Let's talk about race, baby

Let's talk about you and me.

That was essentially the line in class yesterday, though you can throw in a couple of f***s. Guess who said it? Yep, the Troll. (I bet you were hoping you wouldn't have to hear about her again). Yesterday was our last class, and apparently she decided to "crash" the class (her own words I heard second-hand, later). We had all been asked to consider our race, and to consider it in terms of ourselves and our own particular identity formation, in the context of the impact our positionality will have on our reading of materials, and what we bring to our research. Huge enough question for you? As you might imagine, no one was really looking forward to the conversation. It was scheduled for the second half of class, after the student presentations. Troll came in and decided, from her reading of an online discussion post written by another student (let's call him Tortured Latino- TL), that TL was alienated and was never going to come back because of how racist we were and how poorly we treated him. She said we had to talk about it immediately-- that the planned student presentation of the book we read was not important. No one had read the post which was causing her so much distress, but several of us were at the ready to put her in her place and say no, we have a class scheduled, you need to relax. Even the professor stood up to her on this point. What would possess an undergrad to completely derail a grad seminar? I get that she's radical, but honestly. So, we started the class, the discussion leaders immediately had us discuss something in small groups, TL entered class and Troll proceeded to talk with him, burst into tears, and leave the class!

Apparently she called him in the morning saying that she wanted to hijack the class, and he had said he wasn't interested. So she did it anyway, in his name, and then when he came in (he purposely showed up late to avoid her) he didn't back her up. She had interpreted his post completely differently (apparently TL does not think we are all racist and he was willing to come back to class) AND she had presented it as if they were the best of friends and had spent many hours discussing such issues. When I read his post later I had no idea what she was fired up about. He was actually saying that race should not be the topic of discussion; by making it something to talk about there is already a problem. TL told me after class that, prior to her crazed early morning phone call, he had never spoken to her. JEEEZ, people. Need I underline how ridiculous this is? I learned later, of course, that Troll had called another friend of mine who is not even in the class, but somehow always seems to get involved in such drama (again, someone she NEVER speaks to on the phone) to say that she had been silenced in the class. My friend told me that the professor told Troll that she was no longer welcome in her classes. OMG. You might wonder why the professor didn't do something about this sooner!

So, the Troll left the seminar crying, we limped awkwardly through the discussion and then we did indeed talk about race, baby. It was painful, not that talking about race is inherently a bad thing to do. It's a good exercise, but here it wasn't framed very productively. The student "of color" who was the motivating force behind the discussion seemed to want us to say that we were racist and we were sorry for his painful childhood. Maybe that's unfair. It really wasn't clear what he wanted us to say. He wanted to tell us about his tragic life, though. He didn't like it when we tried to take the conversation in other directions, (i.e. what to do as a teacher if you notice that your students' grades correlate with race). He wanted to get personal. Even the professor pointed out that some people don't like to share personal stories in class. My white friend and I (clearly the racist women in the class) tried to point out that there are spaces for getting to know more about each other, and social spaces can be valuable learning environments, which is why we have been trying to boost departmental community. Of course we were speaking from our position of privilege (and one woman "of color" in class piped up about how she does not come to events because she feels excluded). I'm not sure what we could do to help her feel included, honestly. Our department is diverse in many senses of the word- is there a magical potion that might help her feel included? (She's friends with my enemy so I don't trust her anyway. She is down on the whole program. She's also from Canada and always talks about how there are no racial problems there. Um, ok). I could rant so much more on this issue. Let me just be clear: I do think that as educators we need to explore productive ways to talk about difference, and what we bring to the table when we teach students and do our research. I am not opposed to talking about it. However, I DO NOT think those conversations should always end with the blame game and white privilege.

On that note, I finished my crazy Wednesday of classes (thank goodness!), I taught my last class and had my last student meetings today, I sent out the agenda for my committee meeting on Monday, and realized that it was May Day. Happy May, everyone! I can't believe I am at the end of another semester. It was sad saying good-bye to my class this morning; I really had a good group this semester. TMH is coming tomorrow, I have my big meeting Monday, some papers to write and more scary hoops to jump through, and I will be on my way (at the end of the month). It's hard to believe!