Intersectionality

I am a woman.
I am white.
I am Catholic.
I am pursuing a master’s degree in educational technology.
I am in a heterosexual relationship.

These terms and names put me in a bunch of categories, mostly majorities. Intersectionality is how each of these individual identifiers affects your overall experience as a human. Being a part of many majorities has afforded me a lot of opportunities. Other people experience things differently because of their race, socioeconomic status, ethnicity, political ideology, physical ability, and more. Kimberlé Crenshaw does a great job of presenting this topic at TEDWomen 2016. Crenshaw gives a content warning for violence and abuse for the talk, so feel free to skip the below video if needed.

After watching this, I realized a lot of my students fall into many minority categories and it greatly changes their school experiences. My students (for the most part) are various minorities, who are not Catholic like me, who are on free or reduced lunch. Intersectionality will play a huge role in their lives. To remind my colleagues how different our students’ experiences are, I created the poster below.

I felt uncomfortable making this poster because I do not belong to many minority groups and I do not want to display their experiences incorrectly. I hope the impact that this poster has outweighs any misunderstanding I have of their experiences.

References:

TED. (2016, October). The Urgency of Intersectionality [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.ted.com/talks/kimberle_crenshaw_the_urgency_of_intersectionality?language=en