Lessons Learned: Facilitating Social Justice Dialogues as a Woman of Color

Lessons Learned: Facilitating Social Justice Dialogues as a Woman of Color

            As a Student Affairs Administration Masters student, last semester I had the opportunity to teach a three-credit undergraduate leadership course with a fellow cohort mate, who is the only other woman of color in my cohort. Both of us entered student affairs because of our passion for social justice and inclusion and felt a responsibility to integrate concepts of privilege and power into the course. We utilized the social change model of leadership (Komives & Wagner, 2009) as a framework for the course. The experience of facilitating a 26-student, predominantly White, majority male, leadership course as two women of color left us both struggling with more questions about social justice education than we had started with:

• How do I teach concepts of privilege and oppression when students believe I have a “race (or other social identity) agenda”?
• How do I create spaces where students who hold marginalized identities are not further silenced?
• How do I use a co-constructed learning pedagogy where students are validated as knowers and still disrupt oppressive comments?
• How do I share my perspectives and experiences without furthering the assumption that I have an “agenda”?
• How do I “safely” challenge students’ perspectives in ways that won’t cause them to disengage?

We struggled with these questions throughout the semester and ultimately came across the work of Rodriguez and colleagues. They offered theoretical perspectives and their experiences about being women of color teachers in predominantly White classrooms that deeply resonated with us. We felt validated and empowered and in community with other women of color. Rodriguez et al. discuss the work of Freire: he argues that teachers hold authority, referring to the power to influence learning, thought, and behavior. However, “Freire’s theories do not necessarily consider how classroom dynamics change dramatically once the oppressed actually becomes the teacher and the privileged become the students” (Rodriguez et al., 2012, p. 97). The “authority” that my co-facilitator and I supposedly held as teachers was often absent. My White cohort mates were sometimes referred to as Dr. and Professor, but from the moment we entered the classroom on the first day of the semester, we had to earn the respect of our students and prove our competence as educators. The hours we spent around my kitchen table, carefully outlining facilitation questions and searching through activity guides to find ones that would be the least “threatening” and engage privileged students most; the cautiously chosen words and responses to students’ comments; the conscientious choice to have guest facilitators introduce concepts of privilege – they were a necessity for us to be effective in our roles as educators.

Additionally, in our experience facilitating, we were challenged by the notion of a “safe space.” What does a “safe space” look like? More importantly, who is a “safe space” truly safe for? We found that often the “safe space” reinforced oppression, as students with privileged identities were allowed to explore their dominant perspectives at the expense of students with marginalized identities. By not directly addressing a racist statement for fear of shutting down a White student for sharing their perspectives, we often perpetuated oppression in our classroom. We began to utilize strategies, some of which are described below, to attempt to create “brave spaces” that allow power and privilege to be disrupted.

Using the work of Arao and Clemens, Rodriguez and colleagues, and after reflecting on my own experiences, I put forward some suggestions for facilitating conversations about privilege and oppression. Some of these are tools that any social justice educators may use, but may be especially meaningful for educators who hold marginalized identities.

From Safe Spaces to Brave Spaces: Arao and Clemens (2013) offer alternatives to common rules that are often used in facilitating dialogues. A common rule is “challenge by choice” which means individuals can choose to what degree they will participate (p. 146). While this concept is important tenant of social justice education – learners should choose the level of vulnerability they wish to engage in – Arao and Clemens suggest asking participants to consider what keeps them from challenging themselves, with a particular focus on their social group membership. Regarding the rule of “no attacks,” they believe it is important to spend time discussing the difference between a personal attack (“You’re a jerk”) and a challenge to an idea or belief (“I find that idea to be heterosexist”) (Arao and Clemens, p. 148).

High Expectations, Critical Thinking, Speaking Out: Rodriguez et al. (2012) recommends having high expectations of all students and making these expectations explicitly known. They also emphasize critical writing and thinking as important outcomes, rather than solely focusing on whether or not students “get it” in regard to social justice concepts. While these two recommendations may align more with educators in a formal classroom setting, the suggestions can still be instituted in a workshop or program. Lastly, they advocate for speaking out about our experiences and addressing our struggles through dialogue and writing: “By naming our experiences, we hope to open up dialogues that focus on such struggles” (Rodriguez et al., p. 105).

Vulnerability: The most successful and engaging conversations we had in our class occurred when we, as facilitators, and our students were most vulnerable with one another. My co-facilitator is one of the most passionate, strongest, and fierce women I know and the vulnerability she showed sharing her life experiences with a room full of students was inspiring. It also allowed our students to hear and understand her experiences with marginalization and oppression and to see them as her (and many others’) reality.

As I begin my journey into student affairs with my first full time position, I hope to continue to better understand my identity as social justice educator. I am still searching for the answers to the questions above, and many of my mentors, some of whom are women faculty of color, have told me I will be searching for the rest of my career. I hope to continue to engage in dialogue about these questions, reflect on my experiences, read literature and theory, and hear others stories and experiences.

References

Arao, B., & Clemens, K. (2013). From safe spaces to brave spaces: A new way to frame dialogue around diversity and social justice. In L. M. Landreman (Ed.), The art of effective facilitation (pp. 135-150). Sterling, VA: Stylus Publishing.

Komives, S. R., Wagner, W., & Associates. (2009). Leadership for a better world: Understanding the social change model of leadership development. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Rodriguez, D., Boahene, A. O., Gonzales-Howell, N., & Anesi, J. (2012). Practicing liberatory pedagogy: Women of color in college classrooms. Cultural Studies ßà Critical Methodologies, 12(2), 96-108.

Nadeeka Karunaratne

Michigan State University

Graduate Assistant

nadeeka.karunaratne@gmail.com

Twitter: @nadeeks3