Links to Interesting and Thought-Provoking Content
The resources below are divided into categories. Check back for frequently updated content. To suggest a resource, email diversity@meca.edu.
General Resources
The Charlottesville Syllabus
“The Charlottesville Syllabus is a resource created by the Graduate Student Coalition for Liberation to be used to educate readers about the long history of white supremacy in Charlottesville, Virginia. With resources selected and summaries written by UVa graduate students, this abridged version of the Syllabus is organized into six sections that offer contemporary and archival primary and secondary sources (articles, books, responses, a documentary, databases) and a list of important terms for discussing white supremacy.”
Black Womanhood: The Syllabus
“Black Womanhood,” a new course team-taught by two professors at the Johns Hopkins University, was designed to be intimate. But the professors, Martha S. Jones and Jessica Marie Johnson, also wanted to widely share the readings they’d curated on a topic they are passionate about.
Race Reporting Guide
When we talk about education, health care, voting rights, and many other topics, there is often an aversion to talking about race.
Alternatives and Substitutes for Appropriative or Problematic Language
This document was originally created for a Facebook group where non-Black people consistently appropriated Black English, also known as AAVE (African American Vernacular English), and used casual ableism and gendered terms.
JSTOR Charlottesville Syllabus: Readings on the History of Hate in America
JSTOR provides origin stories pointing out historical precedent to current events.
Columbia College’s Resource Page
This page includes articles, books, films and additional resources on various issues related to diversity, equity, and inclusion.
Coummnity Change Inc. Reource Links
CCI provides resources to individuals and groups wrestling with issues of race, racism, whiteness and white privilege.
Intersectionality is Not a Label
This article describes the benefits and some of the complexities of intersectionality.
Letter to My Son
“Here is what I would like for you to know: In America, it is traditional to destroy the black body—it is heritage.”
Required Reading for White America
We asked several black writers: What book should all white Americans read? Here’s what they said.
Broadly.
The Gender Spectrum Collection is a stock photo library featuring images of trans and non-binary models that go beyond the clichés of putting on makeup and holding trans flags.
Accessibility
The Controversial Process of Redesigning the Wheelchair Symbol
This article explores the origins of the new Accessible Icon.
This Open Source Software Could Make Museum Websites More Accessible
Called Coyote, this program provides a system for creating, reviewing, and managing the language used to describe art—a thorny process that involves acknowledging and navigating personal prejudices.
Diversity: Disability
The article examines diversity, particularly as it relates to contemporary art and art history. Particular focus is given to how this relates to ideas of disability and disability culture.
Fighting the Art World’s Ableism
Whether it’s through the Vessel or the accessibility of galleries, by not sufficiently supporting the neurodiverse and disabled communities, the art world is inadvertently reinforcing the ableism that pervades American society.
Diversity In Maine
Maine Initiatives
Maine Initiatives is a network of individuals supporting greater social, economic, and environmental justice in Maine through informed, intentional, and collective philanthropy.
Maine Just Banned Native American Mascots. It’s a Movement That’s Inching Forward.
Professional sports teams and big college sports programs have often resisted calls to rethink their names and logos. But at local levels, lawmakers have had more success.
I Am Not Your Cholo
“Marco Avilés grapples with questions of difference and discrimination for immigrants in Peru and the US in this essay.”
Misconceptions & Commonly Held Beliefs
Project Implicit
“The Implicit Association Test (IAT) measures attitudes and beliefs that people may be unwilling or unable to report. The IAT may be especially interesting if it shows that you have an implicit attitude that you did not know about.”
“White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack” and “Some Notes for Facilitators”
This article, the original of which is widely available online, explores white privilege and the reactions of several individuals working through it.
Cycle of Oppression
The Cycle of Oppression chart is one of several resources found on the Racism Defined section of this site.
Commons Patterns of Well-Intentioned White People
(Please request access from above link)
Collective socialization results in predictable group patterns. This chapter explores some of the most common patterns of well-intentioned people discussing race.
Assessing Organizational Racism
This is a tool for predominately white organizations and multi-racial organizations of white people and people of color.
Dialogues in Diversity: An Experiential Workshop in Understanding Oppression and Racism
(Please request access from above link)
Presenters Rachel Morales and Keita Whitten explore assumptions, a historical roadmap of oppression, and other models of racist oppression.
9 Things People Get Wrong About Being Non-Binary
“That definition’s pretty broad because being non-binary means different things to different people.”
Race, Gender, Class
I Assumed It Was Racism—It Was Patriarchy
Why are some women more invisible than others? To grow new anti-patriarchal movements like Black Lives Matter, we need to start opening our eyes.
Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence Against Women of Color
“The problem with identity politics is not that it fails to transcend difference, as some critics charge, but rather the opposite- that it frequently conflates or ignores intra group differences.”
What the Data Tell Us About the Challenges Facing Female Artists of Color
“Our research uncovered something surprising: we had a lot of data about women in the arts, and a good amount of data about race and ethnicity in the arts, and plenty of articles stating that women of color fare worse in the art world, but not much hard data.”
What Makes a Greeting Card Black?
In 1991 the Hallmark greeting card company, based in Kansas City, Mo., decided it was time to get serious about diversity.
Ibram Kendi, One of the Nation’s Leading Scholars of Racism, Says Education and Love Are Not the Answer
Founder of new anti-racism center at American University sees impact of policy, culture on black athletes.
Silenced and Objectified: Black Women in the US
“Who speaks to whom? Who is spoken of? Whom do we horrify into silence? In the US, such questions are intimately tied to the longue durée of race, slavery, practices of colonial disregard, and the struggle for Civil Rights.”
Spike Lee’s Amazing Rant Against Gentrification: ‘We Been Here!’
Speaking Tuesday night in Brooklyn, blocks away from his company headquarters and his father’s apartment, Spike Lee went off on how the neighborhood has changed.
Is Gentrification All Bad?
This article explores the benefits and drawbacks of gentrification.
Deepening Our Understanding of Structural Racism
Structural marginality is a shift in focus from people and individuals to structures and institutions.