Posted by Mary
Grabar @ The Federalist September
3, 2015
While college
students have been touring Europe, saving rainforests, or interning at
high-powered government offices, college faculty and administrators have been
preparing for the upcoming school year and the biggest problem that afflicts
our institutions of higher learning: microaggressions.
Many people are
unaware of microaggressions, but they lurk around every corner, in every
classroom, dorm room, locker room, library cubicle, coffee shop, cafeteria, and
under every tree and shrub on our bucolic campuses.
The journal
that reports on everything important on our campuses, the Chronicle of
Higher Education, explains microaggressions. This summer, it featured two
lead articles on the problem.
The first, an essay, “Microaggression and Changing Moral Cultures” by
sociology professors Bradley Campbell and Jason Manning, offers a good
definition: “Microaggressions are remarks perceived as sexist, racist, or
otherwise offensive to a marginalized social group.” And, “even though the
offenses are minor and sometimes unintentional, repeatedly experiencing them
causes members of minority groups great harm, which must be redressed.”
A fellow
University of Virginia sociologist, Donald Black, elaborates: moral cultures
are products of social conditions, and “acts of social dominance — such as
belittling someone with insults,” are “more offensive in places or
relationships where people are relatively equal. Likewise, acts of cultural
intolerance. . . .” (The full disquisition is here.)
The
Groundbreaking Discovery of Microaggressions
Chronicle reporter Peter Schmidt, in the companion investigative piece, reveals that microaggressions were
discovered back in 1970 by Charles M. Pierce, a professor of education and
psychiatry at Harvard’s medical school.
In those days,
the scourge was limited to “the subtle slights and insults that black people
regularly experience at the hands of people who do not see themselves as
racist.” Thirty-seven years later, “a detailed taxonomy” of microaggressions
was published in the American Psychologist, with thelead author of the
research team and crack scientist Derald Wing Sue, a professor of psychology
and education at Columbia Teachers College. In 2010, came the definitive Microaggressions
in Everyday Life.
Sue explains
that solutions are not as simple as, say, taking down Confederate flags and Playboy
centerfolds from faculty office doors. Those who still have images of the
Confederate flag or Playboy centerfolds in their subconscious need
special workshops, led by sociology and psychology professors.
Most academics,
being the placid creatures that they are, go along, accepting such directives
as the price they have to pay for being able to work in cut-offs and
Birkenstocks. But there are resisters, such as Eugene Volokh, a University of
California-Los Angeles law professor, who defiantly writes, “I am going to keep
on microaggressing.” No doubt Volokh has a bomb shelter filled with
freeze-dried food staples and adorned with a Confederate flag.
The Solution:
More Sociology Professors
Perhaps the
professor needs a little explaining ? Here is something from the Chronicle:
We can better understand complaints about microaggression and the
reactions to them if we understand that each side of the debate draws from a
different moral culture. Those calling attention to microaggressions have
rejected the morality dominant among middle-class Americans during the 20th
century — what sociologists and historians have sometimes called a dignity
culture, which abhors private vengeance and encourages people to. . . .
(This message would best be delivered to Volokh with a
trickling water fountain and soft Indian zither music in the background.)
With professors across the land trained in conflict
resolution and peace studies, we have hope. Consider the sociology professors’
thoughtful conclusion:
“Surely each side would benefit from a better understanding of the
other. Debates might be more fruitful, and relationships on campus more
collegial, if we more carefully considered the moral concerns of those who
disagree with us. That does not mean the conflict engendered by this moral
divide won’t or shouldn’t go on.”
I like that.
There can never be too many discussions, meetings, roundtables, training
sessions, reports, memos, marches, peace circles, teach-ins, sing-alongs, and
group hugs at our institutions of higher learning.
Passing the
Microaggression Baton to a New Generation
Here is what is
happening in the new frontier of ending hurtful things: Students are reporting
microaggressions through such places as the student-initiated Microaggression Project.
Others use Facebook. Binghamton University, Brown University, Wellesley
College, and Yale University lead the way. Thanks to being properly educated
about the “Red Scare,” students are not burdened by misgivings.
Some institutions have followed students’ lead and now
have an “institutionalized recognition of microaggression.” Ithaca College has
passed a bill “calling for a campuswide online system through which students
could anonymously report microaggressions.”
At Fordham
University, students describe microaggressions they have suffered in a mug-shot
digital photo project. One plaint, about being asked, “So . . . you’re Chinese,
right?” made me weep with guilt. Microaggressions can also happen far off
campus. They occur when a female student is asked by a female relative if she
has met “any nice boys.” Perhaps committees could prepare a brochure for
freshpersons to take with them to protect them from such microaggressions from
Grandma as the turkey is passed around? Even sweet grandmas need re-education.
There is one
safeguard I wished I’d had when I was working as a graduate teaching assistant
and being bombarded with microaggressions from freshmen who said they needed
“at least a B” to keep their HOPE scholarships: A union contract. The Wisconsin
graduate student union contract, for example, protects against
microaggressions.
But in that
most advanced state, California, the entire university system has issued
guidelines to faculty, warning that such statements as “America is a melting
pot” or “I believe the most qualified person should get the job” could be
considered microaggressions.
Here, close to
where I live and work in a safe space called the Alexander Hamilton Institute
for the Study of Western Civilization, the local college responds to students’
needs with unequaled dedication. Last December, way-stations in the library
assisted students assaulted with the trauma of final exams. One table offered
coloring books and crayons, another jigsaw puzzles, another Legos. A bulletin
board was set up for sharing tips. One heart-felt Post-It note read simply,
“Cry!”
Colleges Target
Microaggressions
According to a
top-secret memo leaked to me, it appears that Hamilton College committees have
put the same diligence into coming up with ways to combat microaggressions.
The Working
Group on Diversity and Inclusion has been toiling away for nigh a year now. The
members have presented the initial findings in five areas of needed
improvement. They are:
1. Campus
climate: a sense of belonging, with historically marginalized communities not
only being tolerated but appreciated. The latter objective will be met with
“social belonging/activities over the weekend” and “access to familiar comforts
(foods, cultural events, services such as barbers, etc.).”
2. Bias and
microaggressions: eliminating “unconscious bias / ‘isms’” “insensitivity /
misunderstandings / misconceptions,” and “anonymous acts of
bias/discrimination, especially on the internet and social media sites.”
3. Student
training and education: Diversity programs will also be conducted outside
of the classroom.
4. Faculty and
staff training: Mandatory trainings will be conducted at faculty orientations
and will include instruction on how to value others. In performance reviews,
staff will be evaluated negatively for failing to intervene or missing
opportunities to “educate others.”
5. Diversity
issues in the curriculum: Faculty will be required to offer a more diverse
curriculum in their classes.
Additionally,
diversity trainings, such as “Difficult Dialogues,” Safe Zone Trainings by the
Rainbow Alliance, an MLK Winter Book Read, a Division of Student Life training
on microaggressions, a training session on acceptable theme party costumes, a
transgender issues workshop, and a Ferguson Teach-In, will take place.
Recommendations
include recruiting more “staff of color,” collaboration with human
resources, Staff Assembly Council, and other campus offices, mandatory
bystander student training, diversity training (in addition to current online
sexual harassment and Title IX training), redesigning use of common social
spaces, and encouraging student groups to involve faculty and staff in their
events.
The Price of
Comfort Is Eternal Vigilance
I would like to
commend this committee for such a visionary, far-reaching list. Who would have
thought of “unconscious bias / isms,” sins of omission, and food
microaggressions? However, I must warn the good members: unconscious biases
deep within the hearts and minds of cafeteria workers could sabotage such
efforts. We know from news reports last year the harm done to students when fried
chicken and collard greens were served during Martin Luther King Jr. week!
Imagine what
would happen were a student to encounter a menu with fried chicken and
watermelon! And while faculty certainly have the maturity and cultural
awareness to enjoy their margaritas on Cinco de Mayo, our young fragile flowers
might think we are stereotyping them with a taco night on May 5.
The times
demand strong action. Let us not allow our students to be traumatized and
scarred for life by stereotypical food, looks, refusals to make eye contact,
prolonged eye contact, inappropriate conversation starters, smiling too much,
or smiling too little—or any of the myriad ways microaggressions take place.
We must put in
safety measures on every campus. Let the best and brightest STEM minds
come together—as they once did during Sputnik—to come up with a national
solution. I challenge fellow American professors to come up with a device that
will measure hostilities, unconscious biases, and repressed hatreds, within not
only our professoriate, but also the youth, the hope of the future. Stopping
microaggressions is too important a matter to be left to chance. Bystanders may
not be able to spot them soon enough. The objects of microaggression might be
too lost in thought or their iPhones to notice a microaggressive stare or
question.
Great
scientific minds have come up with such devices for other species, such as our
quadruped companions, lest they be tempted by squirrels or cats to run from the
safety of yards. If we can make devices that these wear, why not one for our
students and faculty? These devices could measure biorhythms, such things as
heart rates, pupil dilations, and body temperature. We already, thanks to the
U.S. Department of Education and the Gates Foundation, have devices that
measure “social and emotional learning” and assess for such things as “grit”
and “perseverance.” In fact, the department’s National Assessment of
Educational Progress, which used to test for such irrelevant things as
historical knowledge, is now testing for “grit.”
So, whenever a
hateful or angry thought would come into consciousness a gentle little tingle
would remind the offender, “Do not hate. Do not microaggress.” It would quickly
end a hostile stare with a head jerk that would also conveniently alert the
object of the microaggressive act that the subject needs further re-education.
These devices could even be designed as fashion accessories, as gender-neutral
brass chains or with colorful fair-trade beads.
Junior and
contingent faculty would benefit immensely from being zapped. No doubt
energetic convulsions shaking instructors at the lectern would bring forth
healing peals of laughter from students. Humor does so much to ease anxiety.
There would be no more concerns about “student engagement,” no worries about
students nodding off or web-surfing. Not when lectures are so electrifying.
And we must not
forget the “workers.” That lady behind the cafeteria counter would certainly
benefit from a gentle shock to remind her that, if watermelon is to be served,
it should be in a nice vinaigrette with a little bit of mint.
Mary Grabar
earned her PhD from the University of Georgia and taught college English for 20
years. She is now a resident fellow at the Alexander Hamilton Institute for the
Study of Western Civilization in Clinton, New York. Her writing can be found at
DissidentProf.com
and at marygrabar.com.
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