This week I had the opportunity to join Dr. Galen Cicel’s
Race and Ethnicity class to talk about microaggressions. This was a fun opportunity that allowed me to
get out of my office, meet a new group of students, and brush up on a topic
that is profoundly present in everyday life.
Microaggressions as defined by Sue (2010) are “the brief and commonplace daily verbal, behavioral, and environmental
indignities, whether intentional or unintentional, that communicate hostile,
derogatory, or negative racial, gender, sexual-orientation, and religious
slights and insults to the target person or group (5).” They happen everywhere and anywhere (home,
school, work the grocery store) are often unintentional and a reflection of our
hidden biases. Because they are “micro”
it is easy for them to go unnoticed or questioned as significant. Yet, they can hurt deeply particularly when
they are compounded on top of each other.
In brushing up on the microaggressions literature, humors Buzzfeed
videos, and college campus’ response to microaggressions here are three things
I was reminded of:
Microagressions can
be environmental
We often talk about verbal microaggressions – “Where are you from?” or “I believe the smartest and most qualified
students should be admitted” or “ you
have a note taker? Why don’t you take your own notes?” - but not as much about environmental
microaggressions “the numerous demeaning
and threatening social, educational, political, or economic cues that are
communicated individually, institutionally, or societally to marginalized
groups” (25).” A few environmental
microaggressions that come to mind include men being promoted more frequently
to leadership positions then their female colleagues, few to no faculty or
staff of color, a non ADA compliant campus, budgets that reflect greater
importance on social activities rather than social justice initiatives or
faculty/staff/student leadership formation, celebrating Christian holidays and
not recognizing other significant dates of other religious/spiritual groups. Although probably unintentional, they are all
structural examples that create an impact that says to target identity groups “you
are different”, “you are not important”, and “we are not trying to create a
community where you feel like you belong.”
We are ALL
conditioned to give and receive microaggressions
We live in a world in which we are socialized at a young age
and have biases based upon our upbringing and exposure to systems. Unintentionally, many microaggressions arise
out of our biases often shaped by norming the language, beauty standards, and beliefs
of the dominant culture. Microagressions
can happen between a dominant identity and a target identity or horizontally
between target identities. Using myself
as an example, as a young Hawaiian female a few people have said to me “Let’s get someone who looks like they know
what they are doing” or “You don’t
look Hawaiian, are you sure your not just from Hawaii?”. And yet as a white, U.S. born, middle
class, straight person, with a masters degree I have a whole lot of privilege
that garners me the opportunity to avoid being the target of microaggressions
most of the time. Along with that I have
screwed up a lot and been the perpetrator of microaggressions – something that
I am sure my students, colleagues, and friends have witnessed.
We probably wont be
able to avoid them
Yes, in a fantasy would we might be able to live without
microaggressions. But for the time being
we have to know how to navigate a world with them. Here are a few tips if you commit a microaggressions:
- · Be in tune with body language
- · Listen when someone raises a concern
- · Do not invalidate a person’s experience
- · Lean into the discomfort
- · Seek feedback on behavior or environment
- · Reflect, unpack, and learn from experience.
And as a victim of microaggressions:
- · Reduce the ambiguity of the event – naming the type of microaggressions and root of the issue can help make the microaggressions concrete and easier to manage
- · Seek social support and reassurance – Often times acknowledgement from peers and allies saying “No, you aren’t crazy” is helpful in naming the situation
- · Practice managing a triggering event
- · When ready, educate others – by no means it is your job to educate, but this is helpful when seeking to grow and sustain a relationship
A few ways to avoid microaggressions:
- · Seek to learn more about defining, recognizing, and deconstructing, microaggressions – for ourselves as victims and perpetrators
- · Learn more about our individual biases and pause to think before speaking or doing.
- · Listen to the stories of others to better understand where they are coming from
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