"The Real Stuff White People Like" Talking About Race, Ethnicity, & Relationships [Interactive Data]

Today in class, my students and I were talking about race, ethnicity, friendships, and dating.  Our discussion centered on how cultural norms in different communities could influence people's likes and dislikes. Because we look for friends and romantic partners who share out interests, these likes and dislikes can affect who we choose to form relationships with it.

In order to get the students involved in talking about this without feeling like they were stereotyping people, I showed them some data collected by the fine folks at OKCupid.  The OKCupid staff looked at unique words and phrases used in the dating profiles of their site users and created interactive graphics showing the results.

The students got a kick out of this activity and it definitely broke the ice. After I showed them these examples, we had some great conversations about we find friends and dating partners and how/why these things matter to their lives.

Link to the site: http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/the-real-stuff-white-people-like/

Intersectional Feminism Using Food Metaphor [Video]

In this video, writer and comedian Akilah Hughes uses the metaphor of pizza to explain intersectionality.  In brief, it goes something like this: in a world made for Burgers, Cheese Pizza is trying to argue that it deserves the same rights as Burgers.  In that struggle, what is a Pizza with toppings other than cheese supposed to do?

It's not a perfect metaphor, but I think it's a way to help students start thinking about intersectionality.

Link to video: http://feministing.com/2015/04/13/intersectional-feminism-brought-to-you-by-pizza/

Using comedy to discuss "reverse racism" [Video]

I recently attended a dissertation defense on the articulation of race in comedy sketches (shout-out to Jennifer Kim: check out her work "The Merits of a Fool: Contending with Race and Racism through Sketch Comedy from the 1960's to the 2000's").  In one of the sketches, comedian Aamer Rahman uses humor to critique the notion of "reverse racism."  This video may be a way of tackling the idea in the classroom.

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dw_mRaIHb-M

A call to redefine what we value as masculine [Video]

I believe that it is important for students to examine how cultural constructions of gender are relational: not only is masculinity defined in relation to femininity, but masculinities are also defined in relation to one another.  I aim for students to be able to identify how constructions of gender, especially hegemonic masculinity, can be restrictive and can affect not only men's interactions with women, but also their interactions with other men and their self-identities.

This video calls for us to value characteristics of masculinity (that the creators see as) opposed to the current construction of hegemonic masculinity.

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nj7Zw4P8LPo