Responses to social/ political issues--profiling, voter/ marriage rights, immigration, healthcare, education, and entitlements--are often restricted to individuals’ experiences. Many are unaware of the perils and perks of privilege that inform personal responses and viewpoints. Conversations on important issues through the lens of race, gender, sexuality, class, age, or ability, for instance, often leave individuals and communities unwilling/ unable to talk, listen and connect.
Project Humanities hosted 2-hour workshops that explored everyday manifestations of privilege. Workshops across Arizona engaged literature, history, language, performance, art, film, history, and popular culture to demonstrate the everyday complexities of privilege. Facilitated by experts who establish guidelines and appropriate prompts, workshops centered on participants’ vital voices, providing a model for understanding and acknowledging privilege.
These facilitated workshops centered on participants’ vital voices, providing a model for understanding “difference,” identity politics, and acknowledging privilege. Consistent feedback across all of the workshops evidenced individual empowerment through critical conversation, information, education, and self-reflection.
These workshops have now evolved to be Humanity 101 in the Workplace: Lessons in Privilege and Bias.
Goals
- Create an awareness of the multiple perils and perks of privilege.
- Examine one’s own perceptions, values, and biases.
- Create strategies for combating systemic biases.
- Enhance personal understanding and skills for living in an increasingly diverse world.
Ground Rules
- Everyone had the right to pass if asked a question they do not want to answer.
- No physical or verbal attacks.
- Keep an open mind.
- Everyone had the responsibility to involve themselves in activities and exercises, and making sure everyone in the group is comfortable with the group’s actions.
- Whatever is said by participants during session should be respected and not repeated outside of session.
- Only one person spoke at a time so that we could best understand everyone.
Privilege Checklists *
* Note: These research tools were not created by Project Humanities.