Alicia Arendt

Chapter 3 Decoding the Dominance Paradigm

Creative Connector:

I was struck by the passage that discussed the assumption of rightness, the passage in summary stated that the White dominant culture doesn’t necessarily see themselves as having culture but rather simply being right.  Whites don’t have a perspective, but rather a truth.

When I traveled to Germany and Poland in 2008 on an leadership program to study the holocaust, my Christian Lutheran upbringing was really brought into question.  While I came from a strong personal religious background, when faced with the impact of the Holocaust, it brought the assumption of religious “rightness” into question.  Many sermons, readings and essays in Christianity follow the assumption of rightness, that if you do not believe in Jesus as the savior you do not go to heaven.  Being in the camps and touching the walls of the crematoriums I was infuriated by this assumption.  It seems irrational to think that just because Jews don’t believe in Christ they wouldn’t make it into heaven but rather died in the hell of a concentration camp, only to be condemned to a different hell eternally in the afterlife.  These ideas and religious assumptions continue to challenge my thinking and my belief system to this very day.

The next passage that struck me was the discussion of the issues of colorblindness.  In my notes I summarized this passage and speaking to the ideas that the term colorblind assumes we can erase racial categories, ignore differences and achieve an illusionary state of sameness.  This treats race as irrelevant, invisible and taboo.

Working with urban youth, I always referred to myself as a colorblind teacher.  I used the term ignorantly, however, implying, or at least I hope implying, a different concept than Howard’s definition of colorblind.

When I think of colorblind, my idea was that all students are unique individuals that have distinct personal experiences, characteristics and abilities.  Colorblind to me meant seeing the students as they are, for who they are, but not looking at the color of their skin to define them.  I now understand that stronger meaning associated with the term and understand its implications as ignoring differences and not embracing them I also understand that my teaching philosophy needs to explore uniqueness and experience while also giving greater understanding to how our culture and/or color affects who we are as individuals.

Vocabulary Vitalizer: 

          

I tried to choose a variety of words to explore.  While some of these terms or words can be considered common vernacular, I thought it would be beneficial to re-examine the definition in terms of how they relate to the content of the book and dominance itself.

1.       1. Paradigm- model that forms basis of something, relationship or ideas to one another.
2.     Supremacists- believer in superiority of particular groups
3.     Hegemonic group- the authority or controlling power
4.     The Melting Pot- metaphor for a heterogeneous society becoming more homogeneous, the different elements "melting together" into a harmonious whole with a common culture
5.     Colorblind- interestingly enough Webster’s Dictionary defined this term as not discriminating
6.     Privilege- restricted right or benefits, rights and advantages enjoyed by the elite, special honor, and confidentiality of communication, granting exemptions to someone.
7.     Ignorance- lack of knowledge or unawareness.
8.     Affirmative Action- program to stop discrimination
9.     Assumptions- something taken for granted, belief without proof, unproved starting point.
10.  Assimilation- the act of becoming part of something, integration into a group, learning process.

The following is a paragraph utilizing the above vocabulary in an enlightening way that makes connections both to my teaching philosophy and the content of the reading:

These is a strong paradigm shift in the status of education that focuses on student engagement, equality and creating relevant learning for students.  This paradigm shift will in theory help develop strong educational equality.  While this move to equality was partly fostered by government programs such as Affirmative Action and No Child Left Behind, the goal of the new educational system needs to place more focus on individualized instruction, personalization and social development, while placing less emphasis on past assumptions of ignorance, assimilation, privilege and dominant ideals.

Essence Extractor:

The current world view holds that White’s assumptions are believed to be true while ignorance of other groups is the norm, thus allowing White privilege to remain unchanged and unacknowledged.