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Several years back, WSU invited a prominent Black scholar to campus to give a talk. Frustrated by the ways such talks did little to empower students nor address campus climate, myself & another faculty member decided to organize a reading group (1/11)
For several weeks, we met with over 60 students, discussing the book in prep of visit. We did this w/out compensation; it was a great experience, a reminder of possibilities transformative education, a dynamic class environment, & what a learning community looked like (2/11)
Once the week came when the scholar was going to be on campus, the university wanted 2 spotlight the class. Rather than celebrate the students, they celebrated WSU. They used the class as evidence of THEIR investment in social justice, diversity, & transformative learning (3/11
Never mind, they didn& #39;t do anything to make it happen, which was nothing new. It was emblematic of brochure diversity: creating the illusion through marketing without actually doing work, resources, and support, much less enacting anti-racism (4/11)
When this scholar was on campus, the university also hosted a dinner 4 him along with others on campus. Neither I nor my colleague were invited (I dont think most of the students got invites). It was yet another reminder that our labor were useful but our presence was not (5/11)
It was a reminder of how universities want to perform anti-racism; perform diversity; perform equity and justice work without resources, without being challenged; without demands of accountability and systemic change. (6/11)
I was reminded of this experience when recently a few of us received an email that the university wanted to highlight faculty work addressing & #39;racial inequities& #39; given recent events. They wanted to claim our work. Our work mattered now because it would be good for PR (7/11)
Never mind, the lack of investment in the work; never mind the lack of support; never mind the lack of resources or interest in our work before. The work we have been doing for years was now & #39;What the university was doing.& #39; PLEASE. Interesting when there is "We" and "US" (8/11)
This is how universities view diversity and equity work; co-optation; appropriation of labor without investment; celebration in brochures and press releases all while doing little to address campus climate, the experiences of faculty and students of color, w/out resources (9/ 11)
While I have had moments like this throughout my time at WSU, I also recognize that my whiteness here. The disrespect; the uncompensated labor; the celebration without investment; the use in brochure diversity is commonplace for Black faculty and other faculty of color (10/11)
Too often the labor; the intellectual and scholarly work; the mentoring; and the many types of service of faculty of color get used as evidence of the university& #39;s race and equity mission even as that work is not supported and is demonized (11/11)
