Jade
Black woman, late 30's, early 40's. Straight shooter, unafraid of confrontation, down-to-earth. Fellow professor and colleague to Sandra. Navigates institutional racism more directly than Sandra.
What Black Women Saw at Ketanji Brown Jackson's Confirmation Hearings
"Black women in American society are effectively expected to fill two roles at work, the one they were hired to do and another role of making their coworkers comfortable at their own expense. It’s not enough to be educated, accomplished, and professional. To navigate the obstacles created by racist stereotypes, they must also hide their emotions. They cannot be too talented or assertive, lest they be perceived as a threat. Like Jackson, they are in a no-win situation and must simply persevere as she has."
-MK
"What kind of sister doesn't look out for her own."
Jade
S7/P62
by Jordan Madison, LCMFT & Josee’ Muldrew, M.A., LAPC
The Skin I’m In: Respectability
Politics in the Context of Black
Womanhood
"As Black women, we must feel empowered to create new norms predicated on our multidimensional existence. Norms that are inclusive and champion the idea that we can ‘just be ourselves and that is a form of activism within itself. As Resma Menachem stated, “At its best, activism is a form of healing. It is about what we do and how we show up in the world. It is about learning and expressing regard, compassion, and love” (Menachem, Resma, 2017. My Grandmother’s Hands). Let’s heal together!"
-Madison & Muldrew
It continues to go unchecked because Dean Whitfield allows it to. The professors of color barely get the respect we deserve but we’re expected to be these “tolerant negroes”. Meanwhile these kids get a simple slap on the wrist. They’ll call it “mischief”, knowing good and damn well that those same rules would not apply if the students weren’t white.
JADE
S7/P73
Does Academia Actually
Want Black Professors?
Senior Contributor@Forbes Magazine
"Academia has a long legacy of anti-blackness. Seeing the public tenure battles of some of the academy’s most well-respected scholars is an indication of a much larger and mostly unaddressed issue. Black academics are being pushed out of their respective intuitions due to reoccurring problems that plague the ivory tower. It is important to note that predominantly Black institutions are not immune to these issues, but within white institutions, these inequities are exacerbated."
Helpful tips for challenging respectability politics as a form of healing and self-acceptance:
by Jordan Madison, LCMFT & Josee’ Muldrew, M.A., LAPC
Challenge yourself to think of what respectability beliefs you may have internalized that are impacting how you see your value and move through this world
Identify what spaces you are in and/or people you are around when you notice yourself changing to accommodate others.
Distance yourself from people who make you question whether aspects of your identity are respectable
Connect with a community that reminds you of our individual and collective value
Affirm yourself and remember that just simply being you can be a form of activism within it
Nikole Hannah-Jones Denied Tenure at University of North Carolina
"Her hiring brought a backlash from conservatives concerned about her involvement in The Times Magazine’s 1619 Project, which examined the legacy of slavery in America."
Jade
S7/P77
When you wore your Black Lives Matter shirt to work the other day, I was proud. For once, just in that 9-hour workday, it felt like we were actually sisters. And not everybody felt that way.
by Toni Bell
"I used to engage in respectability politics. I was taught that, if I proved I was of “good character,” I would be accepted by white society. I learned that it was my job to convince overtly and covertly racist white people that I was okay. I needed to make myself less threatening to shift their conscious and unconscious racist views and thereby make my life better. I was supposed to change someone else’s preconceived notions about myself based on their delusions of white supremacist superiority."
-Bell
I KNOW WHY THE CAGED BIRD SINGS
by MAYA ANGELOU
The free bird leaps
on the back of the wind
and floats downstream
till the current ends
and dips his wings
in the orange sun rays
and dares to claim the sky.
But a bird that stalks
down his narrow cage
can seldom see through
his bars of rage
his wings are clipped and
his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing.
The caged bird sings
with fearful trill
of the things unknown
but longed for still
and his tune is heard
on the distant hill
for the caged bird
sings of freedom
The free bird thinks of another breeze
an the trade winds soft through the sighing trees
and the fat worms waiting on a dawn-bright lawn
and he names the sky his own.
But a caged bird stands on the grave of dreams
his shadow shouts on a nightmare scream
his wings are clipped and his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing
The caged bird sings
with a fearful trill
of things unknown
but longed for still
and his tune is heard
on the distant hill
for the caged bird
sings of freedom.
No, it’s also how you’re saying it. You keep making the distinction between your side of the tracks and mine. That I’m from this elitism and you’re from the people. That somehow the Black students connect more with you because you spent seven years in community college and you come from their world and you care about them more and therefore you’re more down and I’m just another “tolerant negro” professor that’s absorbed in the system of institutional racism. That’s what you’re saying in those distinctions. If we really want to get real, let’s get all the way real.
Sandra
S7/P73
Sandra
S10/P104
Unable to identify an ally, because we’re all navigating this space without ownership over it. My colleague and I can’t ever relax over our common ground, because we feel expendable.