Summary
How do harmful stereotypical ideologies of Black communities’ lead to discriminatory practices in the workplace? In the third episode of Decoding Black, Dr. Christopher Stuart Taylor and Letecia Rose answer the challenging questions that reveal the importance of recognizing how anti-Black racism is permeated across diverse industries and explores differing viewpoints on how organizations can address these issues.
Yasmin Razack: What are types of discrimination faced by diverse Black communities in employment? Torontonians of African descent have an unemployment rate of 13% - nearly two times the provincial rate. Black families are about three times more likely to be living on low incomes than non-racialized families. In this episode, you will hear Dr. Taylor and Letecia answer some of the most challenging questions that are facing diverse Black communities. You will gain knowledge, awareness and hopefully understand how you can meet the current challenges that face diverse Black communities. Once again, join in on the conversation at #DecodingBlack.
Podcast Intro: We have defined Decoding Black in terms of having the ability to destabilize, deconstruct and disrupt systems of oppression, the negative narratives of Black folk rooted in anti-Black racism and the history of anti-Black racism in the Western world and other systems of oppression across the globe.
Letecia Rose: When certain truths are at the core of what an organization believes in, there’s certain things that just naturally happen. I think specifically for me, I've been very, very, very fortunate on the employment side. One of my first jobs was in organization A that was focused in around diversity and breaking down stigma and sharing that specifically with youth across Ontario. But the people who worked there were diverse, and not just diverse in that surface level aspect of how we look at diversity, but in diversity of thought, but also understanding the importance that we also need to reflect the people who we were serving. So it was never a statement that was formally said that we need to look for X person to check off a box. It was just innately known that in order to reflect the people who are serving, we had to hire and approach that in a different way. I think the other space where I've worked, which again was as I mentioned in episode one, was specifically a Black organization, there were certain values that we all had around even the diversity of Blackness, around having people from different diasporas and how do we ensure that we represent people. And I feel like if that's at the core of your organization, you innately start to have those conversations, you innately start to lead with that. Whereas I think with organizations who are getting it wrong, it's a simple checkbox or it's an afterthought where they're saying, "Of course we're diverse. We have 50% females in this workplace," and they're not looking deeper.
Chris Taylor: So how do you shift that, particularly as a Black woman? Because again, we can frame this in the sense of enslavement where Black women, because of their dehumanization, which was different than Black men, Black women were seen as reproducers and producers of labour. They worked the fields, but also reproduced the children to work said fields. And within that, because of the impunity that White men had over Black women, Black female bodies, because again, they owned Black female bodies it became these tropes of the Jezebel. It became these tropes of the sexualization of Black women. It became these tropes of the angry Black woman, the emotional Black woman. All stereotypes have their roots of enslavement, have their roots in colonization that have created this caricature of Black women. So you as a Black woman, how do you deal with those stereotypes on a day-to-day basis in the workplace?
Letecia Rose: Well, let me frame it like this. I call this story how I started to watch Game of Thrones. Again, I've worked in extremely diverse workplaces except for one, and it was a very short stint there. But immediately when I went there, I immediately saw my Blackness. It wasn't diverse at all. There was three Black women on the floor and two of them got fired, so there was only me. I was hyper aware of how I spoke, how I acted, how I dressed, and I've never felt that way before in any of my other workspaces. So I had to be on high alert. When you talk about this idea of angry Black women, my temperament was something I always had to measure; not too angry, not to passive. Always just lining through that middle ground. Whereas as a Black male, I don't think that Black males have to measure that temperament in the same way. I say why ... how I started to watch Game of Thrones, because I felt like I couldn't talk and speak about the things that actually mattered to me in those spaces. Was I going to talk about Beyoncé? Maybe. But I definitely knew everybody talks about Game of Thrones, so I made sure to watch it because I needed to speak almost the same language. I do remember a time in a meeting where the Blackness slipped out and I said, "That's a dope idea." Everyone looked at me like, "Letecia's Black?" And it's like they almost hadn't realized until that moment, because I was “passing” so well or I was masking it so well that they hadn't realized it beforehand. This idea of masking comes in where as a Black woman I have to almost hide who I am in order to enter into non-Black spaces. So what does that mean? How I speak, again, what I wear, what I bring in to eat, but especially how I sound. I'm very aware, especially within that space, how threatening it could be to the fragility of the folks around me.
Yasmin Razack: There's so many things that you said in your story. And one of the things I think about is what can be referred to as the in-group/out-group and how we pattern map people and how our Black identities pattern map to certain stereotypes. And then for you, that tension, that anxiety that you had within the workspace, how is it released? How does it show up in your work? How does it affect the relationships that you engage or choose not to engage in? And it's interesting your Game of Thrones example and I'm sure our viewers out there, using that hashtag Decoding Black, what are some of the things that you felt as though that you had to get to know or that you had to learn about in order to be a part of an in-group at your organization? So I think that's something where I'm going to turn it over to you, Dr. Taylor. When you think about navigating the workplace, I remember you were sharing a story about being a Black professor on campus. And you say it so well, so I like for you to share that story about when you actually teach in night school and what you had to share with your students about an experience you had.
Chris Taylor: So one of the things before jumping into that story, when it comes to the workplace, I explain to folks we need to understand how systems work. We need to understand how the education system works. We need to understand how the post-secondary education system works. Yes, you may have a PhD, but are you a lecturer? Are you an assistant professor? Are you an associate professor? Are you a full professor? Are you a research professor? Are you working in a college system? Are you working in a “teaching university system?" What system are you working in? Are you working in a system or a faculty that's highly funded? Do you bring in a lot of money? Do you have a lot of international partnerships? Do you have that power and sway on campus? And having these conversations to understand how the systems navigate, that's how I locate myself as a cisgender, heterosexual, able-bodied, Black male. Because I might walk around campus saying I have a PhD, I have a book, I have publications, I do this meaningful work on research on anti-Black racism, but when I walk around campus, people just see me as a student. They interact with me as a student. I've had folks within faculties that I've worked in ask me directly, "How did you get here?" I'm like, "I wrote a book and I applied in all these spaces." And so I ask myself why or where did these questions come from? Because the argument is if you are a professor or if you work in these post-secondary institutions, you are “educated” so you are informed. But common sense isn't always that common, and it leaves this misrepresentation of who I should be as a Black man, and the only space on that university campus is me being not only a student, but an international student.
Yasmin Razack: It's so powerful, and it made me think about that Black professor from The Bahamas who was accused of stealing someone's laptop in a major conference in BC. I think that's one of the things too is consistently being questioned, validating credibility, always questioned, and so the result of that is overcompensating, disengagement or underperforming. And so one of the things I think when you're decoding Black and talking with this is, and this is something your viewers can talk about, is how is that disrupted? I think for minoritized communities overall, if this is observed, what are ways in which that you are responding to these observations where Blackness is questioned, credibility is questioned. Where have you or how have you experienced that disruption that allowed you not only to persevere but to be successful in your given roles? So my question to you is, what does that do for your psyche? What is the impact of this and how has that been disrupted that has allowed you to acquire the success that you've had?
Letecia Rose: I think the disruption is you can't thrive in a space like that, and I wasn't thriving. You talked about, I think in the first episode, this idea of privilege, I had the privilege of being in a different space. And I think when you talk about how you navigate that, I'm in a work environment now where it's valued, where my expertise is valued, where yeah, my skin color is valued because they see that it's important for kids and youth in our community to see someone like me. We took a group of girls to a workspace. We took a picture of it and I posted it online. But resoundingly the feedback that I got was, "Wow, all these Black girls in hijabs. It's amazing!" And when you look at the type of staff we have, they are so reflective of the community they serve. But when we talk about diversity, we usually talk about it on this linear side and not around hierarchy. There's a real drive from the top of the organization to make sure that we're pulling people up. So it's not just the frontline staff that look like the community; it's various levels. And we have work to do, but there's a conscious effort. So when you talk about how you start to disrupt this, it has to come from the top. A lot of times it's just the people at the supervisory or at that level having these conversations; is this a concern for the person who's leading and driving an organization. Because if it is, then change and impact can start to happen slowly, but it can start to happen. So this is something where, again, I get to benefit from being in a space where that value is extremely, extremely important.
Yasmin Razack: Yeah, it is. And when you think about now the numbers of Black communities, for example in the tech industry, Black communities in the engineering industry, are the numbers where they need to be to have change. And I think your point about culture and also the values that you see reflected at all levels of the organization, you hear stories time and time again of Black individuals within these spaces, these industries that don't feel what you were saying that you felt and as a result leave. So did you want to speak about that?
Chris Taylor: I think we need to reframe the question. It comes back to Letecia's story from this podcast of never being seen or reflected in her teachers from kindergarten to grade 12. So we always come to this question but okay, how come there aren't as many Black folk in tech or in STEM? That's a big thing now particularly, so science, technology, engineering and mathematics. And we see a big push for women in STEM across different institutions, engineering, so on and so forth. But we're trying to put a bandaid on an issue that really needed some vaccines 20 years ago. Because if Letecia was seven years old and was streamed at seven, she's not going to - and this is an issue that we have in systemic racism in the education system. The one instance and the one interaction that you have as a seven year old being streamed in a particular applied system, you can no longer go and take those university courses, university or college courses. You can no longer take them. And so by 13, 14, 15 years old, you cannot be an engineer. And so then we say, how come there aren't as many engineers? How come they're leaving? It's because when they're seven years old, because of systemic biases, because of systemic racism, because of anti-Black racism, that one teacher said, "You should be in a different class. You, Letecia, have behavioral issues."
Yasmin Razack: So what can higher educational institutions do?
Chris Taylor: Higher educational systems need to put a pause. They need to look at who is creating curricula. Folks like Natasha Henry, who does a lot of work for Black history in Ontario and Canada, to say, "Look, we focus so much on the success stories. The W.E.B. Du Bois would say the talented 10th. We focus on the successes that are sitting right here, but we're ignoring the 90% that had the opportunity that no one said, "Let's go." We have stories all the time. Universities are not going and targeting these Black children when they're six, seven, eight years old. They're not showing them the opportunities to move forward. That's where these post-secondary education systems need to go.
Yasmin Razack: Have intentional programming that disrupts and challenges the historical legacies of systemic anti-Black racism in order to see a difference, not only in the numbers but in the curricula, in the recruitment and so that it could have that overall systemic change.
Chris Taylor: And the biggest shift we need to understand what curricula and curriculum is that we think is just what the teachers teach. But curricula is everything in a classroom. It's everything in a school. It's do you see yourself reflected in the school? Not just what the teacher teaches, but in the images in the classroom, the holidays that are celebrated. Do you see those things? And we need post-secondary education industries - I'm going to use that term industries - to not wait until these kids are 13, 14, 15; when they're five, six, seven years old that they know inherently that they can be that. So if not, they'll be continued to be streamed a certain way. So we need to catch them at JK.
Yasmin Razack: That's such an excellent point. And I think for our viewers to think about is it a multi-pronged approach to this, because higher educational systems are one thing ... I think parents, I think communities. Also, one of the things that I want our listeners to share with us using the hashtag Decoding Black is where have you seen this being disrupted. At the college system, we have over 90% of our programs that have experiential learning opportunities. They're in co-op placements, they're in internships, in industries where they're not reflected. So what does that look like? I think that one of the things too, is what both of you said is very much rooted in practices - practices that start at almost every stage. So we'd like to hear your thoughts. I think it's important for us to continue this conversation to share how we can move this needle to disrupt change. Well that was a very thought provoking episode. Again, I want to remind you that this is not where the conversation ends. Please join in online using the hashtag #DecodingBlack where we can take up any of the feedback you had on the episode. Answer some of your questions, and most importantly, invite you to engage with others on how best we can meet the challenges.