Racism at Gallaudet

Hola Gente!

I am posting a great article that was written for the Buff and Blue by Elena Ruiz. Let's continue this dialogue about race relations and begin to create change at all educational institutions. I really encourage interpreters to read this as well and think about the impact of racism on our field and the Deaf Community as a whole. We have a lot of progress to be made but I truly believe we can accomplish a more inclusive environment for all.

Gilberto Partida

Gallaudet's hidden crisis: racism

Lately, I’ve been sensing a different sort of tension at Gallaudet.

Racism.

This word can evoke an array of images of appalling, stomach-turning incidents predating the Civil Rights Movement — separate drinking fountains, whites at the front of the bus; black people at the back, segregated schools, and so on. But I wonder how many of us are able to point out the inequality that’s happening right in front of us: the inequality that is still based on race and is under the ever-safe cover of colorblind racism.

Colorblind racism is the continued racism that denies its existence. Colorblind racism denies that racism exists because it is not the same racism that we can easily recognize like what went on before the Civil Rights era; it doesn’t want to discuss the racism that isn’t as obvious and shocking as “it used to be.” But anyone who takes a walk down 8th Street can see the obvious residential segregation that continues today — to give one example out of many. But we just don’t talk about it — and many of us just don’t want to.

By denying it, ignoring it, pushing it into the corner, racism continues to breathe and live on. Most of us don’t want to see it, at any cost. And sadly, obviously, Gallaudet is not immune to this. From what I see here on campus, racism is a dirty little secret that’s so often thrown out the window, swept under the rug, or suffocated into non-existence. So now I am lifting the rug.

Recently, while spending some time on Facebook, I came across a picture of some students on campus from Halloween 2010. This picture had a group of young, white deaf men with brown make-up all over their faces and necks to depict a team of black athletes. Or to put it more bluntly, a group of misguided young, white deaf men in blackface. Yes, blackface.

Scrolling down to the comments section, I was hoping to see posts that shared my disbelief and outrage. But all I saw were comments that cheered on the misguided young men and many “LOLs.” I didn’t see anyone brave enough to simply say, “This isn’t right.” No one mentioned the awful, racist history of blackface, and how it was a way to demean and oppress black people by using the cover of comedy and entertainment. Looking at the images, I was reminded of Frederick Douglass’s condemning description of blackface performers as “…the filthy scum of white society, who have stolen from us a complexion denied to them by nature, in which to make money, and pander to the corrupt taste of their white fellow-citizens.”* I wonder why Douglass’s stark expression hasn’t been even remotely considered here, and how this neglect leads to scores of white college students approaching the act of applying brown paint lightly, as it is only for humorous value. Did they/we realize how they/we demean an entire group of people when we fail to recall such a horrid era of history?

After seeing that picture, I truly wonder how many of my deaf peers think about these questions, and if we deaf people of color have emotional, psychological, and physical safety on campus as I hoped we did. I often think to myself: “Why and how is white privilege everywhere here at Gallaudet? How can we, the deaf community, be a part of an oppressed minority, yet still commit horrifying acts that harm other oppressed communities?” It’s a contradiction that I struggle with daily, and I am beginning to see so much of it here on campus.

I’ve listened to countless accounts from students of color about their feelings of academic and social exclusion, and of being the painfully obvious, brown-skinned “token” for a variety of events and programs. Really, how many performances or panels have we gone to that predominantly consisted of all-white students/staff with maybe one person of color sitting on the outskirts? Imagine being welcomed into a group solely based on the bullshit “diversity” points the group thinks it’ll receive from the larger campus community. But that’s just tokenism and not promoting equitable representation. “Tokenism,” or adding in one lone person of color in any group to ensure that “diversity” is being upheld is a widespread trend at Gallaudet, with students, staff, and faculty being the victims of such a practice. If we think about it, it’s utterly debasing.

Yet I’ve seen many white students roll their eyes when we students of color want to express what we go through, chalking us up to being “negative” and/or “obsessive” about what we experience, making a final, dismissive sweep towards our pain. I’m tired of seeing my classmates say, “But there’s been so much progress with racism! It barely exists anymore like it used to, and back then it was really bad! So let’s not talk about it.” I don’t like being made out to seem hysterical and over-the-top in my struggle to express my experience and the experiences of other deaf people of color. I do not think we deserve that. And guess what? We need to talk about it.

Following such discussions with my classmates, I’ve experienced professors who constantly redirect classroom discourse to audism as our primary, and even only, community struggle as deaf people. Many times, I have seen a professor reply to my attempts to discuss the deaf person of color’s experience by saying, “But really, deaf identity comes first… the deaf person experiences audism before all else.” But our struggles with audism do not automatically mean that all deaf people experience primarily audism. Just claiming audism does not grant the (oftentimes white) leaders of our community the right to rank which “-ism” should be first, second, or third, or so on in the daily struggles of all deaf people. We can’t rank audism as number one as a way to ignore the racism happening in our community.

When white deaf people wish to turn a blind eye to the racism that happens in our deaf community, they dismiss the painful experiences that many deaf people of color go through. By denying that such experiences happen, these experiences will continue to happen. And our deaf community will continue to be a broken one. I believe that it is shameful that we’re following the oppressive patterns of white, male, hearing society — the exact same thinking that creates our own oppression. Yes, it is a shameful irony.

We need to have the issue of racism in our community emerge at the forefront. I believe we can finally address racism, audism, sexism, ableism, and so on in each and every one of ourselves. I believe it is okay to challenge one another to look inside ourselves, see how we have committed acts of racism, or sexism, audism, and so forth. What if we didn’t? This can be uncomfortable for so many of us, but what about the daily struggle that many deaf people of color have to endure based on so many people’s unwillingness to confront our inner –isms? I encourage us to ask ourselves these questions:

-When I try to avoid topics about racism, am I trying to avoid being uncomfortable?

-Am I conscious about different forms of racism in history and in today’s society?

-What are some of the things I do and say that could contribute to racism?

-How can I be careful to not reject a person’s expression of pain based on their experienced racism?
(Note that these questions can be asked of ourselves about other –isms such as sexism, classism, audism, and so on.)

This will be a difficult journey for many of us, but a worthy one. Why? Because we will truly be unable to be free ourselves if we continue to allow others in our community not be free. Let us begin “…[a] revolution capable of healing our wounds. If we’re the ones who can imagine it, if we’re the ones who can dream about it, if we’re the ones who need it most, then no one else can do it. We’re the ones.”** * Douglass, Frederick. “The Hutchinson Family.—Hunkerism.”