In “Whiteness in the Psychological Imagination” Dr. Jonathan Lassiter, a Psychology professor, wrote about whiteness in academia and its effects on students of color. There were many aspects of this piece that resonated with me, but none so more than when Dr. Lassiter referenced a conversation he had with a Black female classmate named Natasha. This conversation led Natasha to tears after Dr. Lassiter asked her how she was doing, and it was this moment …
Our education system and schooling curriculum lacks transparent information regarding the country’s racial history and lacks the general knowledge of how to have race talk. Some teachers, who should be educating and pushing the barrier, still frequently ignore race talk or are visibly uncomfortable when racism is discussed. These classroom dynamics are crucial, and teachers and educators set the tone. Teachers need to be able to preach inclusivity, create a positive and productive classroom dynamic, …
Children are defined by their innocence, playfulness, curiosity, and youthfulness. However, those characteristics are defining White children. A set of studies titled, “The Essence of Innocence: Consequences of Dehumanizing Black Children,” conducted by Phillip Goff and colleagues, explains that with the prejudice and discrimination surrounding Black children, they need fewer basic needs and protection. In other words, their innocence is stripped away. But why? Why are Black children treated differently than their White counterparts? In …
After centuries of racial pejoratives and terms focusing on the absence of whiteness, the commonly standard term describe those whose ethnicities can be described as something other than white is “person(s) of color.” This is leaps and bounds better than more archaic terms which were used, with “colored” being similar linguistically but becoming pejorative socially and “negro” being a word borrowed from a language other than English, thereby further emphasizing the “otherness” of people of …
Children of color are at a high risk of being negatively impacted by implicit prejudices and biases. The way that people manifest their prejudiced beliefs can be dangerous to children’s ability to learn and be successful outside of the classroom. In a study done by Goff et al. (2014), children of color were much more likely to be perceived as older than they actually were. Young boys of color are then treated as older when …
I recently met a police officer two years older than me. I started talking to him and having friendly conversation before learning that he was a cop. Naturally, upon finding out about his career, I asked him his thoughts on the current Black Lives Matter movement and police brutality. His response was “Yea, it’s a shame that it was a few bad cops. I work with hispanic people and stuff. I’m definitely not racist.” This …
In the NY Times 1619 project, Nikole Hannah-Jones hosted a podcast called “The fight for a true democracy” where she mentioned a story about Isaac Woodward. He was a 27 year old Black man who had just returned from fighting in WW2. While on his way to see his wife, the bus driver stopped and Isaac asked him if he could use the restroom, he said no. They argued and ultimately, Isaac still went to …
What is a stereotype? Social psychology defines a stereotype as “any thought widely adopted about specific types of individuals or certain ways of behaving intended to represent the entire group of those individuals or behaviors as a whole.” Stereotypes are generalizations made about people and the groups in which those people belong to based on their appearances and behaviors. Do you know of any stereotypes made about you? Your skin color? Your religion? Your ethnicity? …
‘Race talk,’ as Daryl Wing Sue describes it, by itself violates many of the standards and norms that society fights to uphold. Race talk invites emotions into the space and it invites topics deemed too impolite for small talk into a conversation. As a result, race talk is consistently pushed into designated spaces. Aside from society, a key influence on the success of race talk is the awareness of power and privilege that those in …
In the performance world of theater, television, and film, casting without regard to actors’ race or the race of the characters they’ll be portraying is known as “colorblind casting.” It’s a common practice now on Broadway, with Filipina Lea Salonga portraying white French character of Éponine in ?Les Misérables? and Puerto Rican Lin-Manuel Miranda portraying the white founding father Alexander Hamilton, among many other people of color being cast to portray traditionally white roles. The …
This past summer I watched Hamilton the musical for the first time. I was in awe of the Black and Brown people playing our founding fathers and the history that the show made, but I was also aware of its historical inaccuracies. This was the thought that was running through my head as I listened to the podcast for the 1619 Project. I am not a historian, but I’ve always prided myself in trying to …
The word “racism” evokes strong emotions in people, and for many, it’s just about the worst thing one can be called. As language evolves and words take on new meaning, the gravity of the word “racism” hinders people’s willingness to accept new meanings and uses for the word. The term “systemic racism” faces this problem, as there are those who, before understanding its meaning, assume that it is an indictment of the United States and …