Today’s #AntiAbleistComposition feature is “Racialized Equity Labor, University Appropriation and Student Resistance” by Veronica Lerma, Laura T. Hamilton, and Kelly Nielson.
“We identify a cycle of racialized labor appropriation whereby: 1) people of color identify problems in the racial environment of their organizations and work to solve them; 2) leadership responds by blocking efforts and/or denying issues; 3) external and/or internal pressures force introspection and push leaders to resolve an organizational threat (e.g., to the university’s public image of diversity); and finally, 4) leadership appropriates racialized equity labor, and in doing so converts it into a diluted diversity initiative. Those engaged in racialized equity labor may resist appropriation, but the cycle takes a toll on activists. The ways in which organizations respond to racialized equity labor offers insight into the reproduction of racial inequities, despite the hard work of people of color to create meaningful racial change.”
Citation:
Lerma, Veronica, Laura T. Hamilton, and Kelly Nielsen. “Racialized Equity Labor, University Appropriation and Student Resistance.” Social Problems, 2019, pp. 1-18. Online first.
Anti-Ableist Composition 