Visualizing Microaggressions
We came across a wonderful project detailing everyday occurrences of microaggressions on Buzzfeed. What is microaggression? It is a term that was coined to describe the seemingly commonplace, passing comments or observations that can be derogatory, hurtful or insulting towards people of color. This striking photography project from photographer Kiyun, gathers people from various backgrounds and depicts the microagressions that they have encountered in life. The questions and comments are shocking, and unfortunately very common. You can find out more about the project here, and take a look at the awesome Tumblr, Microaggressions for more examples.
Can you relate to these questions and comments? The main point of this project is not to point out the ignorance of others, but rather to learn from these experiences and demonstrate how a seemingly subtle question or comment can actually do more harm than originally thought. Below are a few more photos from the project:
Please share your thoughts?
Wow. That last one in particular I hear so often. My least favorite is, “You sound like a white girl” which was said to a close friend of mine over and over again. How hateful. Being literate and well spoken isn’t a “white people” thing. As a white woman, I am offended on behalf of my husband, who happens to be black, when I hear these kinds of comments being made. It’s also so shameful to me that people say these things around our son. I want him to learn to love both sides of his heritage equally and never to be ashamed of who and what he is. Thank you for this article!
Very True Heather. The same goes for ‘why are you acting black’ when someone speaks a certain way. why is slang and ghetto talk a black thing? ghetto is ghetto, being literate is being literate, neither has to do with race.
I feel like this is a good project to do for anyone. A lot of people where I’m from are extremely racist, only because there are very few people of other ethnic backgrounds. The ones we do have sadly lose their pride in their ethnicity only so they can blend in to avoid being singed out and picked on. It’s sad these days to see how others are treated because they don’t look the same. I mean I am part Puerto Rican and have blonde hair and blue eyes, so no one ever believes me when I tell them I am part Latina. You can never judge someone by they way they look or speak. What makes it worse is most of the time when I see racial tension it is from white people. They choose to judge someone by skin color, instead of by the type of person they are. I’m not saying it’s only white people either. People just need to open up and stop being so afraid.