Racism - ignoring it; working around it; smashing it - Groundings 26 July, 2020

Teaching children
"I didn't expect to have the conversation with my children until they were older" a woman shared. A boy told her 7 year old daughter that 'brown people are ugly'. The teacher brushed it off. "I teach them self-love, they like the colour of their skin.. their hair.. they want their hair locked like their father's'.
 
Another woman said she taught the children around her, to do as she was taught, to respect everyone. Her family is mixed. "The bus driver tells me that he is not passing [where I work].. but you know, I let it go..I will not treat others that way"

Another mother said 'I told my family my son will grow with locks and then take them off' explaining that he first decided to take them off when walking in a white neighbourhood in the USA and a family stared at him. He cut off his locks "to see what I look like without locks' and then decided to grow them.

Another woman said ""I talk to my sons, they have all races in them.. they learn to see no colour.."



Seeing and not seeing colour
"I want people to see my colour, in my beautiful blackness, to see beauty in the different hues and colours"..  another woman said.



Sherlina and I mobilised a virtual  Groundings., inviting people to talk about :-

1. What do we teach our children about racism?
2. What can we learn from our children about dealing with racism?
3. How can we break the cycle of racism from one generation to the next?

And so we talked. Memories of different races together, and not together. Of being accepted and not accepted in mixed race families.

"I never experienced racism, but I know about colourism.. my sisters are darker than me' a young person shared.

The young people said they did not experience racism , they felt that Guyanese saw themselves as one, until witnessing the elections. "I am not reading newspapers, I not able' a woman who said her house has all races in it.


And the separation being made that 'colourism' rooted in anti-blackness is a different experience because it happens 'inside the racial group' while racism is across the groups regardless of the colour of the skin.


One woman felt that "I reserve the right to sit with my own black people or my own Indian people or my own Amerindian people or whoever my people are if I want." She said that White Supremacy was the issue and the structural and systemic racism which extended to capitalism. 'Racism is mercury in the rivers, the exploitation of the earth"

Others new and spoke of their experiences of acceptance and rejection in mixed race families. One woman thought her Indian grandfather had accepted her Black mother and his mixed grandchildren, until she realised he never did. "But i had to look after him before he died.. that is another story'

 Another woman shared "my cousins are Indigenous and experienced prejudice from my Black Guyanese family."  and we talked about how coastlanders of all races in Guyana have treated Indigneous peoples with contempt.

An Indigneous man shared that his grandmother had told him not to marry persons of different tribes.

"But I read, I learned, I had to educate her, talk to her".  He felt that religious organisations had a role to play in ending racism.

There was pain as another woman shared that 'I was told [by other indigenous peoples] that because I am born in Georgetown, I cannot be indigenous.. even though I am descended from Indigenous peoples.

Two people talked about having Madrasi ancestors. And I hear 'Madrasi' and I know that there is a reason why people  make the distinction between Madrasi and other Indians.. Madrasi being 'dark skinned' Indians".

And colourism in the culture.. I am watching an Indian TV show and the casual reference of a mother to a daughter serving in the Army, ' don't stay in the sun, you will get tanned and you are getting married in two weeks'. (The show dealt with homophobia and caste discrimination)

A woman remembers being called 'red' as a child, walking on the road with her school.

And the pain as an adult, of going back to a village where she spent childhood holidays, and people being rude, 'glarinng at me' until she found a man who remembered her, and who cried when he saw her. 'But he shut down, when I asked about elections'


And as we talked about the need to be actively antiracist, a woman pointed out that "some issues are difficult as it may involve us calling out persons that we love and that are close including our families
"
A man said he experienced racism, survived it. Experiencing it in the job market, in being rejected in the UK from land lords, of walking with his wife and being treated differently from her. 'But I talk to everybody, I make sure that I am competent, that I am doing the right thing'.. and he talked about coming back to Guyana, and going all over, meeting with people all over and talking to them.

Another woman said that instead of working around it, isn't it better to just smash it?

And we recognised that talking was a good step.. , even though some might say 'talk talk and nothing doing' is not good. 

Co-creation
And thinking about how we deal with racism.  A man who went to primary school just after World War II said co-creation, co-discovery.. that putting that black eye in the soil to grow together, or 'we went to look for Bacoo".  Some talked about being in the school, but different groups sitting apart.

I know that since the elections, I have been co-creating on different issues with people across difference, and who are from 'other ethnic groups' and other identities.  But we are not talking about whether PNC win or lose the elections.


We talked about the what ifs - an 1823 monument in the villages where the rebellion started - now occupied by descendants of Indian indentured immigrants.. and connecting history to the communities.

Things that some of us would have learned as adults, thinking we should learn in school.

Another woman shared that "I am a patriot- am more interested in the greater good and that can be brought about by any race - being exposed to some of these patriotic activities- marches, mass games - those have helped to built my confidence and teach me me how to network"

She shared that it was the opportunity to see Guyana beyond one ethnic group or geographic area.

We talked about the importance of feeling Guyanese, and being patriotic as a way to move beyond racism in Guyana.

I am not a patriot, I wrote my own pledge to survive the madness. One of the young people who stayed to the end said "awesome session"

I am glad  or not, we could talk about dealing with prejudice, discrimination , talk, listen and work on fixing things.

Professor Vibert Cambridge shared these thoughts
"

Yesterday’s session was painfully enlightening.  It was a quick and valuable survey of the nature and scope of contemporary anti-Blackness in Guyana.  There was much to take away from the conversation.  Among them:

• Anti-Blackness was not only directed to people of African ancestry.  The dark skinned in other ethnic groups are also subject.
• Origins can be found in religious teachings
• Origins can be found in the mythologies, stereotypes, and caricatures that have emerged from the sugar plantation, especially since the encounters that took place since 1834.
• Origins can be traced to the electoral campaigns of the post-universal adult suffrage era (since 1958)
• The pervasiveness of Black popular culture expressions (style, language, music) are dominating public social spaces.  This triggers resistance.
• The language of anti-Blackness is shrill, vulgar, and hurtful.

In an effort to develop counter-narratives, it will be useful if we can generate an inventory of the elements of anti-Blackness in Guyana, including the terms used in abuse and cuss outs, the injunctions against marriage to Blacks, descriptions of the physiology of Black men and women, comments on Black aesthetics, the representation of Blackness in our varied religious texts, etc. 

Another take away from yesterday’s session was the range of solidarities and strategies being deployed to cope with and resist anti-Blackness in Guyana.  These, especially the efforts at equipping the young,  was invigorating.  Can we also  generate an inventory of counter-narratives.  We can start with stories that assert Black humanity, civility, compassion, and service.  For example, the story of Clyde Walcott and his role in the blossoming of Rohan Khanai, Joe Solomon, and Basil Butcher as outstanding West Indian cricketers who did Guyana proud.

Creating counter-narratives to anti-Blackness is the first step in a comprehensive anti-racism collaboration between Guyanese at home and abroad aimed at breaking the “cycle of racism from one generation to the next.”

We must do the same for all the peoples who have settled in the Guyana space of the last, at least 12, 000 years.  The time has come for to shed the accumulations of mythologies, stereotypes, and caricatures that haunt our inner lives. "



Resources shared during the conversation

• "Why Are All The Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria" by Beverly Tatum
• "A class  divided (film) 'by Jane Elliot
• "At Night" by Gabrielle Jamela Hosein
•  "How to be An Antiracist' by Ibram X. Kendi
• Race and Racism: Developing a Personal Understanding of Race and Racism by Dr Cynthia Tyson (Youtube)
• Robert Moore' "Colonial Images of Blacks and Indians in 19th Century Guyana." In Bridget Bretton and Kevin Yelvington (eds), The Colonial Caribbean in Transition:  Essays on PostEmancipation Social and Cultural History.  Jamaica:  Press of the University of the Wst Indies, 1999, 126-158.
• Guidebook : Navigating your Indo-Caribbean Family's Anti-blackness

The next Groundings will be about Diaspora connections.



Header  Image by Vanessa Correia from Pixabay