Topic:
the Implicated privilege and stigma
Mary double-checked the competencies and the rest of the course components
of the coming unit of her Introduction to Diversity
Studies online class. This semester, she had two sociology sections (one face-to
face-and one online), three diversity studies (one face-to-face, one blended,
and one online), and one Contemporary American Society (fac-to-face).
Colleagues in
similar academic fields to Mary’s tended to express a preference: not to be
assigned for facilitating Diversity Studies and Contemporary American Society courses
on their teaching-preference sheets. As for Mary, usually, she did not express
a preference. Being an active union
member, after Act 10, Mary could smell a vague silence and passivity lingering
around campuses. To be more viable as the only minority faculty in this college,
she tried to be as accommodating as best as she could.
Why did Mary check Competencies first? That was the kick in the tech college
teaching environment. Competency-based learning is emphasized in many tech colleges.
They are required by the educational policies of the State. It is a framework
for teaching and assessment of learning, which is also described as a type
of education focusing on outcomes and real-world performance. Based on the
objectives, Mary designed course contents, learning activities, and assessments
aligned with each competency.
For this unit, the competencies were “Assess how power and privilege impact
individuals and groups,” and “Examine the impact of biases and behaviors on
relationships (personal and group).
Mary checked
again all the grammar, spellings, lecture notes, PowerPoint,
worksheets/assignments, and guidelines of each hands-on project. Viola, “Well
done,” she, patted on her own back.
Some homework started appearing in the assignment area of the Learning
Management System which was changed from BlackBoard, Edvance360, to current Canvas. Mary read each student’s
submission carefully and returned with a grade and feedback as timely and
effective as possible. Recalling when Mary
was a student, anxious about how well she was doing on the homework, and what
the score was, were the main concerns during those days. For this quick-feedback
to students’ assignments earned for Mary's high evaluation and praises from learners
in the online learning environment.
As usual, some assignments were completed
in a hurry; some were based on “the least effort principles.” The rest were part of the
teaching-n-learning Routine Tasks. “The best, yet to come…,” Mary patiently
waited for the most rewarding moment to happen. In every class, there was
always, approximately, 10 to 15% of students’ work that brought forth great joy
to Mary. That was the most exciting moment to be an educator.
Then, suddenly,
Ryan’s assignment showed up. That was what Mary called a “joyously exciting
moment.” Ryan was a very good student, turning in homework on time, and completing
each worksheet gingerly. So far, he was in the A grade level. Mary could not
wait to read his assignment.
Mary eagerly opened his worksheet. Then, “what was going on?” Mary was
shocked. Ryan typed with all capped big
font size with bolded sentences all over his worksheet,
“WHAT PRIVILEGE”? JUST BECAUSE I AM A WHITE MALE?”
“THIS ASSIGNMENT IS FILLED WITH NONSENSE! LIST THE TOP FIVE PRIVILEGES AND
STIGMAS THAT I POSSESS? LET ME TELL YOU, I DON’T HAVE ANY PRIVILEGE. I WORK 2
PART-TIME JOBS, AND LIVE IN THE TRAILER PARK! ”
Seemingly,
shouting at Mary, Ryan continued, “WELL, STIGMAS, YES, I HAVE A BUNCH: A POOR GUY, RAISED BY A SINGLE MOM, NO HEALTH
INSURANCE, NO STABLE JOBS, LIVING IN AN UNDESIRABLE CONDITION… WHAT ELSE DO YOU
WANT TO KNOW?”
“Wow, what a
genuine writing…” Mary murmured to herself, “at least, Ryan did express his deep
concerns. Though he was unhappy about this assignment, he did not submit a
get-by, perfunctory homework.” You know,
once in a while, some students in order to get the 3 required credits without
“troubles”, write something to fit teachers’ basic “expectation” or “taste” to avoid
any ramifications.
“Well, how do I write a feedback to him…,” Mary started thinking of questions
that Ryan raised entangled with many socio-economic issues, such as the
socialization process and agents, cultural capital, life chances, social class,
social mobility within capitalism and so on so forth, not just race, ethnicity,
gender etc. which were the main themes of this Diversity Studies course.
Usually,
Diversity Studies is the upper level of course in the 4-year college, listed
under the Department of Sociology. It is
an interdisciplinary course that requires the knowledge of sociology with some basic
economics, and political sciences understanding. In the two-year tech college
setting, there is no prerequisite for this type of upper-level of courses.
For this unique condition, Mary tended to provide a basic review of sociology
during the first week of face-to-face Diversity classes. But for the online
section, it was not so flexible to ask students to review sociology before
taking on Diversity Studies.
“What is the best and clearest way to communicate with Ryan, without his
potential denial or rejection, or even a worse scenario, dropping this course?”
Mary was thinking and looking for a venue to feedback to Ryan. Then, based on the experience in sociology
teaching, Mary found most students understanding the concept of “role and
status” easily through her meticulously designed in-class activities and
worksheets. And role-and-status is precisely related to Ryan’s questions.
“Ryan, you are
doing well for this class so far. I would like to discuss a couple of ideas
related to your questions. I know this feedback is long. Hopefully, you can spend
a little bit of time with me. I understand your feeling about your stigmas and
non-privileged conditions, and I am trying to share some thoughts with you in
this regard.”
“I teach sociology too. I would like to begin with the ideas of ‘role and
status’ relevant to your current conditions. We as human beings are the product of our
society and culture which offer us both freedom and constraints, based on
sociological perspectives. There are
many invisible social forces that shape the way we think and act that tend to
be taken for granted, in addition to genetic makeups.”
“Like on the stage, there are many performers with different roles and statuses
based on scripts written by writers, and/or screen playwriters, directed by the
film director. Some might act like puppets, some puppeteers, and some act in both
roles. They interact with one another to act out a drama. Let me begin with two
interesting human conditions: ascribed status and achieved status, guiding
roles in the drama’s scripts. Ascribed status is the social position that is
born with, or involuntarily assumed in later life. For example, you don’t
have a choice to be born with the skin color of your preference, such as white,
black, yellow, brown, or any other colors. In this case, you were born white.
You don’t have the choice to be born into Bill Gates’ family, or born into a ghetto
or slum. You don’t choose to be born into the US, or Afghanistan. And you
mentioned, being poor, living in the trailer park. You don’t have a choice to
be born a boy or a girl, and we know there are still cultures that prefer boys, and some practice female infanticide, or aborted when sex was identified in the
womb. In your case you were born, a male. (I know, born to be a boy nowadays, might not
be privileged as it used to be 😊.)
So, before life is born, there are many conditions predetermining the
life chances and opportunities in the people’s life.”
“So, the ascribed status enables or disables in positive, negative, or
cancel-out ways on people’s lives in race, class, gender, nationality, localities,
sometimes, even in religions, before one is born.”
“Fortunately, human beings are not like other animals. They don’t change much
of the genetic features and most of them live by instincts. For us humans,
through personal endeavors (both positive and negative) with opportunities
(positively and negatively available), the life journey can be changed in
positive and/or negative ways. This is called ‘Achieved Status”. One,
based on the ascribed positive and/or negative statuses achieves positive
and/or negative statuses during the trajectory of one’s life. For example, some
individuals achieve as a con-artist, or a drug addict, while others,
achieve as an excellent student or employee of the month,” Mary wrote.
As you said, “I am a white male student.” You have not ascribed a color or
female sex. Though born into a male and
white might not privilege as you feel, that I can understand. You mentioned the
“stigmas” that you possessed as a poor guy, raised by a single mom, living in a
trailer park. In fact, you referred to the concept of social class which was
the most important, yet invisible, elusive notion in Diversity
Studies. Social class strongly correlates
to the life chance, life opportunities, and cultural capital which link to
access to health care, education, and jobs. In short, a person’s social
class intersects with his/her race, gender, sexuality, ability/disability,
nationality, language, physicality and so on bio-cultural features affects his/her
social mobility tendency.”
“Ryan, I know
the notion of ascribed-vs.-achieved statuses as the beginning point of our conversation about privilege and stigma might seem abstract, and not exactly
related to your conditions. What I think about you is that your race and
sex/gender might be offset (or cancel out) by your social class condition.
Thus, you feel you have no privilege at all and the stigmas are a bundle. In the previous Unit, we discussed the concept of “Intersectionality” which can be
useful to unpack some social phenomena, particularly, privilege and stigma. I remember I used an example for you guys to
explain what the intersectionality was about: “the life chance/opportunity of ‘a
blind, slave-descendant, lesbian, living in a poor area’,” what could happen, if
there is no awareness, knowledge, and social policy to support the less
fortunate people with various predicaments, who have no direct fault of their
own?”
“Let me know if you have further questions. Welcome to my office for a chat if
by chance, you stop by the main campus.
Mary.”
Mary sent the feedback to Ryan, attached with extra information for his
reference:
1. Video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vX_Vzl-r8NY
2. Checklist https://sites.google.com/a/u.boisestate.edu/social-justice-training/about-us/our-training/privilege-checklist
3. Book: The Implicated Subject: Beyond Victims and Perpetrators by Michael Rothberg for an extra reading.
