Institutional Racism and Microagressions
This section is recommended for students in Year 10 and above.
What is Institutional Racism?
"The collective failure of an organisation to provide an appropriate and professional service to people because of their colour, culture, or ethnic origin. It can be seen or detected in processes, attitudes and behaviour which amount to discrimination through unwitting prejudice, ignorance, thoughtlessness and racist stereotyping which disadvantage minority ethnic people."
The Macpherson report
Why do we need to explore the impact of institutional racism?
In the UK, the scale and impact of institutionalised racism has been laid bare, with young Black men stopped and searched 20,000 times in London during the coronavirus lockdown (the equivalent of 1 in 4 young Black men), along with Black MPs, barristers, senior police officers, sports people and many more.
#BlackLivesMatter protests around the world sparked a commitment among many individuals and organisations to educate themselves about Black history, heritage and culture – as part of understanding racism and standing in solidarity against it.
If that commitment is to transcend beyond social media into real change, everyone, from all communities, needs to embrace Black History Month as a starting point for exploring, discovering and celebrating Black history, heritage and culture – both past and contemporary. From the incredible achievements and contributions, to the many untold stories and barriers to progress – the day-to-day reality of institutionalised racism.
Source: www.blackhistorymonth.org.uk
How will we explore the issue of Institutional Racism in School?
Focus:
- What exactly is Institutional racism? How does it manifest in society?
- Which groups are disproportionately affected by Institutional racism? What evidence is there of this?
- How does institutional racism continue to reinforce inequality?
- What has been done about challenging institutional racism?
- What can we individually do to challenge it?
Why are we covering this theme?
- This is regularly discussed in Social Science and links to the schemes of learning.
- English, Government and Politics lessons and Business clearly offer obvious links to the theme too so we will offer a collaborative effort on this issue.
Key terminology: Institutional racism, unconscious bias, discrimination, Equality Act 2010