087: Talking with children about race, with Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum

This episode is part of a series on understanding the intersection of race, privilege, and parenting.  Click here to view all the items in this series.   We’ve laid a lot of groundwork on topics related to race by now: we learned about White privilege in parenting, and White privilege in schools, and even how parents can use sports to give their children advantages in school and in life.   Today my listener Dr. Kim Rybacki and I interview a giant in the field: Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum, author of the now-classic book (recently released in a 20th anniversary edition!) Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria: And Other Conversations About Race.   We begin by assessing what is White parents’ responsibility to help dismantle structural racism, and then learn how to discuss race and racism with our children.  And in the next episode in this series I’ll have some really in-depth resources to support you in having these conversations with your own children.   Dr. Tatum was featured in a short piece with Lester Holt on how to talk with children about racial injustice that you might also find helpful - she describes ways you can answer their questions honestly and fully in an age-appropriate way.  You can find a link to the interview on her website here.   Jump to highlights 01:25 Introduction to the topic and how this episode connects to previous ones on White privilege 03:45 Introduction to Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum, author of Why Are All The Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria, and to co-host Dr. Kim Rybacki, developmental psychologist and listener 07:56 A misleading version of Black history in America, and Carol Anderson's book White Rage 11:41 The "cycle of racism" and the common emotions - anger, guilt, confusion - that come with new awareness 15:15 How Kim sees White students move through denial, discomfort, and eventually action in her classes 17:16 Why the sense of "post-racial" optimism after 2008 has largely dissipated 22:53 Can a society be "post-racism" without erasing difference and culture? 33:02 Kim's questions about how to be an anti-racist parent, from diverse books to preschool choices 35:46 Dr. Tatum's advice: find your own sphere of influence and build an action plan 44:21 Working out how much to state your own values versus asking your child what they think 51:15 The story of a father whose silence, he believes, left room for his son to become a White supremacist 54:32 What to do when a child resists engaging with books featuring characters of color   References Bonilla-Silva, E., (2004). From bi-racial to tri-racial: Towards a new system of racial stratification in the USA. Ethnic and Racial Studies 27(6), 931-950. Cheney-Rice, Z. (2018, November 11). Bernie Sanders and the lies we tell White voters. New York Intelligencer. Retrieved from http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2018/11/bernie-sanders-and-the-lies-we-tell-white-voters.html Derman-Sparks, L., & Olsen, J. (2009). Anti-bias education for young children and ourselves. National Association for the Education of Young Children. Available at https://www.naeyc.org/resources/pubs/books/anti-bias-education Hagerman, M. (2018). White Kids: Growing up with privilege in a racially divided America. New York, NY: New York University Press. Helms, J. E. (Ed.). (1990). Contributions in Afro-American and African studies, No. 129. Black and White racial identity: Theory, research, and practice. New York, NY, England: Greenwood Press. King, M.L. (2010). Where do we go from here: Chaos or Community? Boston, MA: Beacon. Kivel, P. (2017). Uprooting racism: How White people can work for racial justice (4th Ed.). Gabriola Island, B.C.: New Society. Miller, S. (2017, December 8). Reading race: Proactive conversations with young children. Raising Race-Conscious Children. Retrieved from http://www.raceconscious.org/2017/12/explicitlanguageracebooks/ Roda, A. (2015). Inequality in gifted and talented programs: Parental choices about status, school opportunity, and second-generation segregation. London, U.K.: Palgrave MacMillan. Stalvey, L.M. (1989). The education of a WASP. Madison, WI: The University of Wisconsin Press. Sullivan, S. (2014). Good White people: The problem with middle-class White anti-racism. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Tatum, B.D. (2017). Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?. New York, NY: Basic. Van Ausdale, D.V. & Feagin, J.R. (2001). The first R: How children learn race and racism. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.