It seems this topic is all over the media lately, and there are more studies that we could name on the subject. However, these biases continue to be around, and I am afraid they will not stop anytime soon despite policies like Diversity and Inclusion and Affirmative Action.
I could elect to speak as a scholar on the subject, as a lawyer and public health professional, but I think the most valuable input I can contribute right now is my perspective as a minority female with a strong educational background who left home to pursue her studies.
One of the first things I think about when I tell an audience is one of the many microaggressions I have experienced. “Microaggressions are defined as the everyday, subtle, intentional — and oftentimes unintentional — interactions or behaviors that communicate some sort of bias toward historically marginalized groups.” Kevin Nadal, Professor of Psychology at John Jay College of Criminal Justice (https://www.npr.org/2020/06/08/872371063/microaggressions-are-a-big-deal-how-to-talk-them-out-and-when-to-walk-away).
I was in the middle of a recruiting interview when I said this to the recruiter, and she asked, “What, no place good enough for you at home?” I can, and I felt tempted to jump into a whole slew of explanations, or more likely, justifications, for my decisions and actions. But it remains my decisions, and the consequences behind them are no one’s business but my own. I decided to leave the home I had known all my life at 18 and jump into a culture that was not my own, despite my own false self-assurance that it would not affect me as long as I spoke the language. The truth is I was fooling myself. But regardless of the actual environmental, food, and curricula changes that took longer to adjust to than what I initially thought, the worst change was how I was treated. Yes, humans, every one of us, reject the unfamiliar. And here I was, a Latina with a funny accent, funny eating habits, and covered up to an inch of her life to walk to the nearest corner. I experienced three treatment routes:
- The very loud, very slow talker (I can understand English and took the LSAT, just like you).
- The person who wanted all kinds of supposedly fascinating information on my behavior (no, I’m not a science experiment)
- The person who saw me as a primitive subject (do you have a WalMart in your home country? What’s in there?).
Inside all these interesting experiences, there were people who just wanted to know (gasp)…me. And if my culture had something or everything to do with my behavior, they were open to talking about it. I was grateful for a small college, encouraging mentors, and truly lasting relationships. But these experiences were shaped by the bias because I was foreign, and despite the language domination, I was not “one of them.” Many people complain that immigrants should know the language, despite the fact that when they travel, they expect the English language to be spoken.
The United States is one of the only countries that does not speak a second language. While it is true that English is the language of business (and a beautiful language at that), it is not the only one, and if people do not want to learn a second language, at least acknowledge that they exist and that people who speak English as a second language will never achieve a native language accent. Perhaps if we all knew how difficult learning a second language is, we would not be so quick to judge people who have difficulty speaking the language that we have all come to love.
This article seems like a rant, but there is a point to it – the experience is a direct result of racial and gender bias. We Puerto Ricans keep both our parents’ last names, and I cannot tell you how many times I have been mistaken for a person who married a Hispanic person. Furthermore, I’m not currently married by choice, and I cannot tell you how many women (and men) question a choice that should be mine and mine alone. My point is this, in order to overcome the bias, we should look at ourselves first and what we are being taught in our households about people who look and behave differently from us. We all know that the United States is a giant melting pot, but history is littered with the struggles of foreigners, from the African Americans whose ancestors were brought here unwillingly to the Irish to the Asians…not to mention the days past and present struggle of Native Americans in their own land.
How to fix it? Start with accepting a person…just how he or she is. And that does not go for only minorities but also people who are marginalized, like people identifying as LGBTQ. I know it is easier said than done, and I can quote a hundred different studies, but behavioral change… starts and ends…with each of us.
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Annette “Annie” Rodriguez was born in Ponce, Puerto Rico, and started to write consistently when she was in tenth grade. As her writing and creative imagination progressed over the years, Annie became confident enough to share her work and create her own characters to go with these magical plots, and alas, the first draft of Lifeforce was born.
Fast forward to what felt like endless revisions and consultations, Annie’s beloved writing project was picked up for publication by Green Writers Press, and her first novel was published in February 2019! Lifeforce’s sequel, Immortality’s Peril, is already in the works!
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Annie’s writing is accompanied by her impressive background as a practicing attorney, holding 2 Bachelor degrees and 2 Master’s! Lifeforce was actually published during her first year of law school! A minority woman who has worked with students, Annie’s passion for writing keeps her sane in the sometimes harsh reality of training to practice law and her many other endeavors.
FOR MORE INFORMATION VISIT: annierodriguezauthor.com