Two weeks ago, we had our TNSM community Zoom conversation around Priya Vulchi’s and Winona Guo’s work. These two women spent their senior year of high school exploring what it means to be racially literate. In searching for a piece to start our conversation, we felt like their framing around racial literacy connects to the philosophy here at TNSM and also offers up opportunities for each of us to deepen our efforts and commitment to building a racially literate community.
If you couldn’t attend, or even if you attended and want to reflect more deeply, here is their TEDTalk and the questions we offered to start the conversations:
- What stood out to you from the video?
- How do you see your own family working to be racially literate, in both heart and mind?
- What opportunities do you see for your family and for TNSM to nurture a racially literate community?
Priya and Winona founded CHOOSE, a student-led organization working to equip every American with the tools to talk about race and act on racism. They share a variety of lesson plans to support the development of racial literacy curriculum.
And to start celebrating Women’s History Month, here is a Spotify playlist by adrienne maree brown (who styles her name in lowercase). brown is a doula and healer, a poet, and a leading Black, queer feminist thinker and activist and the author of Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds and Pleasure Activism: The Politics of Feeling Good. We don’t recommend you listen to this playlist on your ride to school — some songs have explicit content.
Claudia López – Committee member