February is coming to an end and I have failed to have the conversation that I had hoped to have with my daughter about racism and black American history. She’s heard poems by Langston Hughes and Nikki Giovanni, knows the lyrics to Leadbelly’s “Good Morning Blues” and we just read a story by Jackie Robinson’s daughter called Testing the Ice, a beautiful parable about everyday courage that features the famous ballplayer in an unexpected role. But I have yet to connect the dots.
It is one thing to share third-person stories about other dark-skinned people who weren’t treated fairly or overcame incredible odds. (It is one thing to cuddle up to black dolls with names like Harriet, Ida, and Sasha.) When the perspective changes, when the story is about you, me, and us – our family, our lives – well, that’s another thing.
I once considered the implications of “Creative Freedoms and the Not Now Book” and the choices parents and teachers must make when it comes to introducing controversial material to children. My little one is turning four in a few months and she’s become more observant, more inquisitive. Whether I like it or not, now is the time to talk about racism.
In Jonathan Liu’s recent post on GeekDad called, “How to Raise Racist Kids,” he offers disturbing sltatistics about the larger consequences of our reluctance to talk about race in America. It’s a great piece, and while it’s mostly aimed at white parents, this passage struck home:
We’ll say things like “everybody’s equal” but find it hard to be more specific than that. If our kids point out somebody who looks different, we shush them and tell them it’s rude to talk about it. We think that simply putting our kids in a diverse environment will teach them that diversity is natural and good.
I winced at this last sentence. It applies just as much to me, a black parent (with advanced degrees in African-American Studies, for heaven’s sake) as it does to the rest of the nation. Though I know better than to make romanticized claims for preserving her innocence, I worry that her recently developed sense of fairness and mutual respect will be shaken. I worry that she’ll turn on her non-black preschool playmates with anger or shame. I worry that her first understanding of history – the stories of past realities that shape our present – will be tangled up with confusions about prejudice, difference, and hard-won triumphs.
Liu’s post directed me to an article by Sasha Emmons at Parenting.com that I’ve since found quite helpful: “5 Tips for Talking About Racism With Kids.” Reading the suggestions from Dr. Beverly Tatum in the piece made me realize that one of the biggest obstacles that I’ve not fully acknowledged until now is the fear that my daughter will learn about racism the way I did – not with screaming racial slurs and burning crosses, but through hushed words and stern glances.
Do you remember how you learned about race and racism? I recall the moments as puzzle pieces. One of your great uncles lets something slip. Your classmate makes an ignorant joke. You begin to unravel the subtext in all those re-runs of The Jeffersons and Good Times, and you see your mother wiping her eyes as she watches Roots on the tiny black-and-white TV in the kitchen. A librarian gives you a copy of Mildred D. Taylor’s Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry and the truth that has been creeping on you for years becomes very real. You’ve been oppressed, enslaved, hated for nothing more than the color of your skin. And the problem still persists today.
It’s tough. Even as I look for ways to simplify these conversations (plural, because I realize this is an ongoing thing), I am also wary of limiting the scope of her knowledge to what NPR’s Sam Sanders calls, “the peanut gallery.” Nevertheless, as I head out to a local Harambee Festival today on this last weekend in Black History Month, I am letting go of the notion that my daughter will learn what’s important simply by our proximity to drum circles, gospel choirs, and MLK posters. Instead I’m going to keep the very first step of Dr. Tatum’s advice in mind: “Don’t be afraid to bring it up.”
I’d love to hear about your experiences and any suggestions in the comments below!
Posted by Miss Incognegro on February 27, 2010 at 10:31 AM
A wonderful post. You know, I actually don’t recall my first experience with racism. Perhaps because it was subtle, as so many are.
I agree with Dr. Tatum. However, it’s not that I’m afraid to raise the topic, but others are afraid to engage. Mainly because they don’t know how.
Posted by Claudia on February 28, 2010 at 6:38 AM
I know what you mean about others being afraid to engage, Miss I. Let’s hope that more people read that GeekDad post. (But hey, wasn’t Obama’s presidency supposed to bring this conversation out in the open more? lol)
Posted by susan on February 27, 2010 at 12:59 PM
Claudia,
I learned about racism much like you did. Growing up in Detroit with black leadership and black role models everywhere, I was insulated in many ways. It wasn’t that I wasn’t aware of racism rather it was I didn’t feel directly affected until I was older when like you said the pieces fell into place.
I love your closing. I read the same article at GeekDad A lot of us like to say children, especially our children are more open-minded that they don’t care about color but that’s not what I see in the city or the suburbs. What I see arr children who cross racial divides because that’s who they are and then there those who don’t cross racial divides for the same reason. I was a kid who always hung out with a mixed crowd. When my youngest was little she asked me why all my friends were white. At the time I worked in publishing so a lot of activities we attended were mostly white and many were my friends. My oldest who grew up when I worked in the restaurant industry reacted very differently to my mix crowd of friends. She thought it was normal.
We think telling our children that we celebrate and embrace diversity is enough. But kids look at who you’re friends are, where you live and how you interact with co-workers at social functions.
And regarding Testing the Ice, I shared this with a co-worker who read it with her daughter. Guess what she said. She asked her mother why the characters were so black, said she was a little frightened by the images but she did like the story. What do say to say like that? My co-worker is black.
Posted by Claudia on February 28, 2010 at 6:26 AM
Whoa. I’m sorry to hear your co-worker’s daughter had such a reaction! Then again, Dr. Tatum does remind us that children often hear prejudiced remarks and repeat them unthinkingly. (So unfortunate, though, since Kadir Nelson’s artwork is amazing, he does such a great job with the detail of Robinson’s face.)
Thanks for your comment, Susan, and for reminding us that we are our children’s first teachers.
Posted by Wilhelmina Jenkins on February 27, 2010 at 1:57 PM
I started kindergarten in 1954, the year of Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka. That same year ,we moved from NE Washington, DC, where we lived in an all-Black apartment building, to a house in a recently integrated neighborhood in NW DC. We were the second black family on the block, and most of the students in the recently integrated public school on the corner. My first experience with racism was with a little girl in my class at school. Her family was Greek, and they forbade her to play with black children. We could play together at school, but not on our block. The second incident I remember was a classmate from India who had a sign on her back yard saying, “No N—— Allowed.” I remember feeling angry, but I didn’t feel that these incidents reflected on me. I just thought (and was undoubtedly taught) that these people were just ignorant.
My grandson, who is biracial, has a very multiethnic school and social environment, but his family lives in a black neighborhood. He has occasionally had to deal with black children who ask, “What are you?” He finds that to be a strange question. (He has light tan skin and long, dark, curly hair.) He is, so far, very comfortable with who he is. I can only hope that he stays that way.
Posted by Claudia on February 28, 2010 at 6:34 AM
Mina, I always love hearing about your experiences in DC. It sounds as if you had a strong foundation to rely on when you heard and saw those ignorant people and I want that for my daughter too. Then again, it may be, in part, because of those incidents that you are unafraid to talk so frankly with your grandson and the students in his class. In any case, I’m glad that those children have you around!
Posted by Wilhelmina Jenkins on February 27, 2010 at 3:42 PM
With respect to Susan’s comment about images in books, one of the saddest stories I’ve read was in the newspaper a few years ago. At a conference of black librarians, an author had her picture book on display. She had illustrated the book and had modeled the main character on her own grandmother who had dark skin and African features. The hostility she experiences from other black people was terrible. They actually were angry with her, saying, “We don’t look like that anymore!” Apparently it’s OK to be black if you look like Beyonce, but looking too African was not acceptable.
One thing that has surprised me is the hostility toward other groups that children pick up from society even when their parents don’t hold those views. Black children in my grandson’s class have expressed terribly negative opinions about Latinos, for example. I know these kids’ parents, and they would faint if they heard what their children said. Of course, since at this point I feel like EVERYONE’S grandma, we talked it out on the spot, but I wonder what ideas they may have picked up that no adult has heard.
Posted by jo on February 27, 2010 at 10:38 PM
this is a great post. my admittedly limited experience (i have been in the US only for 20 years, never had a childhood here) suggests to me that personal conversations about race happen very, very rarely among adults of different races, too. i don’t think that “a lack of communication about race in many of our own childhoods” is all that makes it difficult to talk about race to someone we do not immediately assume is on the same page as us (5 Tips..). i don’t think i am the only liberal white person who gets nervous about “not getting it right” around black people. people of different colors converse about race only in public settings — often to the detriment of real conversations and serious teaching moments (which i, for one, feel i need badly).
i think, for instance, that white and black liberals have yet to have a real conversation about obama.
or maybe this conversation has taken place in some public setting i’m not familiar with (academia, liberal media, liberal blogs), but it’s not taking place over coffee or over email or over facebook.
and i don’t know you guys, but where i have lived in those 20 years (los angeles, miami), mixed friendships are few and far in between. i feel that at least some of us are a long way from being able to embody rule number 5.
i also want to say that the stats in “How to Raise Racist Kids” are very depressing.
Posted by Claudia on February 28, 2010 at 7:00 AM
Hmmm…the pressure to “get it right” does keep many of us silent. We hold ourselves up to some pretty high standards, don’t we? But I agree with Mina, that honesty and willingness to learn about others is a good place to start.
So where/when/what would these real conversations and teaching moments look like? I mean, do Facebook/Twitter/Goodreads threads lack the kind of substance you’d like to see, jo? Because I’ve found that I have more mixed friendships online than in person and sometimes, more honest conversations too. Although they may be brief. But then again, I’m not exactly saying anything too controversial on Twitter.
Posted by jo on February 28, 2010 at 1:36 PM
thanks for engaging with me on this. this is what happens to me. if i have a question about race to which i just do not know the answer, i don’t ask my black friends, because a. what if the question is offensive? b. what if i should totally know the answer already? c. what if they do not want to be/are fed up of being the spokespersons for their race? so i ask my white friends.
facebook has a more impersonal approach, in the sense that i can say something about race there without addressing it to any particular friend in my friends’ list. but interracial conversations about race, even on facebook, are, it seems to me, very much coated with a strain of over-politeness and guardedness.
maybe we should all be a little less afraid. we are inevitably going to step on each other’s toes, whether we talk about race or eating meat. but there is no other way. maybe stepping on each other’s toes will make us all a bit more appreciative of each other’s bodies — the delicate shape of each digit, the three little phalanxes that compose it, the nice little moon of a nail at the tip, the color of the nailpolish. i think we should simply talk, say what we think, write WTF when WTF is our reaction, be polite but be open and try to make conversations across races flourish. the internet is a great tool for this. we are much more likely to meet here than at the supermarket, because, alas, we tend to go to different supermarkets. at least in miami and los angeles. which are the only two US cities i know.
Posted by Wilhelmina Jenkins on February 28, 2010 at 3:12 PM
Friendship does not require a perfect score on the race test. Probably a good sense of humor about race works as well as anything else. I may tease my white friends when they are off-base about a racial issue, but it doesn’t affect the friendship. I still haven’t broken one of my better friends of saying she’s color-blind, but I do tease her about it. What does restrict friendships is holding back for fear of offense. Hey, if I have any dumb questions about Italians, you are the first person I’ll ask! (And, boy, jo, can you write! I love the “toes” analogy!)
Posted by Wilhelmina Jenkins on February 28, 2010 at 12:15 AM
Well, since both of my children are married to white people, I am in an unusual situation. (Some of you have seen pictures of my family.) But I believe that when we encourage our children to actually judge people by the content of their character rather than just paying lip service to King’s words, we have to be sure that we believe what we are saying. It may take another generation before social barriers begin to tumble.
I don’t think that you should hold yourself to the standard of “getting it right” all the time. Who does? But honesty and willingness to learn about others is an excellent start. I think that you are right about black and white liberals not talking about Obama, but you are also right that those two groups don’t talk openly about much. Maybe interaction on the internet is a good beginning.
Posted by jo on February 28, 2010 at 2:13 AM
“It may take another generation before social barriers begin to tumble.” from your mouth to god’s ears. a generations seems a dream to me! hey, and good night! sleepless people make good internet interlocutors. i’m gonna go read Twilight. :)
Posted by carleen on February 28, 2010 at 1:15 PM
I know this isn’t the point, but…your daughter sings Leadbelly?! That is officially the cutest thing EVER.
Posted by Wilhelmina Jenkins on February 28, 2010 at 3:13 PM
This is a perfect moment for YouTube!
Posted by Claudia on February 28, 2010 at 6:46 PM
Hahahaha! Okay, so let me be clear: it’s the refrain, “Good morning blues, how do you do? I’m doing alright, good morning how are you?” that we sing to one another. And it is awfully cute. Clearly I haven’t had a problem introducing her to some things a little early.
Posted by RL on February 28, 2010 at 8:21 PM
Though I’m not yet a mom, I can certainly appreciate this post, Claudia, on more than one level. This semester, I’m teaching an Intro to Black Psychology course. Two weeks ago, the topic was “Racial Socialization” which is characterized by educating our children about race and racism so that *when* racism happens, our children will have some context with which to cope and some understanding of how others may perceive them. FYI, Howard C. Stevenson, UPenn, is the primary psychology researcher in this area. Of course, there’s discussion to the contrary that the goal will backfire and that children will internalize racist beliefs rather than becoming fully functioning members of society. In class, I posed a discussion question regarding whether White couples adopting Black children from Haiti were responsible for socializing these children, racially. Though some folks were conflicted, the overwhelming majority of my 60% Black/40% White class agreed.
My first recalled experience of racism (though I didn’t know to call it that at the time (but was disgusted by it later), was in first grade down in Savannah, GA. I was 1 of 2 Black students in my class. I was always eager to answer questions that were raised in class, but my teacher typically ignored me. Next thing I knew, I was removed from the class and put in one that was all Black. Later, I realized that I’d been moved from the top (gifted) class to the “third” class. In the new class, I was bored and typically helped my classmates get their work done. When I asked my mom about this some years ago, she said that they justified this and she didn’t know to challenge it. The error of my placement wasn’t discovered until 4th grade when I was “retested” and subsquently placed in gifted classes. All that my parents ever told me about race was that I would have to “work twice as hard to get half as far”. Perhaps if they told me more about racism, I would I have known to *check* Miss Pullen :-).
Posted by Claudia on March 1, 2010 at 1:11 PM
Thanks for stopping by, RL. I’m a bit horrified by the story of your first grade experience. No, a lot horrified. I can only hope that our own knowledge of these things will encourage us to ask more questions when it comes to our children. Racism has a way of being subtle and insidious like that. Awful, just awful.
Oh, and thanks for the Howard C. Stevenson reference!
Posted by Holly on March 3, 2010 at 11:26 PM
Great topic. I’m bothered by parents who say, ‘kids don’t see color’ — what? Of course they do. What they haven’t got yet is the context of it — and THAT is what we should be helping them shape by talking about race NOW. Sometimes I worry I lay it on thick with my 6-year old. He’s all I KNOW MOM because I talk about history and race and the ridiculousness of hate. The kid learns in two languages each day and is proficient in a third, he’s lived abroad, and he gets that people are different… so I’ve backed off. I was beginning to feel like I was trying to instill white guilt in him early, when what I was really trying to do was get him primed to set the stage about him understanding white privilege as he gets older.
Posted by Talking about Race « UUCIF Social Justice on March 11, 2010 at 11:38 PM
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