Hearing promises of “safe spaces” is usually a quick way to get me very angry. Safe for whom? And safe from whom? Probably not safe for minorities from dominant discourses… But then calling for “brave spaces” instead does not help a lot either. Brave spaces demand bravery from everybody, so far so good, but what about those people who have to be brave to show up as themselves every single day already because of society’s reaction to who they are? Also, it should not require being brave to be heard. So then, an alternative seems to be to strive for accountable spaces. Here I am digging into some literature to see how people generally think and write about it!
Tag Archives: microaggressions
Intervening when witnessing microaggressions (my backup plan in case I don’t have time for this slide in an upcoming seminar)
I am planning a seminar on relationships in the classroom, and I have way too many things to say on that in general, AND want it to be driven by what participants feel is relevant. One topic I have traditionally included, and talked (and written) about, is how to react when being target, witness, or perpetrator of microaggressions. This blog post is a summary of what I would say about my favorite slide on this if I had the time, so that if I don’t, I can send participants here.
Currently reading “How well-intentioned white male physicists maintain ignorance of inequity and justify inaction” by Dancy & Hodari (2022)
This article has repeatedly been making waves in my circles over the last couple of months: “How well-intentioned white male physicists maintain ignorance of inequity and justify inaction” by Dancy & Hodari (2022). My take-away in a nutshell: Ignorance is bliss. It’s totally worth a read!
Currently reading: “Disarming Racial Microaggressions: Microintervention Strategies for Targets, White Allies, and Bystanders” (Sue et al., 2019)
I have another recommended reading for you! I found this really nice framework for disarming microaggressions, both targeted directly towards the perpetrator, but also institutional and societal macroaggressions, in Sue et al. (2019). The article includes a lot of really helpful examples of what this might look like in practice. Below is a summary of the aspects that I want to take from the article to bring into a workshop I’m teaching next month (so I am reading this through a very specific lens for my own context). I definitely recommend to check out the original article to look at great examples of strategies to intervene depending on the objective (if nothing else, browse table 1)!
Microaggressions: How intent and impact don’t always go together.
I’ve recently started including the topic of microaggressions in my academic development workshops, and here is one reflection on the topic (including the super helpful sandals&boots-analogy by Presley Pizzo). I initially wrote this for a newsletter to all teachers at my faculty, but then I also wrote a second – much more hands-on-“three-things-to-do” – version, which was ultimately the one that was deemed more fitting for the target audience. But I still like this one, so here I’m giving you both. So without further ado:
“That’s not what I said, and it’s definitely not what I meant, and do you really think someone like me would do such a thing?”