Practicing Awareness of Microaggressions

This week, so far has been extremely hot and humid, which was a great time to spend time together at a waterpark/amusement park with my three children and cousins.  As I packed up our things, I thought about this blog assignment and put on my microaggression glasses.  Wasn't hard to immediately notice microaggressions around, including with my own family and even within myself (if thinking and becoming upset inside, rather than speaking outloud is a type of microaggression).  Let me explain the example of feelings within myself, that may have slipped out a little!  Before the park opens our National Anthem is played and the announcement is to please remove your hats out of respect for our country.  As I looked around I was appalled at the number of adults that chose to leave their hats on, not to mention the talking, people of all races.  So I motioned to a man across from me to take off his hat, he did and smiled.  My opinion is that someone shouldn't have to tell you to do that.  You should be proud of living here in the United States and respect our country.  I guess this may not be a form of microaggression, but rather peoples disrespect behavior towards our country.  Ok, enough of that situation that had me a bit fired up. 

Major microassault came from the mouth's of my cousins.  There was something to say about every race and ability there.  Such as "don't you know blacks can't swim?", "I couldn't even understand what he was saying".  The sad thing was that there 10 year old son makes similar comments about people to my son.  So, I had a talk with my son and mentioned that what he is saying is disrespectful and to walk away when he is making those comments.  Soon the boy got the hint and I didn't hear anything else.  The parents on the other hand finally got the hint when I did not respond to there comments. 

I truly believe that working with such a diverse group of individuals has made me accept and appreciate differences among people.  And to hear the blatant remarks that really were uncalled for (the victims were doing nothing harmful or disrespectful) really made me cringe.  Now I need to figure out how to address those making such microaggressions in a respectful but matter of fact way.

                                                                       

Perspecitves on Diversity and Culture

For this assignment I chose to ask a co-worker who has been in the early childhood field for at least 20 years, my husband, and my son, Trevor who is 11 years-old.  Below are their responses:

Culture-

"How a group, family behaves, what they believe, how they dress,eat, based on their ethnicity and the environment they live. Culture is driven by ethnicity but becomes absorbed and changes overtime as the people become a part of their environmental influences- A Arabic family may still eat typically ethnic food and speak their native language, but adapt to environmental influences regarding dress, social norms to become accepted while maintaining the values they deem important to their ethnicity."

"religion, ethics, morals, and beliefs"

"Everything around you.  Like your family, your house, your pets, your belongings.  The way families act, vehicles they ride, language and sign language."


Diversity-

"The differences within a group of people, culture, or ethnic group."

"Everybody has their own beliefs and are entitled to their own beliefs"

"Something that is different.  Diversity would be a good thing, but different.  Everybody is right, nobody is bad."

From the answers you could probably tell that the first response was the early childhood educator, the second my husband, and the third my son.  Between the three of them, they mostly hit deep culture elements.  My son may have been the closest with touching on surface culture, such as your house, pets, and belongings.   A few elements that were omitted by all three are gender roles, health care, and showing emotion. 

Their responses have made me realize that my family knows more about culture and diversity than I thought!!  And that it is not just surface culture that is being valued, but deep culture as well.  However, when I asked my son if they talk about culture in school, he said "no".  That for me was disheartening.  With our society becoming more and more diverse, culture and character education should be at the forefront of the Social Studies curriculum.  Time for a trip to see the principle!

My Family Culture

Three items that I hold dear and which I consider to represent my family culture are:



1.  My family scrapbook  
     The scrapbook is one that I have been working on since my first chid was born.  It holds memories of my children's births, family, friends, vacations, and many other activities our family and friends have enjoyed together.  Even today, our family often takes out the book and looks at it and talks about the fun times together and who the family members are in the photos, past and present.



2.  My coin collection    
     The coin collection comes from my late grandfather, who originally had given it to my mom, who then passed it down to me.  All 3 of his children received a set, however, my mother is the only one who did not sell them.  Now that my grandfather is no longer with us, and with his passing came family turmoil, which resulted in his biological children receiving none of his personal belongings, I still have a piece of him with me.  I also know that it means a lot to my mom that I value our family enough to hold on to a part of her dad.  Even though I plan to never get rid of the coins, in a situation where the coins could possibly reunite me with my country and the rest of my family, I would consider using them only for that instance.



3.  Our birth certificates, social security cards, liscenses, etc. 
     Not really sure why, but never know when you might need them.  Not sure what the other country requires.  So I guess they would be good items to have when going to the unknown.  When my children grow up, they would have these documents.

If I had to give up 2?  I certainly would want to keep the one that would benefit our family in the future.   Which 1 would possibly reunite us with the rest our family and possibly give us the opportunity to leave the host country if need be.  I guess I would have to give up the scrapbook and coin collection.  However, if I thought the possibility of being reunited with family and friends and leaving the host country was never possible,  I would give up the coin collection and birth certificates, social security cards, liscenses, etc. 

I guess this assignment has made me think that I am optimistic and think about what is best for the future.  Family is certainly important, however, thinking about what would make our family happy and successful in the long run is a priority.