Gillian Gans 5/6/15 Humanities Coach Clark Throughout this project we have had many courageous conversations. Courageous conversations are the conversations that take courage to talk about, and biggest topic for this project was race. And I’ve almost always known what race is it just was never something I heard people talk about around me. And I’ve learned that race should be talked about and it’s important to be talked about.
In class we were assigned partners and discussed questions we were curious about, worksheets, experiences, stories, things we know or have heard and questions we plan on asking the elders at Brookdale. We also had a socratic seminar on an article about things such as privilege. But one thing that was a huge eye opener to me was the flower petal activity, were we wrote about when we realized race, religion, social class and many others existed. And trying reminiscence, look back and remember when I first encountered these things as a kid. Getting to hear from my partner Steven, the things he has seen or experienced growing up. And just how things such as music, television and social media have shaped our perspectives on these topics weather we realize it or not we are feeding ourselves different types of media constantly. I learned a lot about race through our discussions in class and my partner's experiences.
The elder I Interviewed was named Adolf and he was very open to talking about his whole life story and what it was like for him growing up without a mother and an alcoholic father, and even all the way up to today and how when he lost his wife whom he had ten children with he went into a lot of depression and would even lock his bedroom door so his grandchildren couldn’t see him. He is now on depression medicine but he seemed extremely happy to speak with us and had a lot of really interesting things to say about race. Something that surprised me was how happy he was to open up to us about such an uncomfortable topic for some people, and I learned a lot from him and his life story. And how much he agreed and wanted to be a difference in the world at his age. Some people might think that kids can’t make a difference because they are young or foolish, or even that elders can’t make a difference because they are too old or not willing to stand up for current issues. But I think that Adolf will be a big difference and has all the power to change the other people in that senior home as well. I’ve also learned that you can learn so much from the elders in our community and means a lot to them as well to have kids come and talk to them about their lives.
We talked about race, and got to listen to a story from a middle eastern man who when he came to the U.S from Egypt he didn’t even know any english and he was severely bullied all throughout middle school and highschool for his race. He said in middle school he didn’t even know what they were saying about him but t point he remembered them making a circle around him and laughing at him. He also was almost expelled from his highschool senior year when he was being bullied about where he came from and he got into a physical fight with a black man and he called the man the N word. Which is pretty crazy that he was open to talking about how he was a perpetrator to that black man and called him those things. And It is hard to admit mistakes but he wanted to share us that story in hopes that we would not treat people badly for who they are. It was also interesting when he told us about how in the Egypt women are treated in his hometown. He said even his mom is in a lot lower power than his dad because they are very traditional. But that his mom is okay with it and likes it that way because that is how she was raised and he family has grown her up believing that she is less than a man. Something that surprised me was that this was just a few years ago in San Marcos that he was being bullied for his race. Sometimes I forget that racism and discrimination still happens right in front of our eyes in San Marcos. I learned a lot from interviewing him and his experiences with racism, sexism and other isms. He was very open to sharing about what he has been through and really encouraged Steven and I to be a change in the world also. My subject for our inequality gap lessons was homeownership and my group and I researched inequality between races in homeownership and why that is. We made a powerpoint presentation on the inequality in homeownership, our theory, what we researched and big takeaways for that the rest of the class could write down in there brainbow books and learn from our presentation. I learned so much from my peers during these lessons and was so impressed in how some of my peers made it so interesting and interactive lessons. I do wish I would have invested more time into the presentation and making it more interactive and engaging. It was really surprising that a lot these issues come from wealth and pay. So a lot of the reasons for why there was inequality had to do with money and unequal pay in money, schooling, living and even crime rates are affected. I also learned why there are these inequality gaps and I’m curious to continue to learn how we can break these gaps and be a difference rather than learning that they are real, acknowledging but never taking any action. I also took a survey to find out what my racial preference was and had to short african american and european american faces into good and bad categories, which I didn’t like how some would say good or bad and a race because you can’t judge good or bad by race but I understand what the survey was trying to gather based on time it took us to categorize each face and word. I was surprised that my results said that I have a “strong” preference for european american over african american because I love all people the same. And I was surprised it was “strongly” one way or another. But I also really didn’t not like how the test made us catagorized good and bad adjectives to people's faces for one race or another. I learned that I might have knots tied in me from society that I don’t even realize so I’m going to work to untie my knots because I do love all people just as I’ve been taught from my school, church and family.
I learned about how racism is embedded in our minds with stereotypes and other knots that have been subconsciously tied due to influence from other people. I also learned how it exists in places like the government, banks, hospitals, etc. and how people are treated differently in these places based on their race. We also had a really interesting conversation with Mr.Clark about race and how we are influenced and need to have opinions of our own and untie knots that have been tied in us from other people. It surprised me how at places like banks and hospitals where you would think race would have absolutely nothing to do with well being and earnings, but it does. And how people are still being treated unequally because of their race. I learned how race is everywhere and it’s a big part of you that affects how people view and treat you everyday. And you might not realize how you are affected by race but it might open your eyes to see how others are being affected. Because it’s part of you and will always be apart of who you are and where you came from. I think one way we can change the way we understand and engage with race would be to simply talk about it more. And it shouldn’t be such a hard conversation it should be an important conversation to realize something and then share and talk to people about race so that it doesn’t stay the way it is. By making it more widespread and sharing things like white privilege and teaching these subjects in school we can change conflict one person at a time and through younger generations. Race needs to be talked about more and these subjects should be taught in all schools. This matters because race is something where everyone falls under a box check mark. And people dismiss it if it doesn’t directly affect them and they don’t have to be affected by it if they have a choice. But along with that privilege if you choose to ignore it you are pretty much not caring about all of the people today that are treated unequally for their race, where they came from, sex, religion, language, social class etc. So let’s knock down labels and inequality and be all one clean humans just as we are when first born to the world.