Learning about microaggression and its compound effect on targets of it has made me ashamed of myself and the countless times I have been the person unintentionally causing discomfort to people I have been in contact with. I want to really learn to be able to distinguish between proper compliments and how they are worded and comments that constitute microaggression.
My evening co-teacher is a beautiful black woman. She changes her hair regularly, sometimes wearing wigs, sometimes putting in extensions, sometimes doing her natural hair in creative ways. I found out black hair doesn't get washed too often. I am always telling her I wish I had her hair, which is listed as one of "nine things everyone needs to stop saying to black women immediately"(Turner, 2014) because my options are: down, or ponytail. I can't skip two days washing, conditioning, and
blow drying, or my head would look like a greasy mess. But I feel I am being honest; I admire the versatility, and the apparent easy-care.
I have also joked with a gay co-worker about his (assumed) sense of style, but it always seemed encouraged by him. Now I am wondering if my comments were first, or after his poking fun at himself.
I would like to present a scenario to my colleagues for your opinion:
I am a white, middle class, 50+ woman. I happen to listen to a lot of rap, among other types of music, probably because my 18 year old fills my playlist for me. While passing a table of co-workers chatting among themselves, all young, single people, the man at the table made a reference to an older song (I don't know the title) about wobble, baby, wobble, baby and I sang the verse and did a little dance. They all were shocked, laughed and made comments about my knowledge of the song words and hurting myself moving like that at my age.
Should I have been offended? I did feel a little weird and thought maybe I should have kept to myself. Can members of the dominant culture be targets of micro aggression? I shudder at how many remarks I have made to my daughter's boyfriend about his whiteness, all in fun, but I'm sure he's tired of it. He said he was nicknamed sunscreen boy in college.
Reference:
Turner, E. (2014). Nine things everyone needs to stop saying to black women. http://everydayfeminism.com/2014/10/9-things-stop-saying-black-women/
Renee,
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed your post because of your honesty. Surely everyone of us has unintendedly committed microaggression. I feel that there is a grey area, where humor and banter is taken as microaggression - perhaps the relationships and the situations can better define it.
When you sang and danced, perhaps your colleagues teased you as a compliment. Perhaps if they thought you would be offended, they would not have commented as such. My opinion is that it depends on the relationships and the intentions.
Interesting topic.
Zeina
Hello Renee,
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading your blog. In my opinion, I think your colleagues were laughing in good term as oppose to negativity. Yet, I can understand your concerns in regards to some young people tend to discriminate elderly people. The concept of hair has been a major debate for women in the Black Community. As a Black woman, reading your experienced brought up an incident that occurred years ago about a young African-American girl was told to remove dreadlocks by school officials. They stated her dreadlocks was a distraction in school environment. In our community, hair represents pride. Our hair tells a story on how far we come in society.
Tanya Terrell
Hi Renee,
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed your post! Yes, being an African American lady, I also change my hairstyles a lot and other races usually admire it. I can honestly say, I don't remember anything being offensive that has been said to me. I don't know how they felt about my hair honestly. I also think it was pretty cool that you are in tune with the rap music, I think your co workers were a little jealous. Keep it up Renee!
Good Job!
Hey Renee,
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading your post! I too didn't realize some of the discomfort that I may have caused people due to microaggresions. Its funny how you stated that people were laughing when you started dancing to the "wobble", but that is indeed considered a "black" dance song. I feel the same way when some of my friends look at me when I'm singing a Katie Perry Song or quote verses from a country song. These are all stereotypical things that we don't realize can caused people to feel discomfort. After this week's reading and after reading your blog post, I have become more cautious of what I say around people. Great post!
Eboni