In this video, Dr Josephine Kwhali questions the concept of Unconscious Bias. “After years of anti-racist debate, policies and strategies… if it is still unconscious then it is very worrying about what it will take for the unconscious to become conscious.”
Dr Kwhali states that institutions have made some changes that support white middle-class women, and that they have consciously taken these actions. This shows that the institutions are capable of managing/ bringing change but consciously choosing not to do the same for the Black, minority and working-class women. Dr Kwhali questions what more needs to be done, written, talked about and presented in order for people who are educating the next generation to get a degree of consciousness on racism, and inequalities in the institutions.
Dr Kwhali shares her experience of being conscious of racism at the age of four. She didn’t learn about racism from lectures, seminars or books – I resonated with this. I myself had never learnt about racism until I moved to the UK and, unfortunately, experienced it myself when I was younger. I found out then that I was seen as the ‘other’ by my white peers.
This resource reminded me of our last session of Dr Shirley Anne Tate’s seminar Whiteliness and institutional racism: Hiding behind unconscious bias. Dr Tate states unconscious bias is used to maintain white supremacy. It is political silencing as it maintains white innocence and fragility (it is made to be forgotten/ erased). In the seminar, Dr Tate shares Sara Ahmed’s words about unconscious bias being a performative act. Using the term unconscious bias, many hide behind the meaning as if it can’t be helped because it is [un]conscious. Unconscious bias is the ‘acceptable’ face of being racist – it is to ‘explain’ institutional racism.
Who gains from this?
Who is made to be erased – Whose pain is being erased?
References:
CriSHET the Nelson Mandela University, 2018. Whiteliness and institutional racism: Hiding behind unconscious bias. Available at: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lur3hjEHCsE&ab_channel=CriSHETNelsonMandelaUniversity>
UCU – University and College Union, 2016. Witness: unconscious bias. Available at: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6XDUGPoaFw&ab_channel=UCU-UniversityandCollegeUnion>