Racial Microaggressions
Strategies for Reporting, Accountability and Healing
What Are Racial Microaggressions?
Definition
Racial Data
Black students are assaulted by racism 5 times a day, on average.
42% of Elementary Mexican students perceived themselves to be the target of teacher discrimination at least once by fourth grade. - Brown 2015
By adolescence Immigrant youth say they experience ethnic discrimination from teachers approximately 2 to 3x a year. - Brown 2015
Students of Color are 2x as likely as White students to report having observed/experienced a teacher telling a joke that mocks or degrades a racial/ethnic group.
About 30% of Asian American, Pacific/ Islander (AAPI) parents said their child experienced a hate incident at school in the past year.
Emotional and Physical Health Impacts of Racial Microaggressions
In my experience as a Black entrepreneur and educator, working and living in a predominately White area, for me, racial microaggressions feel like multiple paper cuts that won't heal. They are painful to the touch. Notably, the scars from these invisible wounds and the inevitable gaslighting that follows, continuously and without mercy, drains the spirit, daily.
Emotional Effects
Low self-esteem
Stress
Anxiety
Depressive symptoms
Suicidal ideation
Psychological distress
Poorer overall mental health
Lower levels of psychological well-being
Physical Health Effects
Headaches
Stomachache
Increased cortisol levels that negatively impact adolescent development
Sleep disturbances
Insomnia
Increased risk of substance, alcohol and tobacco abuse
3 Forms of Racial Microaggressions
Racial Microaggressions gives the overall message to Black Indigenous and Multiracial students, "You don't belong."
Microassaults: These conscious, deliberate, and explicit racist attacks—both verbal and nonverbal—are meant to denigrate or hurt the victim. Name-calling, using racial slurs, avoiding and/or discouraging interracial interactions and displaying a swastika are all examples of microassaults.
Microinsults: While often unconscious and much more subtle, a microinsult demeans and belittles the victim through racial slights or comments that seem innocuous but are insulting to a person of color. For example, a person of color being mistaken for a service worker, or a woman clutching her purse when walking past a person of color, with the message being, “You are a criminal.”
Microinvalidations: These comments and behaviors can exclude and invalidate people’s thoughts, feelings, or experiences in life. For instance, asking an Asian American where they are really from, implies that they are not from the United States and are therefore a foreigner.
What Can You Do? A lot!
Remember:
Silence is violence
Complicity exacerbates Racial Microaggressions
Intent will never supersede impact
Guiding Principles
(Sue, Alsaidi, Awad, Glaeser, Calle, & Mendez, 2019, Thurber & DiAngelo, 2018)
Observer
Gather thoughts
Respond in the moment
Restate
Inquire
Talk it out
Speak up
Get informed
Cultivate and support Anti Racist community within school
Create Racial Trauma informed spaces of Racial healing within the school
Be accountable: Model Anti-Racist behavior
Take action with empathy and care
Highlight universal behaviors not stereotypes
Express disagreement
Interrupt and redirect
Speak up to what has happened
Educate offender
Healing for the:
Racially Harmed
Speak up
Take time for self care
Ask for assistance
Heal, take time and reclaim your voice
Accountability for the:
Offender
Don't center yourself in this situation
Be open to feedback from Racially targeted recipient
Focus on impact not intent
Seek restorative action
Seek counseling/therapy
Attend support groups
Resources
https://tulane.edu/racial-healing-spaces
https://www.amazon.com/Want-More-Than-Survive-Abolitionist/dp/0807069159
https://www.managementcenter.org/staff-board/cheyenne-e-batista/
https://sahanjournal.com/education/st-olaf-diverse-faculty-staff-resignation/
https://hbr.org/2020/07/when-and-how-to-respond-to-microaggressions
Warner, Njathi-Ori, & O''Brien, 2020
Walker, Hodges, Perkins, Sim, ^ Harris, 2022
Thurber & DiAngelo, 2018
Sue, Alsaidi, Awad, Glaeser. Calle, & Mendez 2019
De-Dee Loftin-Davis
South Burlington Vermont School District
577 Dorsett Street
South Burlington Vermont, 05453