Challenging Eurocentrism: The Roles & Priorities of Multicultural Centers in Higher Education
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A presentation on the roles and priorities of multicultural centers that I gave during a virtual campus visit as a candidate for the Assistant Director of the Multicultural Center at Ball State University.
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Challenging Eurocentrism: The Roles & Priorities of Multicultural Centers in Higher Education
- 1. CHALLENGING EUROCENNTRISM: THE ROLES & PRIORITIES OF MULTICULTURAL CENTERS IN HIGHER EDUCATION SOPHONIE BAZILE, M.A. JUNE 2, 2021 BALL STATE UNIVERSITY ASSISTANT DIRECTOR OF THE MULTICULTURAL CENTER CANDIDATE
- 2. TABLE OF CONTENTS • History of Cultural Centers • Roles & Priorities of Multicultural Centers ⚬ Counterspace ⚬ Educational Programmming ⚬ Foster Relationships ⚬ Community Engagement • Relevance of Multicultural Centers
- 3. TERMINOLOGY • C O U N T E R S P A C E : A c a d e m i c a n d s o c i a l “ s a f e s p a c e s ” . • C R I T I C A L R A C E T H E O R Y ( C R T ) : A t h e o r e t i c a l f r a m e w o r k t h a t a p p l i e s a c r i t i c a l a n a l y s i s o f r a c e , l a w , a n d p o w e r t o e x p o s e h o w r a c i s m e x i s t s p r e s e n t l y a n d h i s t o r i c a l l y a t a n i n s t i t u t i o n a l l e v e l . • D I V E R S I T Y : T h e r e c o g n i t i o n o f t h e f u l l g a m u t / b r o a d s p e c t r u m o f e x p e r i e n c e s a n d u n i q u e d i f f e r e n c e s o f a l l m e m b e r s o f a c o m m u n i t y . • E U R O C E N T R I S M : A w o r l d - v i e w w h i c h , i m p l i c i t l y o r e x p l i c i t l y , p o s i t s E u r o p e a n h i s t o r y a n d v a l u e s a s t h e n o r m a n d s u p e r i o r t o o t h e r s . • I N T E R S E C T I O N A L I T Y : A c o n c e p t t h a t p o s i t s s o c i a l c a t e g o r i e s , s u c h a s r a c e , g e n d e r , a n d s e x u a l o r i e n t a t i o n , i n t e r s e c t t o c r e a t e s p e c i f i c f o r m s o f o p p r e s s i o n .
- 4. HISTORY OF CULTURAL CENTERS • Promote the history and heritage of diverse groups of people • Black student protests during the mid-1960s to 1970s • Challenge Eurocentrism • Safe spaces on PWI campuses • Cultural centers may support specific groups ⚬ Women's Centers ⚬ LGBTQ Centers ⚬ Latino/a Cultural Centers • Multicultural centers support various groups
- 5. MULTICULTURAL CENTERS ROLES & PRIORITIES OF
- 6. 1. COUNTERSPACE • A space where students of color can: • Congregate • Feel validated • Vent • Challenge stereotypes • Organize • Mental well-being
- 7. • Fill in gaps in curriculum • Faculty integrating programming into syllabi • Cross-cultural understanding • Intercultural understanding • Engage students, faculty, and staff from wider campus community 2. EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMMING
- 8. 3. FOSTERING RELATIONSHIPS • Friendships, support networks, resources • Hair supply stores and barbershops • Ethnic grocery stores • LGBTQ-affirming churches • Coalition-building • Allyship • Mentoring
- 9. • Local community • Break down walls • Forms of engagement • Volunteering • Meeting with families • Relevance in the community • Future partnerships 4. COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT
- 10. RELEVANCE OF MULTICULTURAL CENTERS IN HIGHER EDUCATION • Challenge the Eurocentrism of predominantly white institutions • Recognize that students of color need specific forms of support • Contribute to a diverse and inclusive campus climate
- 11. THANK YOU FOR YOUR TIME!
Editor's Notes
- Today, I’ll be talking to you about the role and priorities of multicultural centers in higher education and how they help to challenge the Eurocentrism of predominantly white campuses in the United States.
- Here’s what I’m going to cover throughout my presentation. First, I’ll provide a brief history of cultural centers in higher education. I think it’s important to situate the historical origins of cultural centers to understand the significance of multicultural centers today. Then, I’ll discuss several roles and/or priorities of multicultural centers. Those roles and priorities include, but are not limited to: Counterspace Educational Programming Coalition-Building Community Engagement Finally, I’ll make the case for the continued relevance of multicultural centers today and wrap up my presentation.
- Before I begin, I want to review a few terms that you’ll hear me use at certain points in my presentation. COUNTERSPACE refers to academic and social “safe spaces”. This is a term that originated in critical race theory. I use the phrase safe spaces loosely because Black feminist scholar bell hooks would argue that “safe” spaces don’t exist for people of color. However, the phrase is a great way to illustrate what a counterspace is. CRITICAL RACE THEORY, or CRT, is a theoretical framework developed by legal scholars, including Derrick Bell, Kimberlé Crenshaw, and Richard Delgado, that applies a critical analysis of race, law, and power to expose how racism exists presently and historically at an institutional level. Thus, CRT argues that racism is inherent in all our institutions. DIVERSITY: The recognition of the full gamut/broad spectrum of experiences and unique differences of all members of a community. EUROCENTRISM: A worldview which, implicitly or explicitly, posits European history and values as the norm and superior to others. INTERSECTIONALITY: A concept developed by Black feminist legal scholar Kimberlé Crenshaw that posits social categories, such as race, gender, and sexual orientation, intersect to create specific forms of oppression.
- Cultural centers, in general, promote the history and heritage of diverse groups of people paying particular attention to the demographic of the campus where they’re located. Depending on the school and their function, cultural centers are referred by many names that are often used interchangeably, which are probably familiar to you all, such as ethnic centers, multicultural centers, or intercultural centers. According to Lori Patton in her edited anthology Culture Centers in Higher Education: Perspectives on Identity, Theory, and Practice, multicultural centers branched out from black and Latino/a cultural centers that were established on college and university campuses as a result of Black and Latino student organizing during the mid-1960s through the 1970s. In the post-Civil Rights era, historically white colleges and universities—more commonly referred to as predominantly white institutions—began recruiting students of color, particularly Blacks and Latinos, which changed the schools’ demographics. These same students began challenging the Eurocentrism of these universities. Thus, the establishment of cultural centers on college and university campuses originated from students of color demanding that their schools provide them with safe spaces on campus that honored their identities, traditions, and values. Today, cultural centers support specific groups on college and university campuses, such as women, LGBTQ, Latinx, Asian, and indigenous students. Then there are multicultural centers, such as BSU’s Multicultural Center, that support students of diverse backgrounds rather than a single group. Here I have two pictures. The first is an image from 1992 of Tim Smith, a founder of the Black Awareness Council at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. This is a speak-out about the creation of Black cultural center on the campus. Today, that center is the Sonja Haynes Stone Center for Black Culture and History.
- Now, I’m going move on to the roles and priorities of multicultural centers. These roles and priorities are likely to differ depending on the organizational model of multicultural centers.
- The first is that multicultural centers serve as counterspaces at predominantly white institutions. According to Maria Ong, Janet Smith, and Lily Ko in their article “Counterspaces for Women of Color in STEM Higher Education: Marginal and Central Spaces for Persistence and Success” (2018), counterspaces are spaces where students of color can congregate in a welcoming environment, feel that their identities are validated, vent their frustrations of instances of discrimination and microaggressions, challenge the negative stereotypes about the groups that they identity with, and organize around social justice issues. As much as predominantly white institutions may advertise themselves as being inclusive, the truth is that they’re foundationally Eurocentric. This Eurocentrism can be seen in their curriculum that usually centers white male scholars; their faculty and staff who tend to be predominantly white, especially administrators; their buildings that are named after white people, likely men; and the statues around campus of white people, again, usually men. In her article titled “As College Increases Its Diversity, Professor and Activists Argue Cultural Centers Improve Outcomes for Students of Color” (2020), Caroline Kubzansky argues that counterspaces such as multicultural centers provide a shield against a hostile environment that centers and values whiteness, which can greatly improve the mental well-being of students of color because they no longer feel isolated. I felt that this meme of Iyanla illustrates the shield that multicultural centers provide to students of color in a hostile space. And when the mental well-being of students of color increases, predominantly white institutions are more likely to retain them. Students feel supported and are less likely to drop-out or fail out. Additionally, when these schools retain students of color, it increases the likelihood that the students will make it until graduation and attain their degrees.
- Another is designing educational programming that educates the campus and local community about groups that have been historically marginalized and whose contributions and achievements have remained largely unrecognized. Such programming can help to fill in the gaps in students’ curriculum that centers white voices. For instance, as you can see by this graphic created by Nina Chhita, an Asian American woman, Dr. Flossie Wong-Staal, was the first scientist to clone the HIV virus, which is not likely to be common knowledge. There have been faculty, particularly those of color, who have willingly integrated the programming of multicultural centers in their course syllabi. Also, the programming offered by multicultural centers provide opportunities for cross-cultural understanding as well as intercultural understanding. For instance, a series of talks about the history of Asian immigrants in the U.S. can teach Black, indigenous, and Latinx folks about the experiences of Asians that may have been unknown beforehand while a presentation on queer Puerto Ricans living in, say, Indiana, is an opportunity for Latinx folks to learn about the experiences of a specific subgroup within their community. This is important because no group is a monolith, particularly Latinos.
- A third role and priority of multicultural centers is aiding in fostering relationships. Now, this is something that usually happens organically as different groups congregate in multicultural centers as counterspaces. These relationships can include: The fostering of friendships, the creation of support networks, and the sharing of resources, which can be maintained both inside and outside of multicultural centers. Examples of sharing resources can be Black people distributing a list among themselves of Black-owned hair salons and barbershops, Black hair supply stores, and the best nails salons to go to. Or people of color telling each other about ethnic grocery stores and restaurants or where to buy certain food staples. Or queer religious folks telling each other about safe places of worship. A great initiative would be to keep a list of these resources in a binder in multicultural centers or linking a page with a list of these resources on the website. Additionally, such an endeavor is an intentional way of engaging with community businesses owned and operated by people of color. There’s also cross-cultural and intercultural coalition-building. Racial and ethnic student groups tend to use multicultural centers as home bases for meetings. When these groups are in proximity with each other, it’s a chance for students to learn about each other’s struggles and priorities; organize together on similar issues; and to support each other. And speaking of supporting each other, another form of relationship is becoming allies. Students organizing around issues that may not directly affect their everyday lives. The last form of relationship I’ll mention is mentoring. Multicultural centers can coordinate mentoring programs to support students of color. This can be peer-to-peer mentoring, staff-to-student mentoring, or faculty-to-student mentoring, among others. Examples of this are the EXCEL Mentoring Program and the REACH Mentoring Program offered by BSU’s Multicultural Center. When students of color see themselves reflected in the student body, in the faculty members, and in the staff, it can foster a sense of inclusion.
- The last role and priority of multicultural centers that I’m going to discuss is community engagement or outreach. When I say community, I mean the local community: the people, businesses, and organizations that surround the campus where a multicultural center is located. In a conversation with the Assistant Director of the Center for Equality & Social Justice, they commented that local communities often don’t understand what it is that cultural centers do, much less know what else is happening at a university or college. Community engagement can remove that mystery or confusion and help to break down the walls of the Ivory Tower. An example of community engagement is when I chaired the Dimensions of Politically Ecology Conference in 2019 at the University of Kentucky, I coordinated an activist panel that included members from the local community surrounding the campus. One of the panelists was a director of a food co-op and another was a community organizer who helped to take down a confederate monument in Lexington. Other examples of community engagement can include coordinating a volunteer program to get students to volunteer at organizations in the community or going out into the community to talk to families about their children attending that college or university when the time comes for college applications. By engaging with the local community, multicultural centers make themselves relevant within that community and create avenues for future partnerships.
- Multicultural centers continue to be relevant in higher education in the 21st century and will likely be relevant in the foreseeable future. If you keep up with the news, especially news within higher education, then you know that over the last decade or so, lawmakers have been waging a legal fight against anything remotely related to critical race theory, intersectionality, and diversity. The pervasive argument is that such topics create division on university and college campuses. Within this conversation, multicultural centers are perceived as contributing to separatism and even reverse racism. This is because the Eurocentrism of higher education continues to be denied and students of color are expected to acculturate to university environments without question if they want to be there. Multicultural centers are necessary to challenge the Eurocentrism of predominantly white institutions. Multicultural centers are also a way for predominantly white institutions to recognize that students of color need specific forms of support. And multicultural centers are necessary because they contribute to a diverse and inclusive campus climate by promoting cross-cultural understanding. At BSU, the existence of the Multicultural Center is an act of beneficence towards the students of color enrolled there.