I am far from an expert in issues related to diversity, inclusion, or decolonization but because my work involves holding space for increasingly complex conversations in increasingly complex environments, I make it my mission to learn as much as I can in order to do better and to serve better (and to pick myself up after my mistakes). Especially as someone who has (largely) benefited from a colonial system that has harmed others, I take it as my responsibility to face my own discomfort in order to work toward a better future. A lot of damage can be done in a space where we have unexamined privilege and power imbalances, combined with a conversation host who has not done some work in facing her own unconscious bias, so I am trying (with as much humility as I can) to decolonize myself and the spaces where I work.
A couple of years ago, I set an intention to spend a year decolonizing my bookshelf and centring marginalized voices by reading only books written by writers who were not from the dominant culture. (This year, I’m trying to do the same with courses, workshops, and conferences I attend.) I wasn’t entirely successful (I wrote about that here), but I was, nonetheless, radically changed by the experience. My worldview was expanded, I became much more aware of my own unconscious biases, and my ability to hold space for brave conversations was considerably stretched. AND… I discovered that I actually loved this shift. Now I find myself gravitating toward these writers because they inspire and challenge me and bring a lot of richness to my life. In the two years since this pledge, I still rarely seek out the most common writers from within the dominant culture, but instead, seek out those working at the edges in more complex spaces (whose ideas are less amplified by mass media, publishing houses, etc.).
People often ask me to provide them with resources that will help them stretch their worldviews, decolonize themselves, and hold space for more complexity and diversity, so I’ve put together the following list of books, articles, and videos that have influenced me in recent years. Most of the voices on this list are from non-dominant groups. (I left fiction off this list, simply because the possibilities for that list felt too endless.)
Before I go there, though, I highly recommend that you also seek out teachers from within these groups that you can PAY FOR what you’re learning. A good place to start is the online course Diversity is an Asset, or a deeper version, Social Justice Intensive, by my friends Desiree Adaway and Ericka Hines. (I participated in Diversity is an Asset the first time they offered it, and because I know that they are both life-long learners with insatiable hunger for evolving ideas, I know that the content has grown even better since then.)
(Note: This list is in no particular order. And there are things missing from it that I simply forgot to save links for.)
Articles and blog posts:
- Intent vs. Impact: Why your intentions don’t really matter (this article helped me understand the damage we do when we try to hide behind “well I didn’t really MEAN it that way”)
- White Women’s Tears and the Men Who Love Them (this is one of the first articles that helped me understand the damage we do when we centre our own feelings over those more marginalized than we are)
- What reconciliation feels like to people “locked in the bathroom” for a century, by Niigaan Sinclair (an Indigenous perspective on colonization and the efforts to “reconcile”)
- What cultural appropriation is and why you should care, by Shree Paradkar (a well-thought-out response to some recent controversy in Canada about an “appropriation prize”)
- A short comic that provides a simple and profound understanding of privilege, by illustrator Toby Morris
- Dear White People, by Bayo Akomolafe (an African man’s perspective on colonialism and appropriation)
- Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics, by Kimberle Crenshaw (the original piece in which she coined the phrase “intersectional feminism”)
- The Cycle of Socialization, by Bobbie Harro (helps to gain a better understanding of how we were socially conditioned to think and behave the way we do)
- Please don’t tell me I’m in a “safe place”, by Jamie Marich, PhD (on holding space for trauma and not assuming you understand what makes another person feel safe)
- From Safe Spaces to Brave Spaces, by Brian Arao and Kristi Clemens (the academic article that first introduced me to the concept of Brave Space, which I now use in my work)
- White People: I Don’t Want You To Understand Me Better, I Want You To Understand Yourselves, by Ijeoma Oluo
- Nine Phrases Allies Can Say When Called Out Instead of Getting Defensive, by
- Strategies in Addressing Power and Privilege, by Leticia Nieto, Psy. D., and Margot F. Boyer (a helpful framing of status, rank, and power that I use in courses I teach)
- White Fragility, by Robin DiAngelo (this is the academic article in which DiAngelo coined the phrase “white fragility”)
- Here’s How We Can Center Queer & Trans Survivors In The #MeToo Movement, by Neesha Powell (a great reminder of the people who get overlooked in movements for social change)
- Understanding White Privilege, by Francis E. Kendall, Ph.D (understand white privilege as an institutional (rather than personal) set of benefits granted to those of us who, by race, resemble the people who dominate the powerful positions in our institutions)
- The Radical Copyeditor’s Style Guide for Writing About Transgender People (so we can do better in how we include people in our language)
- Six Backhanded “Compliments” That Mentally Ill People are Tired of, by Sam Dylan Finch (we can do better in holding space for those with mental illness
- Indigenous Nationhood Can Save the World, by Niigaan Sinclair (how we can all benefit from a more Indigenous perspective on nationhood)
Podcasts and Videos:
- Jesse Wente (a Canadian Indigenous columnist) on cultural appropriation (a passionate response to the carelessness and arrogance of settlers who appropriate stories and art)
- Kimberlé Crenshaw: The urgency of intersectionality (a TED talk that explains intersectionality and what we’re missing when we ignore it)
- Alok Vaid-Menon: The Pain and Empowerment of Choosing Your Own Gender (Alok does an amazing poetry/comedy performance that I highly recommend if you ever have a chance to see them live)
- I’m not your inspiration, thank you very much (Stella Young, on seeing past disabilities)
- Unreserved (a radio show hosted by my friend Rosanna Deerchild, about Indigenous Canada, full of great content)
- Colour Code (a podcast about race in Canada)
- I Am Not Your Negro, James Baldwin (worth renting or buying or finding a place where it’s showing)
- The Danger of a Single Story (a brilliant TED talk by Nigerian novelist Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie that I used to use to teach university students to see past their own blindspots)
Non-Fiction/Teaching Books:
- Beyond Inclusion, Beyond Empowerment: A developmental strategy to liberate everyone, by Leticia Nieto with Margot F. Boyer, Liz Goodwin, Garth R. Johnson & Laurel Collier Smith (a powerful analysis of the psychological dynamics of oppression and privilege – useful especially for conversation hosts)
- The Inconvenient Indian: A curious history of Native People in North America, by Thomas King (one of the best resources to help with an understanding of colonization in North America – heavy content, but surprisingly easy to read and rather humorous)
- Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds, by adrienne marie brown (an invitation to better understand personal and collective relationships with change)
- Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants, by Robin Wall Kimmerer (I love this book! It is a beautiful combination of stories and ancient wisdom that changes the way you see the world and our relationships to each other and the world.)
- Between the World and Me, by Ta-Nehisi Coates (in an open letter to his son, Coates paints a picture of race in the U.S.)
- All About Love and Teaching Community: A Pedagogy of Hope, by bell hooks (she has a way of telling unflinching truths with love and openness)
- So You Want to Talk About Race, by Ijeoma Oluo (particularly about the racial landscape in the United States)
- Blind Spot: Hidden Biases of Good People, by Mahzarin R. Banaji and Anthony G. Greenwald (from the co-developers of the Implicit Association Test, a really useful test that you can take online to help you understand your own biases)
- Conflict is Not Abuse: Overstating Harm, Community Responsibility, and the Duty of Repair, by Sarah Schulman (I’m not sure I agree with everything in this book, but it was still really helpful in expanding my thinking about the possibilities for generative conflict)
- Connecting to our Ancestral Past: Healing through Family Constellations, Ceremony, and Ritual, by Francesca Mason Boring (I’ve been intrigued with family systems constellations for some time and was happy to find this Indigenous lens on the teachings)
- Whose Land is it Anyway? A Manual for Decolonization (this book just came out and I haven’t read it yet, but it looks helpful – you can download it for free)
Memoirs:
- When They Call You a Terrorist: A Black Lives Matter Memoir, by Patrisse Khan-Cullers and Asha Bandele (a powerful and personal story of how she became an activist)
- Fire Shut Up in My Bones, by Charles M. Blow (a gut-wrenching story of poverty and race)
- Gender Failure, by Rae Spoon & Ivan E. Coyote (what it’s like to be gender non-conforming)
- Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body, by Roxane Gay (read anything by Roxane Gay – she’s a powerful writer)
- Unbowed, by Wangari Maathai (Nobel Prize winner who mobilized women to plant trees across Kenya)
- Mighty Be Our Powers: How Sisterhood, Prayer, and Sex Changed a Nation at War, by Leymah Gbowee (facing conflict in Liberia with creativity and strength)
- Confessions of a Fairy’s Daughter: Growing Up with a Gay Dad, by Alison Wearing (she also wrote Honeymoon in Purdah: An Iranian Journey, which I also really enjoyed)
- Living for Change: an Autobiography, by Grace Lee Boggs (an activist’s experience in Detroit)
- The Reason You Walk, by Wab Kinew (growing up with a father who’s a residential school survivor)
- A Long Way Gone: memoirs of a boy soldier, by Ishmael Beah (growing up in conflict in Sierra Leone)
- Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust, by Immaculate Ilibagiza (a powerful story of genocide)
- Laughing All the Way to the Mosque, humour/memoir by Zarqa Nawaz (a Canadian Muslim writer who wrote also created the sit-com Little Mosque on the Prairie)
- Between Two Worlds: Escape from Tyranny: Growing Up in the Shadow of Saddam
, by Zainab Salbi (the founder of Women for Women International, about what it was like to grow up with Saddam Hussein as a family friend)
Poetry:
- Femme in Public, by Alok Vaid-Menon (powerful poems about being brown and gender non-conforming)
- Calling Down the Sky, by Rosanna Deerchild (about her mother’s experiences in residential school)