Actually, I speak English very well.
Guadalupe Mitchell, Damascus, OR. Growing up, most people just saw a little brown Mexican girl. I remember when entered the second grade and my family...
Dude, could you please calm down?
Payton Collier, Woodbridge, VA “Can you please calm down” is an unwanted sentiment that has been offered to me many times. The most hurtful of...
Don’t glance at coins on sidewalks.
Jill Epstein Ann Arbor, MI Understanding Race Project- University of Michigan At a family gathering years ago, a relative of mine inspired me. He told...
No, I won’t do your homework
Dillon Pham, CA. As a person who enjoys volunteering and helping others, I typically don’t mind if my friends or fellow classmates ask me for...
Black man, white girl kissing; beautifully scared.
Tracey Rae Palmer, Myrtle Beach, SC. I was told never to kiss a n***** or get close to them; they would only rob you or...
Her black smile I fondly remember
Harry Dapron I was a white, nerdy, shy, socially invisible teenager in senior high school. She was a beautiful, black classmate with a lovely, engaging...
Mommy, I want to be Vanilla.
Jasmin Marie Harpe, Burlington, NJ. It has been hard to fit in to both societies growing up as a biracial child, especially being in academia...
Judge by character, not by color.
Helen Zhang, Camarillo, CA. When I was in middle school, I noticed that my classmates tended to form “cliques” with people of the same ethnicity....
Why the wink and the gun?
Mark Overmann, Washington, DC. I grew up in a mostly white suburb north of Cincinnati, Ohio. My grade school was not diverse. I remember one...
We come from the same ocean
Timena Mano, Northern CA. Since I was a young child, one thing I knew for sure was that I was Samoan. I am Polynesian but...
My fear exceeds yours, white people.
Kokujin Cameron Salt Lake City, UT When I was in kindergarten and in class, I had to use the restroom. The teacher had forgotten and...
Isn’t that the symbol Nazis used?
Eesha Verma, USA. When I was in elementary school, we had a Diversity Day kind of thing where everyone was asked to bring in something...
Sorry, My Mom Don’t Like Blacks
Amber Roberson-Rowell, Essex, MD. That was my second incident of prejudice and what instilled in me that race–the color of my skin–was a problem. The...
Bridge across cultures: our reconciliation, salvation
Ned Reese, Onalaska, WI. Other potential submissions: 1) Hunka (Dakota adoptee) by/for whom, 2) immigrants all: borders–when, where, why?, 3) Coming home–whose space? 4) Left...
I’m sorry for past uninformed judgements.
Dale Kolomaznik, Dayton, OH. I’d love to be a part of future discussions on this topic. I became interested I’m racial relations when, as an...
No job because his name was Mohammed.
Vicki Parrish, San Jose, CA. My engineering graduate student from India had the family name, Mohammed. He is in the top of his software engineering...
No One Is Better Than You…
Kim Skillern Samuels, Cleveland Heights, OH. I lived in a neighborhood of black people, and went to an inner city public school. When friends found...
Does your mother know you’re here?
Dolly Szymanski Fort Wayne, IN Both of these quotes are things my mother heard or said The first quote – my mother was a child...
