Diversity welcome, prejudice not

The first person I saw at the workshop was a large black man. He was incredibly tall and broad. I was immediately intimidated.

“We all have a record playing internally,” said Shay Davis Little, a facilitator for the NCBI workshop. “It is a natural response to what we hear and see.”

My internal record was the reason why I was intimidated by a man I did not know at all.

Little said that our internal records come from the people who raised us and the communities and environments in which we grew up. Because of our internal records, we hold prejudices not only against others, but also against ourselves.

The National Coalition Building Institute (NCBI) hosted a four-hour-long prejudice reduction workshop to educate University of Georgia faculty, students, and staff about our internal records and personal identities.

“Through our workshops participants are able to learn more about themselves and those with whom they interact,” according to the University of Georgia’s NCBI Team Overview handout.

During the workshop, we identified how we perpetuate stereotypes about our own identity groups. I discovered that it was easier to feel an opinion than to actually voice it. One black female student talked about her struggle for balance in her identity.

“I’m constantly balancing being black enough and not too black,” she said. “I feel like I’m either splitting a fence or on the fence between being black and too black.”

Listening and talking with others put an entirely different perspective on my ideas about prejudice. Not only did I talk to participants one-on-one, but I also had the opportunity to talk to the entire group.

“Pride can supercede all groups,” said Rick Gray, a workshop facilitator.

Once we took pride in our different identity groups, it made the workshop experience that much more powerful. We were proud to represent so many different, diverse groups.

NCBI hosts two different workshops: half-days and full days. The one I attended was the half-day, which lasts four hours. Its purpose was to open ourselves up to our identities and the identities of those around us.

The full day workshop lasts eight hours. The first four hours are the same as the half-day workshop. The last four hours allow participants to share stories.

“The second half of the full day workshop is for learning stories,” Danny Glassman, a facilitator for the workshop, said. “It’s important to share stories because one of NCBI’s sayings is, ‘To shift attitudes, hear stories.’”

The first person I saw at the workshop was a large black man. At first I only saw some parts of his identity. By the end of the workshop, I knew his name, ethnicity and sexuality. I saw someone completely different, but only because I made a change in the way I saw him.