By
With the exception of oddly costumed extremists, most white people are afraid to talk about race. As heartfelt as their rhetoric of racial blindness might be, even those who strike an enlightened posture are surely aware of the hypersensitive nature of any conversation about racial interaction in contemporary America, and as a consequence are particularly careful in such discussions.
Sensitivity is only a good thing up to the point that it begins impeding the exchange of ideas. Unfortunately, the result of racial anxiety is that the only time when most whites talk about their perception of race relations with any honesty is while they’re in groups of other whites.
At best this is unconstructive, as it does little to promote heartfelt interchange between race groups, and at worst breeds a group-think negativity and an over awareness of racial difference that can spiral quickly out of control.
The required cultural diversity courses incumbent on U of L undergraduates were designed to mitigate this conversational abyss. Exposing students to unfamiliar social group might provide them a vocabulary and a framework with which to consider cultural difference. For many students however, these attempts are unsuccessful.
Many of the cultural diversity classes send mixed and confusing messages to U of L students regarding how they are expected to talk and think about race.
While these courses should instruct students that race is not a strictly black/white issue, the disproportionately limited course offerings that address Far Eastern, Middle Eastern, ancient, Latin American and Native American societies would indicate that the University’s interest in global (not just African-American) culture is casual at best.
Moreover, in the same moment that students are expected to think about minority social groups as wholly integrated into society at large, they are taught about such groups in almost complete isolation.
Courses with titles like “African-American Communication” (aside from the odd implication that such communication might be in some way extra-lingual, like whistles that only dogs can hear), seem to do little to advance the university’s mission.
Many students feel brow-beaten into empty echoes of the professor’s ideas rather than having the opportunity to address their concerns about race issues facing Americans. A white student who disagrees with Affirmative Action because her father was passed over for a promotion in favor of a less talented member of a minority groups cannot simply be dismissed as a racist. And every class that functions along such lines only creates further hostility, rather than achieving the admirable and essential goal of eliminating racial tension by addressing these issues.
In the past, challenging the efficacy of cultural diversity classes has been considered code for attacking black people, however we at The Cardinal believe that such courses are necessary, just poorly executed.
We invite students to share their experiences, both positive and negative, of the required cultural diversity courses. Additionally, we encourage professors in the Pan-African Studies department to offer their thoughts on strategies to successfully encourage a healthy dialogue about race on our campus.
