REAL AS THE RAIN IN LOUISVILLE.\" BARRETTA (2017, P. 12) PAGE FOUR| JOURNEY

In addition to openly talk about segregation segregation and injustices did not only affect with their children, I would like to encourage Black people, but also many other people of adults to let their children explore the color, including Asian and Latinx people in the illustrations in the book. Morrison’s depiction U.S. (see Wallace, 2017; Rea, 2004); and third, of the bazaar that Muhammad Ali visited, for Muhammad Ali’s social justice movement example, captures many elements (e.g., extended beyond Black people; he embraced people, signs, colors) that can facilitate all people of color and acknowledged their children’s understanding of the struggles as his struggles. With his implementation of segregation in a public intersectional identity as a Muslim, a Black place. Being a Black artist himself, Morrison is person, and an athlete, I believe this book being intentional in his choice of colors, attracts people across different races and spaces, and representation of people in the nationalities. After all, Muhammad Ali is not illustrations that he made. He created dark- only a legend in the U.S. His fame and love color-themed visuals throughout the book reached every corner of the world, especially with the dominant color of brown and black. in Muslim countries like Indonesia that he He also ensured that each page of the book visited three times in 1970s to 1990s or Iraq features more Black people than people of where he helped negotiate the release of 15 other races. I personally found his intention hostages (Associated Press, 1990). Therefore, interesting because as an Asian person, I was the element of racial diversity in this book looking if Morrison did represent the people needs to be improved to allow readers of of my racial background in the book. After different racial backgrounds reflect on the scanning the illustrations in the book for a few story. times, I unfortunately could not find any Asian or Latinx persons in the book. I am aware that Another big thing that I found missing from this book is about a Black man named this book is Barretta’s attempt to talk about Muhammad Ali, but I hope to see more Islam and Muhammad Ali. While I do representation of people of color because: appreciate Barretta’s last statement to include first, representations is key in affirming religious beliefs in the social justice work of identities and developing literacy character of Muhammad Ali by saying, “He fought for young readers (Muhammad, 2019) – it is not people who were treated unfairly because of impossible that this book is read by Asian or the color of their skin or their PLaAtiGnxEchFilOdrUenR;|seJcOonUdR, N E Y

religious beliefs” (Barretta, 2017, p. 31), I certain identities can marginalize people. believe it is important to mention his identity Adults can ask, \"do you think it is fair to treat as a Muslim. As a Muslim, it is surprising for persons differently based on their religion?\" me to find not a single word of “Islam” or Representation is key in social justice “Muslim” in the story. I may be biased because discourse (see Hopkins, 2020; Baker-Bell, I share the same religion with Muhammad Ali, 2020). Ghouldy Muhammad (2019), for but I believe his identity as a Muslim should example, in her book on cultivating genius, not be ‘hidden’ or simply written at the back of recalled her fifth-grade experience where she the book. Black, Muslim, athlete, and social had to lie about receiving Christmas gifts justice worker are the intersectional identities because she was “too afraid to not fit into the of Muhammad Ali that make him who he is. mainstream culture” (p. 70). Her teacher also The name Muhammad Ali itself is a beautiful never talked about Islam and her Muslim name bearing two important figures’ names identity in the classroom, so her religious in Islam, i.e., Muhammad ibn Abdullah (‫َﻋﻠَ ْﻴ ِﻪ‬ identity and traditions remains ‫ )ٱﻟ ﱠﺴ َﻼ ُم‬and Ali ibn Abi Thalib (‫)رﺿﻲ ﷲ ﻋﻨﻪ‬. I unacknowledged. I hope there will be no believe it is a moral responsibility of any more young Ghouldy Muhammad’s who feel authors of biography books to present the ashamed or worried about their religious figures they are writing holistically, including identities, just because their identities are not disclosing his religious identity. Muhammad acknowledged in the classroom space. One of Ali himself is a great example of how fluid the fundamental things to do in our literacy identity can be; he converted to Islam at the work, I believe, is by disclosing holistic age of 20 years old and thus bearing an new identities of figures we are reading or writing. identity as a Black Muslim person. The This will open pockets of conversations that turbulence of career that he experienced as many people in the U.S. consider ‘taboo’ to he changed his name from Cassius Jr. and discuss, and validate identities of our children converted his belief to Islam can mediate who are not from the dominant culture. meaningful conversations on how bearing PAGE EIGHT| WISNU

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WHY IS MUHAMMAD ALI'S MUSLIM IDENTITY IMPORTANT? Muhammad Ali is one of the prominent figures in the world that understand religions, power, and race deeply. Below are some quotations of Muhammad Ali about religions and Islam, a religion that he chose to believe his last breath: \"Rivers, ponds, lakes, and streams -- they all have different names, but they all contain water. So religions all have different names, but they all contain the same truths... I think the people of our religion should be tolerant and understand people believe different things. It's a shame that this (tolerance) didn't happen before.'' (CNN, 2001, his speech after 9/11 incident) \"And after hearing the powerful message of islam and seeing the beautiful unity of Muslims, after seeing how the children are raised, after seeing the procedures of prayer, after seeing the way we eat, the way we dress, just the whole attitude of Islam, it was so beautiful... Whether they be black or white, red, yellow, or brown, Christian, Jew, Hindu, Buddhist or atheist, if he hears Islam, reads the Koran, hears the plain truth about Muhammad, he'll have to be affected in one way or the other.\" (Eig, 2017, p. 514) Throughout his life, Muhammad Ali has devoted himself to be the helper of people in need across the globe. He was known for numerous charity work, events, and causes in many muslim countries, including Indonesia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Malaysia, and other countries in the Middle East. PAGE TEN| WISNU

TEACHING CONSIDER ATION ‘Muhammad Ali: A champion is born’ is different kind of Black children’s book that will be a great addition to the Pre-K to grade 2 classroom bookshelf and home bookshelf. While most of the popular Black children’s book available on the market feature prominent political figures, such as Martin Luther King Jr. and John Lewis, this book offers a successful Black athlete that gained worldwide fame for his victories and commitment to the people at the margin. This book allows children to see a different kind of success that goes beyond career. As Muhammad Ali said at a British talk show presented by Michael Parkinson in 1971, “Boxing was just my way of introducing me to struggle. My main fight is for freedom and equality.” The life of Muhammad Ali embodies qualities of a person that worked on social justice beyond his own silos – he helped those that are marginalized regardless of their race, religious belief, and nationality. This book provides a rich avenue for teachers and parents to socialize racism and social justice issues to their children. It allows adults to move beyond storying for comprehension into storying for sociopolitical and sociocultural socialization (see Muhammad, 2019). As I mentioned in the earlier section, adults must be able to capitalize the ample representations of Black people in the book to help mediate justice learning and affirm identities of Black children. In addition, I also encourage teachers and parents to integrate many publicly available resources on Muhammad Ali to provide different reading experience and support meaningful conversations on racism. PAGE ELEVEN | WISNU

Teaching resources, such as, child-friendly To be able to facilitate an effective meaningful documentaries, photos, and interviews are dialogue on racism and Islam, teachers and available for free viewing on the Smithsonian parents need to educate themselves on those Learning Lab website and YouTube. Teachers issues before opening up the discussions with can select some pictures of Muhammad Ali, children. Besides, it is also important for the starting from his photograph, his robe, gym teachers to learn the history of Muhammad Ali bag, and clips of his visits to different places. beyond his boxing victories. The conversations Powerful quotes of Muhammad Ali can also be with the young ones on the life of Muhammad great teaching resources for children. I Ali should include not only about his race and imagine teachers can decorate the classroom his victory, but also his religion. This with prominent Black figures photographs and conversation is fundamental to be established their quotations, especially during Black in order to address the misunderstanding of History month. One of Muhammad Ali’s Islam and the islamophobia as a result of the powerful quotation that can be included is his 9/11 incident propaganda. While many people statement on social justice in Gast (1996) in the U.S. associate Islam with war, documentary: Muhammad Ali refused being drafted for Vietnam war in 1967 due to his moral stands \"I'm gonna fight for the prestige, on humanity. He said, not for me, but to uplift my little brothers who are sleeping on “My conscience won't let me go shoot my concrete floors today in America. brother, or some darker people, or some poor Black people who are living on hungry people in the mud for big powerful welfare, black people who can't America. And shoot them for what? They never eat, black people who don't know called me nigger, they never lynched me, they no knowledge of themselves, black didn’t put no dogs on me, they didn’t rob me of people who don't have no future.\" my nationality, rape and kill my mother and (Muhammad Ali, in Gast, 1996) father. … Shoot them for what? How can I shoot them poor people? Just take me to jail.” Organizing a discussion on Muhammad Ali’s (Brown, 2018) speech is also a great medium to discuss Black English and other legitimate variants of English Social justice work cannot be done if we are in the U.S. Teachers can use his interview, still working in our silos (Ladson-Billings, 2021). speech, quotes, and even poems to mediate Our work of social justice should embrace this discussion and normalize the use of non- multiple issues of injustices that has affected white English in the academic setting. millions of people of colors across generations. Validating his words and language in the form Teachers need to begin talking about of meaningful discussions and assignments, I intersectional identities and how identities can believe, will be a great segue for students to marginalize people’s lives. Valuing the multiple learn that there is not a ‘good’ and ‘bad’ identities, as Muhammad (2019) argued, is the language; and see how languages can first step in Historically Responsive Literacy. marginalize people of colors (Baker-Bell, 2020) Therefore, openly talking about identities of the figures they are reading along with their histories is greatly needed in the work of cultivating genius. PAGE TWELVE | WISNU

\"AND SHOOT THEM FOR WHAT? THEY NEVER CALLED ME NIGGER, THEY NEVER LYNCHED ME, THEY DIDN’T PUT NO DOGS ON ME, THEY DIDN’T ROB ME OF MY NATIONALITY, RAPE AND KILL MY MOTHER AND FATHER.\"

I chose this book by coincidence. About a month ago, my department had a book fair where everyone could pick up any children’s and young adult books they liked. I decided to come there to pick up some books for my colleague’s children; I also keep some for myself as I love reading children’s book during my leisure time. I intentionally picked books that feature people of colors and their culture for my white friends. Among the books that I picked include ‘Mommies Khimar’ by Jamilah Thompkins-Bigelow and Ebony Glenn (2018) that feature a young Muslim girl, and ‘Muhammad Ali: A Champion is Born’ by Gene Berretta and Frank Morrison (2017). I previously did not know that one of the books that I picked was listed in the NCTE Build Your Stack until I saw a familiar book cover being reviewed by one of the speakers. Thankfully, I have not given the book to my friend, so I can still review the physical book. I am not going to lie, but my biggest RRREEEFFFLLLEEECCCTTTIIIOOONNN motivation to pick ‘Muhammad Ali: A Champion is Born’ among the hundreds of books that I could pick in the shelves was because of the name ‘Muhammad.’ Growing up as a Muslim in Indonesia, I have known Muhammad Ali since I was in the elementary school, but I was never really interested in knowing the figure deeper. I only knew he was an American, a Muslim, and a successful boxing athlete. This assignment was, in fact, the main motivation for me to know Muhammad Ali beyond his victories and titles. Before writing up my review, I decided to read some articles about him and watch some interviews and documentaries about him on the internet. A few things that I had in mind when reading the articles and watching his interviews were: “what made Muhammad Ali different from other Black famous figures?” and “what happened to him? Why his name was rarely heard among school kids nowadays?” PAGE FOURTEEN | WISNU

In my library research, I found numerous unique Overall, this book is a good children’s book things about Muhammad Ali beyond his boxing that should be added to the children’s career and victories that made him a champion bookshelves at home or in the classroom. inside and outside of the ring. He was a fighter Although this book limitedly captures where his real battle was actually outside of the Muhammad Ali’s identity as a person, I still ring against social injustices. His justice work think that this book is worth to read by extended beyond racism in the U.S. No wonder children. I adore Barretta’s story writing style, many people are still watching his videos and left especially his courage to talk about some great comments about him on YouTube segregation and his attempt to explain such a and on Instagram in 2021, which is 6 years after complex issue in a children’s book using a his death. I was also surprised when I found his simple language that can be easily understood poems, especially the one that he wrote in by the young ones. While this book highlights August 1963, six months before he won the the topic that many people may say too ‘heavy’ world heavyweight championship and converted for children, I like that Barretta still to Islam, entitled “I am the greatest.” The poem incorporates some vital elements of children’s and all the works he did outside of the ring book, such as the use of simple sentence should be known and remembered by many construction, simple diction, humor, and people as a role model of a person that has various use of onomatopoeia, e.g., sound of strong determination on what he believes is right. punching and bells. I found his writing style to be a good model for my writing, especially in terms of tailoring my language to my audience. Often times, great writings and research articles are too difficult to understand by people that we are researching. I think it is time for us to decolonize our ways of writing so that our social justice works are accessible by many people, including those at the margin that may find research article too dry or too difficult to comprehend. In addition to the story, I also highly value Morrison’s drawing technique, detailed illustrations, and choice of colors, which even for me as an adult, are eye-pleasing. The combination of good story writing and beautiful illustrations make this book more than just a children’s book, but a work of art in social justice that all ages will enjoy reading. PAGE FIFTEEN | WISNU

RESOURCES FOR TEACHERS Quotes of Muhammad Ali: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmMMAv1_4VM&t=138s Interviews with Muhammad Ali: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XiD0wfduxKE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7YF58ygric Poems by Muhammad Ali: http://www.thehypertexts.com/Best%20Muhammad%20Ali%20Poetry.htm https://www.npr.org/2016/06/10/481590365/remembering-muhammad-ali-through-his-poem-i-am-the- greatest https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFUobkiq_Tw Muhammad Ali’s photographs: https://learninglab.si.edu/org/nmaahc? f%5B_types%5D%5B%5D=resource&st=Muhammad%20Ali%20&s=&page=1 Articles Talking about race: https://nmaahc.si.edu/learn/talking-about-race/topics/race-and-racial-identity Significance of African American in Sports: https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/exhibitions/sports PAGE SIXTEEN | WISNU

LEARN ISLAM Below are some resources to learn some basics about Islam: https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/ap-art-history/introduction-cultures-religions-apah/islam- apah/a/introduction-to-islam-2 https://islamfaith.com/easy-guide-to-learn-about-islam/ https://www.edx.org/learn/islam https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxuHBTES2-s PAGE SEVENTEEN | WISNU

REFERENCES Associated Press. (1990, November 27). Boxing’s Muhammad Ali meets with Saddam, Hostage release promised. Associated Press. https://apnews.com/article/ae7d3a67b1cb4abd5e100821ce810805 Baker-Bell, A. (2020). Linguistic justice: Black language, literacy, identity, and pedagogy. Routledge. Barretta, G. (2017). Muhammad Ali: A champion is born (F. Morrison, Illus). HarperCollins Publishers. Brown, D. L. (2018, June 16). ‘Shoot them for what?’ How Muhammad Ali won his greatest fight. The Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2018/06/15/shoot-them- for-what-how-muhammad-ali-won-his-greatest-fight/ Eig, J. (2017). Ali. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Gast, L. (Director). (1996). Muhammad Ali: When we were kings [Documentary]. PolyGram Filmed Entertainment. Hopkins, J. P. (2020). Indian Education for All: Decolonizing Indigenous Education in Public Schools. Teachers College Press. Ladson-Billings, B. (2021, January 24). Justice matters: Reclaiming a fundamental right [Webinar]. UGA Mary Frances Early College of Education. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3W8_zt7V_4 Muhammad, G. (2019). Cultivating genius: An equity framework for culturally and historically responsive literacy. New York, NY. Scholastic. Rea, T. (2014, November 8). The Rock Springs massacre. WyoHistory.org. https://www.wyohistory.org/encyclopedia/rock-springs-massacre Thompkins-Bigelow, J. (2018). Mommies Khimar (E. Glenn, Illus.). Salaam Reads. Wallace, K. (2017, May 19). Forgotten Los Angeles history: The Chinese massacre of 1871. Los Angeles Public Library. https://www.lapl.org/collections-resources/blogs/lapl/chinese-massacre-1871

CRITICAL BOOK REVIEW MUHAMMAD ALI A CHAMPION INSIDE AND OUTSIDE OF THE RING