Thread by @MalindaSmith

Equality vs Equity: durable obstacles to equity: myths of neutrality, objectivity, colourblind, allwhite panels/#manels.
Big obstacle?
The gap betw principles & ‘how-to’. Why would those who have comfortably coexisted with, benefitted from, rationalized status quo, be the change?

Smart people admit there’s no level playing field.

Repeatedly reminded of fmr Bennington College prez Liz Coleman’s claim that when it comes to change, academe is often notable for “learned helplessness”.
If playing field isn’t level what is to be done?
Academe: path dependency

“Why don’t we have any fresh ideas around here?”

Reproduction of sameness impacts ideas, perspectives, creativity, innovation.

Cooper cookies, cookie cutter.

Paper: we’re committed to diversity, sugar, spice, all things nice.

Practice: change nobody believes in, cynicism

@SaraNAhmed ‘You end up doing the document rather than doing the doing’: Diversity, race equality and the politics of documentation”

Philomena Essed is right. One of the biggest obstacles to change is the bias *for something*: alikeness, cultural cloning, mini-me, “one of us”.
#BreakTheBias
Paper: committed to diversity.
Practice: rare slate of socially diverse candidates.
Outcome: social reproduction of same.

Statement: We’re committed to a diversity of people, ideas, knowledges.

People
Evidence req.
No trends data.

Knowledges?
On Plurality: Can we decolonize knowledges if social science and humanities scholars ignore imperialism, and willfully *exclude ‘non-western’ knowledges?
No

Not difficult convo: Has good intentions produced equitable change? No.

Reproduction of homogeneity as social injustice: Cloning, Cultures, and the Social Injustices of Homogeneities. In Clones, Fakes and Posthumans: Philomena Essed & David Theo Goldberg brill.com/view/title/309…

W/out doing EDI research we have to rely on others, contractors. No peer review. Sometimes they tell us only what we want to hear.

I would tweak my: The Dirty Dozen w/

Shirley Tate: Whiteliness and institutional racism: Hiding behind
(un)conscious bias”

Might revisit my “The Dirty Dozen:Unconscious Race and Gender Biases in the Academy” in _The Equity Myth_ (2017)
alongside
Shirley Anne Tate & Damien Page: Whiteliness and institutional racism: hiding behind (un)conscious bias, Ethics and Education (2018) tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.10…

*Oops “Have good intentions…”
Answer is still no. Good intentions, hopes and prayers, wishful thinking coexist with status quo.