Toni Cade Bambara's "The Lesson" and social inequality

¶ … Bambara, 1981) the author Toni Cade Bambara presents, at the superficial level, from a child's perspective, a visit to the F.A. O Schwarz Toy Emporium in Manhattan, of the protagonist and her friends led by the resident gadfly, busboy and self-appointed educator Miss Moore. The protagonist Sylvia, and her comrades -- Sugar, Junior, Rosie Giraffe, Mercedes, Flyboy, Big Butt, Q.T. And Junebug are African-American children growing up in the poorer neighborhoods of New York.

In order that their children might imbibe some culture and learning, the parents willingly "give their" children over to Miss Moore. On this particular day, they are bundled into two taxis into downtown Manhattan. After some window shopping, they are led into the store. The children realize immediately that any of the store's inventories is way beyond their economic means. Sylvia actually considers various necessities that her mother might prioritize rather than purchase a 35 dollar toy. The children find it hard to comprehend how a toy-yacht could cost over $1,000 where one could be procured in the "neighborhood" for 50 cents; and if such a toy was destroyed necessitating another, it would involve a spanking. The children return embittered, wondering that this hot summer day could have been better spent "cooling off" at the pool.

One suspects that Miss Moore's excursion with the children involved some lesson as the title of the short story denotes. At face level, the whole episode is cruel because Miss Moore dangles before the children that which they cannot have. Miss Moore obviously wishes to impart some hidden wisdom. Here are two lessons that one might speculate on: One, that the children ought to motivate themselves to study, get jobs so that one day they might afford not only toys but other material accoutrements of the richer (white) people. And, two, that the trip was a lesson on the social ramifications of being born of the wrong color at the poverty-end of society. It seems from Miss Moore's attitude, that the second is truer. This is borne out in Sugar's summation that seemed to satisfy Miss Moore: "I think," say Sugar pushing me off her feet like she never done before cause I whip her ass in a minute, "that this is not much of a democracy if you ask me. Equal chance to pursue happiness means an equal crack at the dough, don't it?"