Practicing Awareness of Microaggressions

This week in class I have learned about Microaggressions. I have found this topic very interesting and it has really changed my way of thinking. From my observations this week  and reading articles in the newspaper, I realize more than ever how unaware others are when they make comments, which can be seen as microaggressions. So many people really do not understand that the generalizations and stereotypes that they have  can cause hurt in other people.

An example of a microagression is from a newspaper article I read, in which a teacher told a black student to read the poem 'blacker'. (see below)  This microagression is a micro insult, which insults the student and demeans his racial heritage. Also, this is micro invalidation because when he asked the teacher if she thought all black people spoke this way, she reprimanded him and was told to sit down. She invalidated his reality. When I read this article, I was outraged. This has been exactly what we have been learning in class and I was shocked that this teacher would actually tell a student to read it 'blacker.

Ninth-grader says teacher told him to read Langston Hughes poem 'blacker'  By NBC News and msnbc.com staff

A veteran Fairfax County high school teacher has been accused of using racially insensitive language by telling a student to read a Langston Hughes poem in a "blacker" style.

Jordan Shumate, a ninth-grader at George C. Marshall High School in Falls Church, Va., told the Washington Post that he was reading Hughes' "Ballad of the Landlord" when the English teacher interrupted him.

"She told me, 'Blacker, Jordan. C'mon, blacker. I thought you were black,'" Shumate told the Post. The 14-year-old student claimed that when he refused to continue reading the poem, the teacher read it herself, apparently to demonstrate the style of speaking she meant.

"She sounded like a maid on the 1960s," Shumate told the Post, saying he asked the teacher if she thought all black people spoke that way. “She read the poem like a slave, basically.”

He said he was reprimanded for talking out of turn and was told to sit down.

Shumate told his mother, Nicole Cober Page, about the incident on Tuesday, the Post said.

According to the Post, mother and son identified the teacher as Marilyn Bart. Bart has not spoken publicly about the alleged incident, the Post reported.

Principal Jay Pearson declined to provide further details on Friday, adding, “We take these allegations very seriously, and we’re investigating.”