Microaggressions Week 4

The most salient experience that I have with racism was when I was interviewing for a teaching position.  I interviewed for a middle school position teaching special education.  The middle school was in an urban area and was predominantly African-American.  The principal asked me about my high school’s diversity ratio and my own personal upbringing.  My high school exhibited very little racial or ethnic diversity.  He asked me, “How in the world do you expect to relate to these children who come from poor, abuse-filled, black homes?  You have no idea what they have to deal with on a daily basis since you came out of a happy, white home.  They will eat you alive”.  I was disgusted by his comments.  He was judging me before he even knew me.  I told him that despite my upbringing, I attended a diverse university and was not racist.  He made several other rude, demeaning comments toward me about my inability to teach African-American children.  It was very frustrating.  I thanked him for his time and told him that I did not want to work in an atmosphere where I had to prove that I was not racist.  He knew nothing about me.  My family is bi-racial and prior to my father finishing college (which he did when I was 5) we lived with limited financial means.  Just because my “surface culture” fit into the dominant culture in the United States, all families are different and should be treated as such. 

This experience made me realize how quickly someone can judge others by only their surface culture.  It is frustrating and unfortunately I have been on both ends of the experience.  I have judged others wrongly at times.  This is something that I need to work on.  

(I chose this photo of our trip to Disney this past summer.  We were are Epcot and loved the diversity that it presented.  Noah, Masen, Maddyn, Mekhi, Owen, & Ella with Mickey!)

My family is blessed to be racially diverse, have multiple religions, differing sexual orientations, differing financial statuses, and ability levels.  Diversity can be so beautiful!  We can learn so much from each other!!! 

WEEK 3 Cultural Definition

THREE FRIENDS:
My Brother-in-law Stan:  "My definition of culture is, I guess, that I am a Black man.  I am involved with my family, well my in-laws and my own family.  I am from Indiana, but have lived a lot of places.  I am a Marine."
"My Mom was a single, hard-working mother.  We moved a lot.  I knew she loved me.  After she died, I was pretty lost.  I lived with family, but I was not really involved.  I started to value family when I met your sister."
"Diversity is a mix of different aspects of your life, like race, sex, finances, how many are in your family, if you do stuff with your family."

Matt:  "I guess my culture is that I am a heterosexual, white male.  I am now a single father.  Divorce sucks.  It changes you." 
"Growing up, I tried to avoid my family.  I had a ton of chores on the farm.  I worked hard.  I guess I learned the value of hard work and how it pays off."
"I guess diversity is how mixed up your heritage is, like I am Irish, Scottish mix.  People can be many cultures or races."

My sister Amber:  "My definition of culture is that I am a family-centered, wife and mother.  I love and cherish family.  I am a mixture of a country and city girl." 
"Well, you know my childhood.  Mom and Dad were very loving and involved.  They taught us about God and the values of education.  We knew what they expected, not that I always did that.  I have a lot of good memories of growing up.  I hope my kids have good memories too." 
"Diversity can be any mixture of differences.  The differences can be family structure and dynamics.  My kids are bi-racial.  One way to be diverse is what your family values and stresses the importance of.  That is one example of diversity." 

These conversations made me realize how different peoples' definitions of culture can be.  Some people include race, some include gender, and some people include their values in their definition.  I think that childhood memories and interactions can form a basis for your cultural values.  However, I know that it does not have to make you follow in the path of your past.  For example, my cousins (my Mom's brother's children) grew up in an abusive home.  The parents were addicted to drugs and alcohol.  My parents and grandparents ended up taking my aunt and uncle to court to get custody of the kids.  My cousins went to college and have great family lives.  I am so thankful that my parents and my wonderful grandparents helped them.  Their lives could have been very different. 

Week 2 6164

This is actually something similar to a discussion that I had with my husband this week in wake of the catastrophic tornado activity in our state.  Honestly, I believe that preserving our culture would be importantm but the health and safety of my family would be most important. 
The three items: 
*I would take would be my photo album containing photos of my granparents, my parents, my in-laws, my sister's family, my husband's siblings, my husband and I as children, and of course my own children.  The photos are of major events such as birth, baptism, holidays, or weddings.
*A Bible. 
*A container containing baby supplies of my children. 

I would keep the photo album.  While the Bible is important in my faith journey, I do not feel that I would need a physical representation to continue to pray.  The baby clothes and blankets would represent my love of family and how family-centered we are.  It would also be represented in the photo album.  The family photo album would demonstrate our love of family and that most events are a family affair.  The photos would include our faith (by photos of baptisms and holidays) and our love of family (by including our loved ones). 
These are examples of photos that are in the photo album.  The first photo is of my nephews (Mekhi and Masen) and Noah; second photo is of my niece (Maddy) and Owen; third photo is of Masen and Ella; fourth photo is of them enjoying breakfast before school.  Family time is the best!!!

I have always known that my life revolves around family.  While giving up the Bible would be difficult, I would also want my children to have photos of their family heritage.  This was an interesting assignment.