What Could Racism Look Like in our Writing Centers?

As we prepare for the upcoming 2009 ECWCA Conference, we're considering a new approach to Antiracism activism.

So we have to ask:

What could racism look like in our writing centers?

Are We a "Nation of Cowards"?

While I'm not a fan of opinion columns, I think the summary provided through the NY Times link is a source for discussion.

Thoughts?

The Opinionator

Are We All Plagued with the Inability to Self-Organize?

As an undergraduate writing center tutor, I recently (October 2008) had the chance to present a special interest group workshop (along with six other peer tutors) at the IWCA/NCPTW 2008 Conference in Las Vegas, Nevada. We presented our experiences practicing Antiracist Activism at our writing center. While I could (and will soon do so) respond to the complicated variety of resistance we faced, I’d rather empathize with the invisibleness of most social justice work.

Our workshop was plagued, among others, with poor planning. Multiple presentations of social justice presentations, panels, or workshops, occurred at the same time as our own. Rather than coming together as a coalition of tutors interested in social justice, we were systematically separated and categorized individually as a result of our diversity in presentations.

While we could form special interest groups and committees forever into infinity, I’m concerned that we’re going nowhere politically. We are all marginalized voices and we need to stand together as a collective voice to respond to the political majority. Otherwise, we will become white noise to each other silencing ourselves through separate practices.

Perhaps the most difficult, most pressing issue in front of us is to decide how to effectively organize.

Keep writing!

Linking up

Hello everyone!

Since our blog is lucky enough to have followers from different universities, I was hoping that everyone could post a link (which I will then add to the blog's resource section) to their writing center's website. I think it is important to remember that as tutors, Directors, and Assistant Directors devoted to social justice work, we are each others most important resource.

Thanks!

It is a new year.

This is my first semester away from a Writing Center. I want to know: how is it going? Have our antiracist conversations started yet? What are we doing OUTSIDE of our centers to promote antiracism?

Link: Antiracism Peer Tutoring Praxis -- Antiracist Writing Centers

http://antiracistwritingcenters.blogspot.com/

A Reflection on Racial Language in Peer Tutoring Practice.

As a transfer student, I came to my current writing center with one year’s worth of experience. To me, it was already apparent that I walked into an important conversation. And it was at my current institution that I first became aware of Antiracist Activism. That doesn’t mean that I was a bad tutor, but it did mean that I could be better.

One of the greatest hurdles I had learning to realize—not apply—Antiracist Activism was defining race. I confused race with culture and from there, it was easy to form assumptions of group behavior leading to me stereotyping my peers. While I may never know what is in a writer’s head or in their heart, I do know what I say to them. Given the established constraints of a typical tutoring session, I can not afford to alienate writers during our sessions. And so, I looked for racist assumptions or speech, and I first found them in me.

In particular, it was these three words: exotic, foreign, and ethnic. The problem was not so much the words put forth, but it was the meaning I pushed behind them. As a white male tutor, I casually used these terms to mean one thing: non-white experiences. Films, foods, people—it didn’t matter to me then, but I didn’t understand that either. I soon realized, by assuming that the peerness I share with writers is overarching and deep, I am actually projecting internal racism and I am potentially silencing writers. Without realizing it at first, I associated my peerness with my whiteness.

Through months of reflections in addition to these difficult—although worthy—conversations with everyone who would listen, I began to develop something useful—a sensitivity. But this awareness was only a first step. And dialogue was only a second step. This is a process of unlearning that will continue for the rest of my life.

In yesterday’s Special Interest Group on Antiracist Activism, we agreed that an action of no action is still an action. That was deep. It is useless to talk about topics like Antiracism if we do nothing with it. This is ongoing work for us, and we must not leave a single assumption unchallenged.