ELENA ALBERTI: In thinking about what
was the most impactful takeaway from this course,
I really realized that the most important part for me
was the self-reflection, and kind of delving
into what I thought my racial identity was,
as I am multiracial.
So I just kind of identify with different things
at different times, and seeing how that actually
fits my personality and what that means for myself.
What about you guys?
DANA VIGUE: Yeah, going off of that,
as another multiracial person, I started
to realize as we engaged with the social scientific theory
behind the way people code-switch,
that there is a science behind it.
And it's not arbitrary.
It's not chaotic.
It's part of a larger social system
with institutionalized expectations for the way people
engage with one another and other institutions in place.
And understanding that we're sort
of following by an unspoken set, and occasionally very
vehemently spoken set of rules, when
we do that-- when we identify differently
in different circumstances-- was something I hadn't actually
explicitly realized.
ELENA ALBERTI: Mhm.
LORRAINE WONG: I agree that the self-exploration
and the self-reflection was the most important takeaway,
I think, that I could get personally from the course,
in addition to all the academic readings that we did--
all of the engagement with the outside world that we did.
I think, in order to be able to change the world,
first we have to understand ourselves.
And it helped me do all of that, and navigate the tensions
between how I am read and how I am,
and trying to figure out those differences.
COLIN GODWIN: I think what I most enjoyed
about the class was, outside of the self-awareness,
increasingly reading into the patterns
that we see in society, and how that
influences how we see others.
A really impactful part was when we
delved into why creole and other developing languages
are considered to be lesser languages.
And how there wasn't really much science behind that.
It was more just cultural leading
of whites being superior to blacks
and the preservation of slavery through another form--
through both the disparagement of Creole and African-American
English.
ELENA ALBERTI: Bouncing off that as well, I
think another important part was,
I mentioned before, the multiracial aspect.
But in class, Dana.
You were talking about how one of the more ant parts was also
talking about how historically under-represented groups or--
I forgot the exact terminology you used--
can form alliances.
And how there are similarities, but also dissimilarities
between how the groups work.
And I think classes like these allow
you to discuss people in general who are in those situations,
but also allows you delve into the nitty-gritty
like you're talking about with Creole.
DANA VIGUE: Yeah, I was surprised
how much a class entitled Black Matters
dealt with things that you would never identify
as a specifically black issue.
And we ended up talking about populations that are not read,
or may not identify, as black.
And that was relevant.
These were not tangentially related political issues
or social issues or economic injustices.
And I started to see how black issues and black matters
and black experiences are really not something that
can be studied in isolation, and play
into larger global networks.
ELENA ALBERTI: Mhm.
COLIN GODWIN: Yeah, because a lot of themes in the course
were centered around the mechanisms of oppression
instead of what the oppression of a particular group.
So it was really nice having those case studies
inside of immigrant populations and American populations
as well.