Page 267 - Microaggressions in Everyday Live Race, Gender, and Sexual Orientation

Microaggressions and Difficult Dialogues on Race in the Classroom 241

of the experience. To people of color, it is believed that schooling can either
serve the interests of the group or betray it. These scholars have observed that
the educational curriculum has become racialized (Sue, 2003) and that school-
ing can often be used as a tool to perpetuate and maintain the prevailing
power arrangements and structures, whereas education is a means of trans-
mitting eurocentric values, beliefs, customs, traditions, language, and arts/
crafts of the dominant society (Ford, Moore, & Whiting, 2006; Shujaa, 2003).
The ultimate result is the (mis)education of students of color, in which edu-
cation becomes a form of “ domestication ” (Cokley, 2006). These statements
have considerable support when one realizes the many inaccuracies taught
in our curriculum and imposed upon students of color as well as their White
classmates: Columbus discovered America, the internment of Japanese
Americans was necessary for national security, and the enslavement of Black

people was justified because “ living under unnatural conditions of freedom ”
made them prone to anxiety.
Earlier, we indicated that power is in a group ’ s ability to defi ne reality
and that schooling/education is a major socialization portal (Sue, 2003).
Through omission, fabrication, distortion, or selective emphasis, the history
and contributions of White Western civilizations are reinforced and elevated
to superior status and imposed upon all students. The result is perpetua-
tion of myths and inaccuracies about persons of color. Microaggressions are

reflections of a worldview of superiority - inferiority, normality - abnormality,
and desirable - undesirable ways of thinking, feeling, and behaving. If we
address the issue of race and racism, schooling and education may uninten-
tionally reflect racial biases and oppress students of color while elevating

the status of their White classmates and White teachers. When left unchal-
lenged, they reinforce the attitudes, beliefs, and Eurocentric knowledge of
Whites, while denigrating, demeaning, and invalidating those of students

of color. When challenged, however, they can lead to difficult dialogues on
race and represent a clash of racial realities. Many educators believe that class-
room dialogues on race may represent a major tool in combating racism and
helping to make racial microaggressions visible (Blum, 1998; Bolgatz, 2005;
Sue & Constantine, 2007; Watt, 2007; Willow, 2008; Young, 2004; Young &
Davis - Russell, 2002). We turn our attention now to analyzing the meaning

and significance of difficult dialogues on race, but it is important to note that
dialogues on gender and sexual orientation may share very similar manifes-
tations and dynamics.

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