Race is hard to talk about—but it needs to be done.
On Thursday, November 1, I participated in Anti-Racism Training at Goshen College. This four-hour seminar was led by Professor Regina Shands-Stolzfus, and attendees ranged from students to faculty and other Goshen College staff to community members. Over the course of the afternoon, Professor Shands-Stolzfus dispelled assumptions about race, provided thought-provoking questions and space for participants to discuss race, and taught us ways to be more aware of our own interactions with race.
To begin the seminar session, we had small group discussions about our names, our own race, and what we felt most connected with in terms of our own identities. The small group I was in consisted of three white females, one white male, one Latino male, and one African male. While white females were dominant in the group, I felt that we all had surprisingly similar interactions with race. For the most part, our group agreed that in our home lives, ethnicity had been seen as something to celebrate, while race was pushed to the background. For most of us, we felt that we were aware of our race growing up, but that this awareness was predominantly from social interactions at school or the media.
None of the white people in our group professed pride about being white; instead, we all said that we were embarrassed to be labeled white, and often tried to identify in some other way to distance ourselves from the white label. The African male said that when he was young, he was afraid of people with white skin, and that when he saw white-skinned people, he would hide from them out of fear. Hearing this made me feel surprisingly hurt—as much as I want to distance myself to power-holding whites, I must realize that I am still a part of the white group and the prejudices others have towards whites they also have towards me.
Towards the end of the discussion time, we talked again in groups about how to deal with racism in our places of work or study. The group I was in came up with multiple ways: intentionally seeking out friends of other races, choosing to not be “colorblind” but color-conscious, and to promote conversations about race. Being willing to ask the hard questions about race and our own racism—and answer them ourselves—was something we all agreed would foster better understanding among racial groups.
Personally, I found it kind of difficult to talk about race. Growing up in a home where race was not discussed, I often found myself at a loss for both articulate ideas and words to share them. However, hearing from other students who better articulated their experiences helped me to better understand my own. I realize now that I need to continue these open, honest conversations about race, so that when I am in a position of authority or leadership I have the capacity to talk about this subject with grace.
Hearing white young adults not know how to talk about race, or how to positively identify with their own race weighed heavy on my heart. I also feel that way, and I am very aware of the injustices that work in my favor as a white woman. However, I feel that everyone should be able to identify positives to their race, just as they can identify positives for all other races. Seeing the beauty in color is important—regardless of what color it is.
As a teacher, I hope to be able to connect what I learned about on Thursday, and what I am continuing to think about today, to my calling as a teacher. By striving to be consistently color-conscious both in and out of school, I hope to be a role model of positive race relations. In a school placement that I am currently in, I feel that color-blindness by far rules the classroom; but that is not healthy. Teachers need to move past the desire to see all students as colorless, and to recognize that all races need to be noted and incorporated into classroom interactions. By being aware of racism and being willing to talk about the hard questions of race and racism, I also hope to promote interracial conversation and understanding in my classroom.
I do not want to teach in a homogenous school. I would much rather teach in a community with learners representing many different cultures and colors. Having a hybrid classroom like that, with students of many shades, only makes the class stronger. In science, a hybrid is stronger than either of the separate parents—in the classroom, I can’t see why that would be any different. Teaching in a multiracial environment would open up the opportunities for me to promote healthy conversation about race. Students need to know how to talk about race in safe, nurturing environments.
Students need multicultural—and multiracial—literature. Students need to see people of their same race and gender in positive positions of authority. LeAlan Jones and Lloyd Newman, co-authors of Our America: Life and Death on the South Side of Chicago expressed the need of seeing positive black male role models. I believe that children of all races need easy access to same-race role models. Students need to be given the chance to get to college and succeed. This is the basic concept behind Lamov’s Teach Like a Champion and Wormelli’s Meet Me in the Middle: Becoming an Accomplished Middle-Level Teacher, and all other respectable teaching books. Students need to not feel held back by the color of their skin. Although I am no more than a white woman, I can encourage more than just white females to be future teachers, principals, pastors and coaches.
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