MC Quixote

Mrs. Speardon and Pico Union Bullet-Shell Soup Part 26

I remember the first time I saw Mrs. Speardon and how surprised I was that she was Latina. It's strange that I've gotten used to the idea that my teachers here will probably be Anglos. Now, I try to check myself on these types of assumptions and figure out where they come from.

It seems that after a while I start to reproduce the assumptions that are built into the institutions that I've become a part of; in this case it would be school. I've actually adopted some of the racists' expectations that I'm critical of.

It's strange and complex, but true; and that's why I try to remember to check myself, try to be honest and understand my thinking first, and then try to figure out where the ideas / assumptions come from.

Here in Utah I've gotten to the point where I expect my teachers to be Anglos. About 95% of all my teachers here have been white and most of these teachers didn't really understand my culture or where I came from. After a while it makes you expect that teachers aren't equipped to know who you are on a deeper level and this is what feeds being marginalized. Marginalized is like being separated, ignored, but at the same time there's this lie that you're being recognized and you're equally part of this society.

Being marginalized racially, ethnically, and culturally is like all of these parts of me are sort of ignored, unrecognized, sometimes I say "white-washed", because White / Anglo culture is like the default setting that you get 99% of the time in school here.

This makes me feel like these parts of myself aren't important, they aren't valued within these institutions, pushed to the side, ignored. Strangely, I've noticed that over time I start to reproduce this way of thinking.

When I look at how racial lines are drawn in school here in Salt Lake City; the first thing I notice is that most of the students are brown, but I rarely see a brown teacher. I know, I know, you're gonna call me a racist for making an observation based on race. So, I'm backed into a corner once again. But if I ignore race, I ignore a part of me that I pay a high price to try and keep. And there's the underlying problem when we don't recognize race, the message is loud and clear saying, "We don't have racial inequities here."

It's funny how some people will say, "I'm color blind, I don't judge people based on race. Why are you noticing if your teacher is brown, white, red, or green? It seems like you're being racist."

Those arguments drive me crazy, and it almost always comes from a white person. So I'm trying to wrap my head around this idea of "colorblindness" and it seems to be based on the idea that we don't have any problems with race anymore and things are equitable today. So why are you noticing race?"

Like I said before, more than 70% of the students in this school are brown and 95 % of the teachers are white; there's something wrong with that. And if you look a little deeper, you'll see the ratio of students at the university here is like 80% white and another big problem.

When I'm up at the U. it seems to be a Gringolandia. What's up with that? Why aren't there more brown students up on campus? I think it goes back to the first problem of not having teachers that come from diverse backgrounds. We need those role models because they're an example of what we can become while maintaining our identity. And believe it or not, there are different cultural ways to approach learning which are completely ignored in today's testing-based education.

White people don't know what it's like to face people who are "different" from you saying,

"You can go to college and get an education just like me." It's a message that underneath it says,

"Check your color, culture, and background at the door."

I think most Anglos don't understand why a person like me wouldn't want to put my background in the background for access to power in this system.