Discussion of NurtureShock, Chapter 3 "Why White Parents Don't Talk About Race"

We're talking about NurtureShock by Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman all summer. One chapter every Friday. Jump in whenever you'd like. The first week we talked about Chapter 1 about praise. Last week we talked about Chapter 2 about sleep. This week we're talking about talking about race with your kids.

This chapter is called "Why White Parents Don't Talk About Race" and I found it really, really interesting. One of the things I think is so much fun about this book is the way Bronson and Merryman start with the assumption and then tell the story of the research process instead of just reeling off figures. They tell you what the researchers thought they were going to show, and whether that turned out to be what they showed or not.

This chapter opens with a description of a study that was trying to look at the effects different ways of talking about racial differences would have on little kids. But that study didn't pan out, because so many of the white parents in the study dropped out or refused to talk about race with their little kids. So the researcher started looking at why the white parents were so uncomfortable talking about race with their kids.

We've been taught that racism is learned behavior. So we assume that if we don't want our kids to be racist, and instead want them to know that people are people, we should just not talk about it, because talking about it makes a big deal out of it.

The problem with that, though, is that little kids naturally categorize things and people. They can't help it; it's a normal and necessary part of learning to be human and to interact with others. And physical difference, like skin tone, is one of the easiest distinctions to make. And that kids naturally prefer people they see as "like them." One of the researchers said that:

"kids are developmentally prone to in-group favoritism; they're going to form these preferences on their own. Children categorize everything from food to toys to people at a young age. However, it takes years before their cognitive abilities allow them to successfully use more than one attribute to categorize anything. In the meantime, the attribute they rely on is that which is the most clearly visible...The spontaneous tendency to assume your group shares characteristics--such as niceness, or smarts--is called essentialism. Kids never think groups are random."

So, basically, we're letting kids interpret physical differences, like race, all on their own, without any guidance, thinking they're blank slates. But instead they're drawing the exact conclusions we don't want them to.

Another mistake white parents make is assuming that the Diverse Environment Theory is true. The DET (Bronson and Merryman's term) is that if you surround your kids with people who all look different, the kids will just learn that everyone's the same and it won't be an issue.

I have to admit that I assumed that was true. I've been assuming my kids are cool with everyone because we live in NYC and they each have had friends and classmates of all different races and ethnicities. But the research (and Bronson's anecdotal experience) shows that, once again, when we don't give our kids guidance by talking explicitly about race and ethnicity, our kids aren't drawing the conclusions we want them to.

As I was reading, I was thinking about how easy it is for me to talk about gender with my kids. How many "Of course girls can be doctors" conversations we've had. But we don't have many conversations about race like that. (The last one was probably during the 2008 election, honestly.) So I wasn't surprised when the authors pointed that out, too.

There's also a whole discussion about the fact that schools that are more racially diverse seem to have more stratification, so the reality of desegregation isn't what we thought/think it would be. I'm not even sure how to start unpacking that.

But what I'm taking away from all of this is that I need to start being explicit about talking to my kids about why their friends look different than they do, and what that means.

I feel like I have NOT done a good job of summarizing this chapter. Can someone else help me out? Thoughts? And if you're not a white parent, please go ahead and comment on what you see white parents doing/not doing and how that dovetails with how you talk to your kids.

Comments

[Charisse]

great topic! I haven't read the chapter, but this comes up a lot for us. (I guess I should say: we're white - west coast, no-connection-to-the-old-country, American mutt white)

I had always made the same assumption about the Diverse Environment - we're in SF, Mouse was the only white kid in her toddler daycare, we're out and about, we must be good, right? I actually got the first inkling of all this during the presidential campaign in 2008. I made Mouse stay up and watch Obama's victory speech when he won, and I told her she needed to remember it because it was really important.

Mouse: why?

Us: well, he's actually the first dark-skinned-person to ever be president. That's a big deal.

Mouse: why?

Us: well, for a long time the people with skin like us treated darker-skinned people really badly and it was pretty much impossible for someone with dark skin to get into an important position

Mouse: what did they do? how were they mean to the dark-skinned people?

Us: gulp. Well, in some places and times they made rules and in some they didn't but the worst thing was that long ago, white people actually bought and sold black people as if they weren't people at all. Things have gotten better but it's still harder for darker-skinned people.

Mouse: why did they do that?

...you get the idea. She really wanted to know and it was *really* hard to even start to explain in any kind of age-appropriate way. But I'm glad we tried. We keep at it.

(I also made her watch Hillary's concession as a great example of how you're supposed to behave well when you lose!)

These days, Mouse attends a civil-rights focused public school in SF. They taught about the bus boycotts and segregation in her kindergarten class and it was great both because they have experience with doing this and also because they took advantage of the diverse environment there. (It's a no-majority school.) The biggest thing was making it personal to her in a way that I think it can fail to be for a lot of white or just privileged kids - those movements were important but they benefitted the people that aren't like me. Well, Mouse came home saucer-eyed one day after they had actually gone through the class and explained who wouldn't be able to be friends under segregation, and who wouldn't be able to use the same drinking fountain, etc. I think that bit, about how racism/sexism/etc affects even those who aren't the specific target, is really key.

I do not have any other answers, but school forces us to keep looking at the questions.

[Shanna]

So far the only good race conversation I think I've had with my 3-yr-olds was just before Passover. We were talking about the story of the exodus and I was trying to teach them songs, and then I launched into "Go Down Moses." After we (er...I) sang it through, I told them it wasn't actually a Jewish song - it was written by other slaves who were inspired by the biblical exodus story. (Uh....not exactly in those words.) The three of us had a nice meandering conversation about slavery and then I went back to the "other" slaves and talked about skin color and how some people thought that it was okay to make other people slaves because of it....but it's not really okay, and we don't do that in this country any more.

We need to have more involved discussions like this, I just don't know how.

[SarcastiCarrie]

There was a Newsweek article on the same topic (possible even an excerpt from this book). Here it is (ahhh, the magic of google):
http://www.newsweek.com/2009/09/04/see-baby-discriminate.html

I read it and decided that I would explicitly talk about skin color with Chuckles (he's 5 and we're white, for the record).

I actually found myself having to say the following sentence: "Yes, well, it is good that you want to be friends with AA and ZZ because you like them, but kids with white skin can be your friends too. White kids can be nice."

Chuckles had just indicated a preference for "brown" (his word) people. Which I thought was really open-minded, except, I didn't want him judging people (anyone) on the color of their skin. So, we went through his classroom, which is a study in DET and talked about what color skin each kid had (using his words to talk about colors not using grown-up words for what those colors represent). So as not to put too much emphasis on race, we also talked about whether the kids were boys or girls, what kind of hair style they had, whether they had brothers or sisters at school, pets, games played at recess, etc. The color of the skin was just one more part of the kids. We also then talked about a couple of the kids who were actually from other countries and how those kids could be his friends too (well, the nice ones at least). It was eye-opening, and I was a little nervous that he might repeat some of the things we said while at school and then have people take it out of context. So, I made sure to tell the teacher and day care center director what I had been doing.

Oh, and one time I mentioned that the President was black, and he corrected me to say "brown" because truthfully, his skin is brown. So, then, I had to explain that black is a sort-of shorthand for how we talk about skin color for certain people who are brown (much like we say "white" about ourselves even though our skin is more peachy or caramel colored). And then I worried if I was supposed to be saying African-American. To Chuckles, brown encompasses a lot of people whose ancestors are from widely dispersed geographic areas (India, Mexico, the Caribbean, central America, Africa) so I think it might help if I made distinctions, but then I wonder if making distinctions starts to classify people unnecessarily.

All of this is a long way of saying, it's hard to talk about race, but I'm trying to do it and downplay it at the same time.

My prediciton: this post might get fewer comments than some of the other chapters in the book because people don't want to talk about race.

[Mama Fuss]

Interesting. Growing up in a tiny parochial school, we didn't have a lot of different races in my class at school until high school (and even then, I graduated w/ maybe 15-20% non-white students in my class) but I never thought about the Asian kids being different from the rest of us (we didn't have any black kids until upper elementary school, but had 2 Asian kids in K-4th grade in my class of 20-30 students). But I know that I never thought of myself as even remotely racist until I met a girl in high school who defied all African-American stereotypes and I realized that maybe I HAD made some assumptions about people through the years. (seriously, this girl should be President of the USA some day. She is that amazing and brilliant and classy. Much more so than anyone else I had ever/have ever met since - black, white or purple) Of course, my parents also owned a business where most of the employees were lower class (read: barely educated) and a lot of them were of other races, so I think my assumptions came from those interactions.

I hope I am better at pointing out the equality of these things to my own children.

Of course, I also know a bunch of white people who claim "race isn't a big deal" and several non-white people who say that it is a big deal and the whites just don't realize it. I wonder if that is why so many white parents don't talk to their kids about race - they just don't see it as a big deal. And when you never have to worry about it for yourself, then maybe you don't realize that it is/can be a big deal. Just a thought.

[Moxie]

SarcasticCarrie, I think your prediction is right, and was thinking that myself...

[Lina MGM]

I haven't read the book, but think this topic is super interesting... and hoping more people chime in so i can read their thoughts :)

[akeeyu]

About a year ago, I read a post somewhere(that I haven't been able to find again for the life of me) that said children interpret silence about race as shame and/or A Thing That Must Not Be Discussed, and that kids who are given an opportunity to talk about race always have a TON of questions that they've just been saving up.

In light of that, I decided to try to talk to Fitz-Hume and Milbarge about race early, so there wouldn't be A Big Awkward Conversation later.

This probably sounds silly, but I've been having a lot of "important" conversations with them since they were one, mostly so *I* could practice.

We've talked about skin color and same sex marriage and manners and strangers and where babies come from and a dozen other things, and I doubt they understand or remember much of it, but I want to be in the habit of having casual conversations with them about important issues without things getting all AWKWARD and FRAUGHT with WHATEVER.

Right now we're in this stage:
"This doll/baby in the picture book has (X color skin) because his/her parents have (X color skin. You have (Y color) skin because Mommy and Daddy have (Y color) skin," because...you know, they're two.

[Cecily]

I read that part of the book excerpted in Newsweek and it has completely changed the way I discuss race with my daughter Tori.

Right after I read that, we were blessed with an opportunity to talk about race because of hair. See, my daughter has mostly African-American classmates in her preschool and she really, really wanted to have multiple braids ending in barrettes like her friends do. So we had to have a long talk about race, and different kinds of hair, and we actually went ahead and tried it on her hair and it didn't work. So now she speaks quite often about "brown" people and "white" people. We talk at length about different people coming from different parts of the world originally, etc.

But I have to admit, when she asked a classmate if she is "white or brown" (the girl happens to be both) I cringed. I have no idea how to train her to either ask that question or to not to ask it -- and I don't know what is appropriate. And I feel weird asking my African-American friends about it too because yeah -- I don't much like talking about race.

Sigh.

[momgawaga]

Of all the chapters in the book, the chapter on race has the most direct impact on my own parenting. Like many people, I was assuming that DET was enough. I read that chapter very shortly after a visit from my brother-in-law and his girlfriend. (DH, daughter and I are very light skinned Irish-y peoples - like, ghostly white - as is my brother-in-law, his girlfriend is from Haiti, and has very dark skin.) I sat down with my then 2.5 yo, and commented on the differences between her skin/hair, my skin/hair, and my BIL's girlfriend. Holy cats! She had SO much to say - lots of questions, commentary - I was so glad that I had brought up the subject with her. Since then DH and I have made a real effort to discuss race, ethnicity, gender, size, and sexual orientation with our 3 yo. I think we are moving, I hope, as a society from a "we're all the same," to "we're all different, and we're all valuable," so that sociocultural differences can really be appreciated. Fundamentally, it's not like kids don't notice - I think they just learn that they shouldn't comment, which isn't the same as not judging.

[Sherry]

I've been thinking about this lately, because I've been considering sending my (white) 3-year-old to a school without much diversity. Worrisome.

[Sedge]

Haven't read the book yet (though I've requested it from the library).

Somewhere along the line I happened across a blog which used to be called Anti-Racist Parent and is now called Love Isn't Enough. I started to follow it in hopes of getting help in raising my white son to not be a racist. They've discussed the topic of this chapter in the past; it came as a real shock to me. (This was the post which really got me thinking about this. (And now that I go back and reread it, I see that it talks about Nurture Shock.)

My husband and I have been working hard to make sure to talk about these things with T as a result. I'm also glad to say that they've also talked about this some at his child care -- he's come home with slightly muddled but essentially accurate ideas. (Someone killed Martin because he wanted people with brown skin to be able to sit in the front of the bus!)

He's clearly puzzled about the whole thing, but just as clearly less uncomfortable talking about it than I am (because he doesn't have the same emotional baggage attached yet). It is an awkward conversation, but necessary, just like the conversations about sexism, different sexualities, and disabled people which we've also had.

(Posting instead of lurking as usual because I do want people to talk about this!)

[Sedge]

Evidently my links didn't work? Sorry; here's the link to the post I found an eye-opener: http://loveisntenough.com/2010/03/08/bigotry-blindness-and-basketball/

[Kate]

I don't talk about race enough with my kids. They go to a very diverse school and are interested in the differences they observe, and naturally enough they want to talk about it. I don't think I do a good enough job with those discussions.
Part of my discomfort with talking about race is that I'm white, and so I don't want to make assumptions about other people's experiences - especially the experiences of people of other races. It's sort of like when male friends (even lovely pro-feminist types) go on about gender issues - sometimes I'm appreciative but sometimes they say something really irritating and insensitive and they have no idea why anyone would be offended. Because I haven't suffered because of my race I'm unsure of what to say about racism or of how to educate my kids about it. Friends of other races can be really helpful, but I don't want to presume on them because it's not their job to educate everyone else. So I muddle through, and am very thankful that my kids have many amazing teachers of different races. I tend to follow their lead whenever I can.

[Coley]

I haven't read the book yet (waiting for it to be available at the library), but this is truly an awesome discussion. As a white woman raising biracial kids, I'm trying to make it a point to make discussions of race a normal thing. In theory.

My 2.5 year old is all about learning his colors right now, pointing to things, asking what color. So, yesterday he started doing this with skin, for himself, his much darker complected brother, me, daddy etc. And even though he's just learning primary colors, (let alone "Fuchsia, beige, peach")I found myself being VERY specific: kind of a caramel color, a dark beige. And it was just a little reminder: I'm still super uncomfortable having this conversation.

My husband and I are comfortable discussing, but when thinking that everything I say may be influencing my son's perceptions of race? I'm feeling a lot of pressure. Perhaps because these are things he will actually have to deal with, and I'm not just teaching him about "you and others." He's learning about how HE may be perceived, and even harder, how he perceives himself.

[SarcastiCarrie]

Oh, one thing I saw somewhere (and I haven't read Nurtue Shock...just the excerpt so it might be from there) is that this is the least helpful thing to say:

We're all the same on the inside.

Because kids know that's not true. They know boys and girls are different. They know mommy is different from them. They know. And then, they think you're lying. They don't realize you're talking about race. They just know that you're wrong or confused because what you've said directly contradicts what they have observed for themselves. So, you have to be specific about boys/girls/skin/hair/country of origin/language/LBGTS, and any other differences you want them to know are arbitrary or don't matter, whatever.

[Neil]

As my wife and I are "mixed-race" (m wife is French-Canadian, I'm Chinese-Canadian) race is a present and natural part of my son's life. I've been talking about race with him since he was around 2, mostly around the idea that people come in all shades and speak many difference languages, but we're all still just people.

For the most part, we don't make a huge deal about race in the same way we don't make a big deal about the differences between sexes. It helps that Canada is very much a multicultural society, so he's been exposed to a multitude of people from all corners of the world since be was born.

[J]

I think the hardest part for me is knowing what to say to my almost-three-yr-old about why people look different. I was certainly convinced to do so by this chapter of nurture shock, and wanted to start right away, but being white and never having "learned" how to properly discuss race, I am leery of what I can teach her that won't sound offensive to someone when it inevitably comes out later. Discussing parentage with her (x's parents were also light/dark/etc skinned) doesn't answer her questions about why people look different... I would absolutely love to hear more perspectives on how we can broach the subject to our little ones so it comes out right. So far I have started by getting more books from the library on different animals from various continents because I am trying to introduce the concept of the world and its diversity to her. Also she is a princess-aholic so we have lots of talks about how belle comes from France which is close to where our families came from, which is why we have light skin, etc. I am starting this way because a) she is extremely curious and b) loves animals and is starting to get the concept of the different places in the world but also c) I thought about the concept of pride of heritage and thought that, even if it is totally not PC to be proud of being white, at least she can understand that we came to America from somewhere else and that other people move around too. And just writing this down has made me completely terrified that I have offended someone so that is why it is so garbled... I suppose my point is, what exactly are people going to start SAYING to introduce thus concept concretely to our children? Because in the book it seemed very clear that tiptoeing around the subject with kids made things worse...

[Molly]

This has been on my mind this year--the information in this chapter seems to have been floating about the Internet and has prompted some good conversations with friends.

I've initiated some conversations with the kids (ages 2 and 4--all of us white, for the record) about this, but it is hard. For instance, in public, if my son says something like, "boys are better than girls," I have NO problem talking about that with him, in the moment. But if he says something about someone else's skin color, I feel very uncomfortable talking about it, at least in public. Quick example: The other day at the grocery store, he started trying to talk with a girl with darker skin in Spanish, assuming that because she looked Hispanic, she would speak Spanish. She just looked at him funny (and her mother looked at me funny), and I steered him away. I'm sure that I did not handle it correctly, and it's this very "in the moment" moment that I'm having the hardest time with regarding this issue.

I think the reason is this: I have agency when discussing gender issues. I am a woman, I have a daughter. But regarding race, I think part of the reticence of well-meaning white parents is that we don't feel like it's "our place" to talk about race. Like, racism was not our experience and I would be, somehow, co-opting that experience by trying to explain it to my kid. That sounds lame, and I know intellectually that it is lame, but it's almost an emotional response. Which is why it's so hard to flip off "in the moment."

Of course, I know that I have to make doubly sure that I get over my own discomfort and keep talking.

[Andrea]

I always thought the line that we're all the same on the inside referred to internally anatomy. People of all color have lungs, hearts, stomachs, etc., but maybe that's the biologist in me. I think it can be difficult for all people to realize this concept. People are people.

[sweetcoalminer]

Like Coley, I am on the hold list for NurtureShock from the library. But I have read and discussed with my DH and provided my daughter's teachers a copy of the article Sarcasticarrie linked, which was written by the authors of Nurtureshock and linked to me by MK of Musings and Mutterings when I was having a hard time in January with all of my kid's preK teachers talk about "black people". We had worked so hard to not label people with the color of their skin!

But she was right to do it. My daughter had been noticing all along. Asking the UPS guy, "Why is your skin a different color?" Asking the apartment manager, "Why is your skin so dark?" She asks why everyone who works at our local post office is black. And even though she has close friends of all different races in diverse L.A., if you put a palette of pictures of kids in front of her and asked her who would be a nice friend, she would probably pick the lightest color friend.

So we point out people's differences now and explicitly say that even though our skin colors are different, we're nice friends, or she's a good doctor, or we're lucky to have such a fun playdate.

And she quizzes me on these conversations, so I know she's mulling it over. I just hope that these conversations help.

I grew up in a (grandparent's) household that was very openly racist and yet my friends were always very diverse and my beliefs always reflected humanity over color, so I guess I don't understand what the end result of all of our hemming and hawing will be, though, truthfully. But, that said, they ALWAYS were willing to talk about people being different. There was no "we're all the same". In their defense, where they grew up was very white and so in their later years when they were actually exposed to diversity, they embraced it.

How did your parents'/grandparents' attitudes on race affect you? What will our end result be? I'm really looking forward to getting this book.

[Cathy]

Ours is a mixed-race house, where almost everyone's mix is a little different. We've talked about civil rights history and the struggle to my step-son (he's black, white, and Asian); we've also talked about how interracial relationships weren't always common or acceptable. We've also talked about what life would have been like for my husband had he stayed in Vietnam, as a person who is white and Vietnamese.

I wish that I knew more about the fight for civil rights, that I were able to discuss more than a general outline of it. My hope is that his mother and his mother's family have had some time to answer questions about it.

Oh, and after his sisters and I go to the school open house for his school, he always fields questions about whether he's adopted. :-P

[sweetcoalminer]

Re the princesses, my daughter was a little resistant to Tiana, instead embracing Snow White. We've had a number of talks about how *stupid* and helpless Snow White is. And how Stupid Arek is from The Little Mermaid - he falls in love with a VOICE and then can't tell the difference between the good one and the WITCH, and it's finally his DOG that figures it out.

We went through the stories one by one. She doesn't know beauty and the beast, although we've talked about it, but we talk about how Belle and Tiana are much smarter about life and love that Stupid Cinderella, who let her nasty stepmother and stepsisters boss her around and then moved in with a guy she hardly knew. :) And then I point out that Tiana and her prince have dark skin.

It's all a process. At first she was SO MAD that I was insulting her beloved princesses, but now she points out in the movies where they made bad decisions.

[Nell]

I've had to explain to my 5 yo son on more than one occasion that I'm not Asian like his dad (I'm white and really pale) even though I speak an Asian language. I find it interesting that he does not assume a connection between skin color and linguistic/ethnic background.

[Shelley]

Discussion of this chapter alone makes me want to read this book. Some guidance in the area of race or ethnicity would be really helpful. We haven't had much opportunity to discuss it because of the ages of my kids. We have lots of books with diverse images of kids, but we tend to run into white or white-ish people around here. Working in Chicago brought me friends of many backgrounds and countries, but now living in Maryland with small children as a SAHM brings me in contact with more people of similar look and background.

I haven't tried to bring up race with my 3 year old, because I felt like I wanted him to bring his questions to me. I didn't want to make him hyper-aware of something he might not be making a big deal of otherwise. I guess that is simply avoidance. I like a few of the suggestions above - talking about picture books, etc.

I recall thinking most of the brown skinned people I befriended growing up (not very many in our town) were really beautiful and I even went through a stage in which I wished desperately that I had such beautiful skin. Mine is very light and freckled.

There wasn't any talk of race in our family which I think was because of my mother keeping a lid on my father's prejudices. I was shocked to find out how he categorized people, when he began to talk more frankly about race as I became an adult and yet, his actions and attitudes of individuals was completely different. Also his opinions have evolved quite a bit in the last ten years. I guess this makes the whole thing a lot more confusing for me to approach with my own kids.

[Charisse]

@sweetcoalminer, you can have a lot of fun with the "real" - unDisneyfied, unBowdlerized - versions of the princess stories. there are still traditional views in them but the Grimm's or Andersson versions are a lot more ambiguous.

[-R-]

My stepfather (who is therefore one of my kid's grandfathers)is black, while the rest of my family is white. I guess this creates an opening to talk about race, but I'm not sure how. "Your black grandfather is just as great as your white grandfathers" seems weird.

[sweetcoalminer]

@Charisse, we've gone that route, but I so don't want to explain to her how Rapunzel got pregnant. :)

I'm interested in what you do, because before we did any disney, we checked these beautifully-illustrated books out of the library for many of these stories, but there's something about the Disney versions (the marketing? The nightgowns/costumes/bicycle helmets) that she is drawn to.

But you're right. She's older now and I will try harder.

[Ck]

I totally agree with @Molly when she says "I think part of the reticence of well-meaning white parents is that we don't feel like it's "our place" to talk about race. Like, racism was not our experience and I would be, somehow, co-opting that experience by trying to explain it to my kid."

I can easily get on board with talking about the color of peoples' skin because, well, there it is. It's on the outside; no one can deny that there are different skin colors and I can't imagine that anyone would be offended by acknowledging that. I actually expect that to come up pretty soon with my 2 yr old as my neices and nephew are biracial.

However, I am not sure how to address the experience. Is it even my place? I don't want to downplay it too much but I also wouldn't want to overdo it... When the time comes, I hope to find some good age-appropriate books to read together.

[bethp]

I really liked this chapter. My son, too, goes to a very diverse pre-k program (he's almost three), with a wonderful black women who is his teacher. He also loves my mom's 16-year old foster kid, Angela, who is very dark black. But we've never discussed race at all. He even pointed and shouted at a woman who he thought was his teacher and I was horrified - but later realized that she DID look a lot like her (she was across the street), but I was so embarrassed at the idea "all black people look alike" that I quickly whisked him away. It seems so silly now, but eye-opening and I hope I'll be better prepared for such conversations from now on!

I liked learning about the study that when children were read a book about Jackie Robinson, including language about how he was a victim of discrimination by white people, it made a real impact on the kids.

I went to the library to seek out some books, but came up short (lots of books with diverse races, none that discuss discrimination explicitly - i'm talking picture books for a preschooler.) I'd love some suggestions!

[Rudyinparis]

I have the book at my desk and still haven’t picked it up! Sorry—lazy. I’m not sure if what I have to contribute is relevant—but--I grew up in an entirely White area. Now, we live in an urban setting that is much more diverse (although still ((informally)) segregated to a shocking degree)—Eldest went to preschool through a program housed in the public schools. For various reasons we chose a school that is almost entirely African-American, Black, of color—whatever term you like. Eldest was, for the first half of the year, the only white kid in the class. I was *so grateful* she had this experience, so unlike my school experience. And it really stretched her Dad and me, too, in ways we didn’t expect. “Why do we call them Black when they’re brown?” was definitely a point of curiosity. Hair, too. And then, halfway through the year, a new girl joined the class. “Mama, she’s WHITE like me!”

Man, the topic exhausts me—and here’s the thing, it’s like my trying to teach Eldest Comparative Religion (we are attending religious ceremonies of all different types this summer, resulting in me attending my first Catholic mass this past Sunday…) It is SO HARD to get your arms around where to start. (Me, during the service, to myself, “I think a reading of the book of Luke might be in order…”) And you don’t want to screw up. But, like religion, with race, if we don’t go to the bother to teach our kids, there are plenty of other people that would jump at the chance to fill their heads with their own agenda, you know? So it’s worth the work, but it’s hard.

[MC]

I've got Nurture Shock still sitting on my shelf and have been meaning to jump in on the discussions. So I haven't read the chapter yet, nor have I had to discuss race yet with my 13-month-old, but just wanted to share my personal experiences.

I am a mostly Irish white mutt who grew up in Los Angeles in the 70s and 80s. This was during a period of rapid immigration by Asian (Cambodian, Vietnamese, Laotian) and Latino (Salvadoran, Nicaraguan) refugees to SoCal, adding to the already rich ethnic and racial mix in the public schools. I do remember as a very little girl (maybe 4 or 5?) asking a black kid why his teeth weren't also dark. I chalk that interchange up to simple curiousity, or an attempt to categorize as Moxie talks about, as cringe-inducing a memory as it is.

Once in mid to late elementary school, say 3rd or 4th grade, it seemed that we took care of our own diversity training peer-to-peer. Yes, we had MLK day and Cinco de Mayo as institutionalized opportunities to talk about race. But we had also learned by then that not all 'Orientals' (as was the term) were Chinese, nor were all Hispanics Mexican. So I remember the question, "What's your nationality?" being a fairly common one, albeit probably a mostly one-way street from white kids to kids of color. But in fairly short order we learned that Filipino was different than Cambodian, which was different than Japanese, and so on. I don't remember my parents explicitly talking much about race, which makes me wonder if the DET does work to some extent in a highly racially varied environment like the LAUSD. Which is not to say that we kids didn't self-select our peer groups on the playground along racial lines, but it didn't feel like it was out of fear or distrust per se. It was just the way things were.

In any event, very interesting discussion. Maybe I'll cram this chapter tonight and chime back in.

[Cloud]

I'm sort of fascinated by the differences between my approach to race (I'm a white American, raised in a liberal household that tried to be non-racist) and my husband's approach (a white New Zealander, raised similarly). He is just soooo much more willing to discuss race, and always has been. I often wonder if that is because the racial history in New Zealand at least doesn't include slavery. The document that is the foundation of their state is a treaty between the Queen and the native people (the Maori), who are the largest group of non-white people in the country. They are still arguing over the interpretation of that document, but I have to think that is a far better starting place than what we have here. Now, everything is not smiles and sunshine with regards to race in New Zealand, but my husband's instinctive approach to discussing race with our children is much closer to the one recommended in Nurture Shock than mine is.

We've both read the Newsweek article and are still trying to figure out how to incorporate it into our parenting. We want to read the actual chapter, but haven't gotten around to it yet. That probably says something, too. Our oldest daughter is 3.

Diversity is one of the things I'll be looking at when we decide on a school for Pumpkin. I am the product of fairly diverse schools, and that is one of my favorite things about my pre-college education. I learned a lot from my classmates. Maybe one of the biggest lessons I got was how it is next to impossible for me to really understand the daily crap that someone who is not white has to deal with. But that my friends were willing to forgive me when I got things wrong, if I was honest in my attempts to learn and do better next time. And that trying was better than pretending that there wasn't a problem there in the first place.

[Rayne of Terror]

I can't wait to read this chapter. My mom's bringing the book over tomorrow. We are white, we live in a town of 4,000 that is 98% white, and the elementary school is 95% white. We don't talk about race unless our son brings it up and it's usually because he says something surprising or shocking.

We went camping two weeks ago and he said, "Hey, have you noticed there are no brown people camping here? Why were there brown people at the WalMart but no brown people camping?" I had no answer for that.

Hey, at least we don't have that diversity thing going against us too.

Yeah, I need to read this book.

[mo]

I too fond this chapter fascinating because I saw that I was doing everything wrong (avoidance). I'm white, my husband is Filipino so my boys are inter-racial. My husband and I have had conversations about how neither of us will ever truly understand their (the boys') experience since they aren't Filippino or White but rather both. Lately, my boys have been noticing things like their skin is darker than mine but lighter than their dad's. We've talked how I "watered" down Daddy's dark hair and dark skin. They wonder if they will have hair on their arms like me or none like their dad and why do some people have hair like that and others don't, etc.

My mom is from Berkeley and so we grew up in a pretty liberal household. My dad remaired a lady from the South (and they live in Texas) and it still stuns me how different it is there than on the West Coast. Since I turned out pretty open-minded, I kind of just assumed my boys would too (especially given they are bi-racial). The idea of pointing out different skin colors seems so foreign to me as it seems so in your face, this person is different from us. But as someone above said, I have no issues pointing out who is a boy and who is a girl.

I do notice my boys picking out like people in the sense that my one son wears glasses so he will constantly point out that another person wearing glasses is just like him (just because they both happen to wear glasses) so that compartmentalization is going on in their heads.

I think the one thing (and this was in general across most of the Nuture Shock chapters) that I had really hoped to see at the end of the chapter was some concrete examples of race conversations. How do you bring it up? What happens when (as most kids do) they start talking about it out of context or say something in appropriate in a public venue? What are some age-guidelines in terms of what to say when?

Charisse - your pre-school/school sounds great. Definitely something I would expect to find in the Bay Area.

[Sedge]

Two books I used to start conversations about diversity:

One World, One Day by Barbara Kerley. Shows how kids around the world live their days.

Shades of People by Shelley Rotner and Sheila M. Kelly

I don't think the text of either is sufficient by itself, but they were helpful for me, because I needed a springboard.

[Sharon @proactiveparenting]

I've read most of the posts and wanted to throw my two cents in. We’re a mixed-race family. Just like -R- my stepdad is black. So my kids have a black and while grandfather. My sister just adopted a sweet, adorable black/Hispanic little one, can't tell I'm in love can you!

When the kids were little we lived in a well-known-fancy-dancy area outside of SF. In the beginning there were a lot of looks when papa came to see us. The thing about my stepdad is he has the deepest voice I’ve ever heard; you can’t miss that voice. So when he yelled hello to the kids, lots of people appeared at the window or opened the door to see what the ruckus was all about, and the kids noticed that. That’s when the questions began.

We told the kids what Andrea @ 03:00 PM said. If you look inside of every person on the earth you’ll see the same thing, red blood (boys love blood) a beating heart, and the ability to breathe in the air we need to survive. Then I broke it down into kid language for them. I asked them to think back to the butterfly pavilion and remember that most of the butterflies were different from each other, but they were all butterflies, and that’s how it is with people. I told them to think about the dress up box at their friend’s house. I said, GOD has put each of us in a different outfit, a different skin color, different hair, different nose, some with glasses, some without, but at the core we are all the same.

Of course then the inevitable questions came, like why did we sell slaves. What worked for me was to tell the truth. I told them I don’t know how people could have done that. I said I believe that it came from seeing people as separate, not equal to others, and not part of the big picture we call humankind. I told them that I believe to act on separateness is to act from ignorance.

I took each stage as it came. When it was time to talk about slavery we did, but we looked at it across history, not just the civil rights movement. My kids cried and were deeply hurt that someone could have told us that we couldn’t love papa! They couldn’t imagine a world where that could happen.

I listened to their questions and let them take the lead. Other kids would ask me why the boy’s grandfather was black and not white, and I would say, because their grandmother fell in love with him. I always told the truth but from a different point of view. I choose not to make our family’s truth about race, I chose to make it about the love we have, the equality we believe in and the fairness we extend to all human beings, and they were comfortable about that.

They grew up knowing all humans have value in this world, and that you look beneath the skin. That’s what we did. Taller has been living with his African/ American girlfriend for 3 years, and Tall is dating a woman from Sweden, so I guess some of it rubbed off on them.

[Kirsty]

I live in France with two daughters (we're all white - aspirin white to be perfectly honest). Two anecdotes:
My younger daughter (6) has four friends with the same first name, so they've all got an extra "nickname" to distinguish them. One is "Lucy music" because they were in the same music class, one is "Lucy Anaïs" because her big sister Anaïs is my elder daughter's friend, one is "Lucy last name" and the fourth is "Lucy school where they first met". What's funny about this is that Lucy music is blond, Lucy Anaïs is half French-half African, Lucy last name is brunette and Lucy school where they first met is Kenyan (but adopted by a white mother)... Neither of my daughters ever mentions that Lucy school is black - my daughter told a friend, "that's my friend Lucy" and the other friend asked "which child?" and my daughter described her clothes but didn't say "she's the only black girl in the playground"...
Second incident: my daughter was given a Tiana costume for her birthday. She looks adorable in it, but really, really not like Tiana (did I mention we're whiter than white?). Her older sister said that yeah, the costume was nice but that it would look better on Lucy (school) or Lucy Anaïs. My daughter looked perplexed and asked why. Her sister said that it was because the two Lucies in question both have brown skin (one much darker than the other). My daughter looked at her arm in amazement, having never apparently really noticed that her skin is much, much whiter than her two friends...
We've talked about Kenyan Lucy (school) and her origins, looked at pictures of Kenya and so on, so it's not like we've avoided the subject, but I really don't think it's an issue. Both my kids have had friends from different cultures all their lives (lots of North Africans in France, plus Vietnamese, Sub-Saharan Africans...) and maybe race questions are less sensitive here in France. I don't know. But the fact remains that they are at a private, Catholic school where there are kids of all races and religions, and skin colour really doesn't seem to be a problem (unless you want to look like Tiana - my daughter was heartbroken that she'd never really look like Tiana!). I hope it stays that way because of course there is racism in France...

[Alice]

Does anyone else feel overwhelmed with the share number of things we're supposed to do right? Compared with the number of things that our parents did 'right'?

I read the book and loved it, it also freaked me out about all the things that I think I'm 'not doing good enough' and race was a big one. I have tried to incorporate it into daily life. However, I have been slack on race too. When you are just trying to make it through the day and then you think of all the things you've been doing 'wrong' - praise, sleep, race etc it gets way too much.

However, this discussion has made me realise what my daughter has really been asking me when she says to me "Why is 'T' my friend?" "Why does 'M' play with me?" (For the record, white family here, moved from the US to New Zealand - VERY multi cultural where we live.) What she is really asking me, is 'why, even though he/she looks different to me that we still are friends?' I think I'll address that one tonight. (Every night at bed time we turn off the light and talk about things that she wants to talk about.)

I have tried really hard to just be casual about talking about sex, but I am very bad about talking about race. I will try and just comment here and there and be casual and let her ask questions. I have noticed, when I try 'too hard' with my daughter it backfires. If I answer questions openly and honestly and tell her she can ask anything, she seems very satisfied with that.

However, I look at my family of origin and see the blatant racist beliefs that were present and I realise that I turned out ok. I grew up hearing stuff like "For a 'X' they are a nice person/hard working/smart...." And "Bloody 'X' they are taking over and there will be nothing left for us."

Mind you I also grew up hearing: "I wish you were a boy, why were you born, you were a mistake etc etc" I distinctly remember at age 8 deciding I would NEVER be like my family. I wonder if that decision meant that I LOVE living in a multi cultural society.

So the upshot is I think I will just try my best at everything and hope that my kids turn out ok. I think I am finally 'over' trying to do everything perfectly, because you know what, they are going to grow up, and have issues about something and all I can do is hope that they know, they were loved, respected and challenged, and I hope that translates to them loving and respecting and challenging the world (in a good way).

Sorry if I'm rambling, I have a 4 month old and we all know what that does to the way you express yourself!

[Daisy]

The problem with relying on DET is that people are relying on it only at the child's peer level. It's perhaps more important that we adults have diverse peers and close friends. It also takes the pressure off feeling it's not "our place". When you have close friends of different races, the conversations arise naturally over dinner, etc. And if your kids are present, they absorb it. when they're old enough they likely will even begin to participate.

[meera]

I read this chapter a while ago and I remember thinking about the DET when i read it. It's totally spot on. I too live in a very diverse area, the bay area, and am south asian. One thing I noticed was that even though it is very diverse here (all kinds of asian nationalities, europeans...etc) so much so that whites are almost a minority - People still hang out MOSTLY with their own kind. (Hang out here means deeper friendships as opposed to interactions that you have at the park or bank etc). Think about the type of folks you would invite home for dinner. This I feel is very much in-group.

In my son's pre-school he is the only brown kid (though he is not the only one of asian origin). So far he hasnt commented about skin color at all, but like most kids I think he is able to figure out which kids are more of his kind (as opposed to white). I really dont know how I should broach the subject with him, or if I should point things out to him. (when he hasnt yet shown any curiosity abt his skin color or that of his friends). If he did bring up the subject, I suppose at that time I could talk to him about it.We've been talking to him recently about gender since he has been all about what girls can or cannot do. Perhaps books about the subject would be good too...but I didnt take away too many things from this chapter that I could act on in my life today..(my son is 3)

[Alisha]

No time to read all the comments, and I'm late to the post, but after reading Moxie's intro, all I could think about was my students in Revere, MA, about ten years ago. Many of them were Latino or Cambodian and they were very vocal about race. There was a lot of gang activity and racial tension, but on the other hand, plenty of "mixing." I still have a gorgeous photo of a red-headed Irish girl, a Thai girl, and a girl whose parents were born in Kenya. The contrasts are strikingly beautiful, as is their obvious friendship. One 13 year old didn't hesitate to say she hated white people and I asked her how she could like me, since I'm white. "You're not white, you're Jewish," was her answer, which was really surprising. I have no idea how to bring up race with my almost 3 year old, but I hope to learn something from reading these comments, maybe when the newborn gets older . . .

[Jenny]

I don't know if the book addresses it but we also have started not only to discuss race (something we try to do often since C and I are a different race from the girls) but also deformities/SN/etc. A good friend had cleft and Cammie asked him about it. Conor freaked, I then explained to Cams and she was like Oh o.k. Conor freaked cause he was worried it was rude, I said it wasn't cause she asked politely and she is 3! Anyway, will be interested how people comment.

[nej]

My sister recently came out of the closet and when she told me, I was so happy for her. And then I thought about it and realized that I was happy for myself and my children, too, because now we can have authentic conversations about same-sex marriage. Then I asked my sis if there was any way that the girl she was in love with was black. She laughed and said if this one didn't work out she'd see what she could do. It would have been nice because then we could also talk about race in the same breath.

Our parents are off-the-boat Cuban but my sibs and I look mostly white. We tan up nice in the summer and some people assume we're hispanic, but it surprises others when we bust out in Spanglish. So I don't really know what people assume about us. When we were children, however, we lived in white-ass MN and boy, did our town wig the eff out when we moved in. I can still feel the sting of my 5th grade teacher telling my dad I would never be prom queen b/c I was brown. (BTW - He was wrong. We just had to move to Florida.)

Anyway, my dad is a vocal racist. We grew up with him constantly sneering and muttering not-quite-under-his-breath about n-word this and n-word that. But my sibs and I...we're not racist one bit. So maybe his constant vocalization worked.

Today at the pool my friend brought her boyfriend, who is black black. (As in not brown black.) E (who is almost three) stared at him for a few minutes and then went about his business. I realized that because we live in whitey Colorado, that was probably the closest he'd ever been to someone so black. We will talk about it tomorrow after he's had a good night's sleep. We've talked about skin color but mostly like "oh yeah, this fire truck came with a white firefighter, a "mom" firefighter, a "dad" firefighter and a brown firefighter. Look at that." Curious to see what his thoughts are.

[meandmrb]

A while back I read the Newsweek article about this subject that a few folks have mentioned. The idea that our kids are categorizing people, just like they categorize everything else, makes a lot of sense to me...it actually seems rather obvious once it's explained like that.

Actually incorporating this into real life conversations, though...well, we'll see. I'm from the US and my husband is from Australia, so we have different cultural baggage associated with race. We live in Mexico. Our son was born here so consequently is both a Mexican national and the only "white" kid at his school. When we talk about what people look like so far I've kept it to explaining that he has blond hair and blue eyes because his dad and I do.

It's socially acceptable here to refer to people based upon their physical characteristics, so my child gets called güerito a lot. With all the nicknames based on whether you're chubby or have dark skin or whatever, I think we're fine as far as everyone openly acknowledging that yes, people do look different.

As far as learning that this doesn't have anything to do with the value of a person, though, I have a hard time imagining how the conversation would go..."Yeah, it's true, Pablo and Jesus and Araceli all have darker skin than yours. You have so much fun playing with them, don't you?"..."Why wouldn't I, Mom?".

[the milliner]

Like a few others have kind of mentioned, I got to the end of the chapter and was thinking 'What? Don't leave me now! I know what NOT to do in talking about (or not talking about) race now, but what do I DO? Specifically? Examples, I need examples!'.

And again, as a few others have mentioned, it's hard to have conversations about something that you've only experienced second hand. I've never been subject to racism. I've witnessed it. I've been offended by it. But I don't know what it's like to have predjudices held against me due to the colour of my skin. It's easy to talk about gender. I have 40 years of experience with that.

Haven't had any race discussions with DS who is 2. He goes to a very diverse daycare where white kids (like him) seem to be the minority. And to be honest, I don't even think there is a majority race in the kids that attend. Very diverse. I'm assuming he's categorizing, but as far as I can tell, the kids he plays with the most are from a variety of backgrounds, and the majority of the educators are Latino.

One day when we were talking about sunscreen to DS' main educator, she said she (lovingly) calls him (and the other pasty-white kid in his room) 'mi Guerro Quebecois' (my [little] white Quebec boy). Writing this down, I realise that it could be taken as racist, but I took it more to be a term of endearment and to refer literally to very pale, white skin (DS is very, very pale). After reading the NurtureShock chapter on race, I'm kinda thinking it's a good thing that his educator is frank about their differences, yet she treats him with the same love and warmth as the other kids (DS is IN LOVE with her...cries when she attends to other kids...but that's a whole other issue).

While I understand and agree that DAT does not work alone in combating racism in kids, I think it provides the possibility for having friends from different backgrounds, understanding more about different races and cultures, and at minimum, providing a basis for conversations about race. But the explicit conversations need to happen. I must admit I'm still working it out in my own head - how to talk about race (not just have it be the (no pun intended) white elephant in the room). What helps a lot, I find, is hearing about (non-white) friends' thoughts on racism or details about their own experiences with racism.

After reading the chapter, it's now plainly evident that I have to start the race conversations soon. I'm thinking talking about friends at daycare and about food (we love to eat food & dishes from a lot of different cultures) may be the way to start things off. I also like the idea of introducing the concept of the different continents via animals, which DS loves. And not to wait until 3rd grade (as I probably would have if I hadn't read the chapter...unless questions were asked, or if a situation came up). DS doesn't have many words yet so for now, the conversations will be mostly one sided.

@akeeyu, I LOVE your idea of 'practising' the challenging conversations when your kids are young. Totally stealing that.

Oh, and last point. My best friend is of Persian and Irish descent. She is commonly thought of as 'white' by most people. Even I had (unwittingly) categorized her this way until one day, about 5 or 6 years into our friendship we were talking and she was telling me how for her, as a kid, she often felt conflicted because friends would say racist comments in her presence (often about Indians), assuming of course that she was 'white'. Of course, at the time, she felt ashamed for being who she was while also guilty and conflicted about not standing up for herself about this part of her, and meanwhile, fearful that the 'friends' would find out the 'truth' about her. She's worked it all out now as an adult and embraces both sides of her heritage. But it's a good reminder that really, and truly, we can't make assumptions about people. I think it's this sentiment that I think of most when I think about talking to my son about race. We can see how someone looks on the outside (skin colour, hair colour, etc.) but to know about someone's experience in life (i.e. how they are on the 'inside'), and the kind of person they are, we have to get to know them. Everyone has a different story.

@Andrea, I think of the same thing with the 'We're all the same on the inside' line (biology not emotions). But I guess I'll need to be explicit as @Sharon mentions, if I ever use that line.

[Julie]

If this topic interests you, you should read "Other People's Children" by Lisa Delpit. While written for educators, it talks about a lot of what everyone above is talking about. The most striking thing I remember from reading her book years ago was that while white people think they are being open-minded and liberal in saying things like, "I don't see color, I just see people" was that comments like that completely invalidate the most fundamental aspect of someone's identity - their race and cultural background. Plus, it's a lie. Of course you see someone's color - it's the first thing you see. Teaching your child not to value that by *purposefully not noticing it* is teaching children to deal with cultural differences by ignoring them. Um....not exactly what we're shooting for, and possibly why we find ourselves in such a mess in our country compared to other countries.

[maria]

I don't have a lot of wisdom to share on this, but I do have a story. Many years ago (late 80s) I had a boyfriend who was black and I remember a friend's (white) son, who was about 3 at the time, asking my ex why his skin was so dark. He answered very openly and easily that he just happened to have dark (he might have said black, although in reality it was a medium reddish-brown). The 3 year old was very curious about whether it was the same as his skin, whether it hurt when he scraped it and such. My ex (who turned out to be a real sh*t in most ways) handled it really well and made it such a natural conversation.

Like a lot of the previous posters, I would have a really hard time answering these kinds of questions so easily because I am white and I guess I don't feel that I have a lot of credibility on the topic of racism. My daughter's schools have been helpful, talking about MLK and civil rights in January, and we have been able to have some decent talks about it. She tends to describe people of color as brown and when playing with other kids at the park or whatever doesn't appear to notice or care what color they are.

I do have concerns because *everyone* at her school and pretty much all of our friends and aquaintances are white, with the exceptions of a couple of Asian kids in her class. We do live in a racially diverse area but segregation is, IMO, even more entrenched than ever these days.

[Leah]

I was talking to my husband about this chapter last weekend and in trying to describe it I realized that I didn't really get it either. So I'm glad to be talking about it here. I "got" it to the extent that I understand that talking about race to kids is a good thing and avoiding it is a bad thing, but the specifics of exactly how and why and when and what aren't so much there for me.

That said, a few things stood out. I live in one of the more diverse neighborhoods in Chicago, my almost-4-year-old's best preschool friend is black, and we have good friends who are indian, asian, black, etc. That said, the kids her age who live near us are almost all white (there are quite a few black kids but they are all just enough older that they aren't in her peer group when we're all playing outside). I was embarrassed, however, when she brought up a woman's "beautiful skin" at Target. I think I handled it ok (what do you like about it? yes it is a lovely color, it is pretty cool that people all look different so that people get to all have cool skin colors and eye colors and so on, I went on like that for a bit), and the woman gave me a big smile so I assume she wasn't horrified. I was trying to figure out why I was embarrassed though, and realized that I think it's because I felt like I hadn't done a good enough job already in explaining it, and when she mentioned it in public it was like it exposed my parenting flaws. Perhaps irrational, but it's just such a LOADED topic.

I do know that one of the big things that I want to convey but I'm not totally sure how to get this one across to a little kid is that people get to choose how they feel about things. I mean, I tell her that about herself, but I just feel like our society is so focused on "right" vs. "wrong" ways to feel about things it's exhausting. For instance, there's constantly something in the news about native americans being offended by whatever sports team. In my experience (growing up in a small town in MI where the biggest minority is native americans), there's no consensus and people sometimes are fine with it and sometimes offended by it. But our overarching culture seems to be divided into "this is horribly offensive to this culture" and "those people should get over it" - when the ACTUAL culture may come down somewhere in the middle. I am rambling and I doubt it's making sense, but I just really want to be able to convey that I don't get to decide what offends people, THEY do, so try to be empathetic.

In other news, I didn't get much sleep last night. Sorry for the incoherent comment.

[ramy]

I thought this was a really interesting chapter. We've started talking about race for several reasons: my daughter's first friend was adopted from Guatemala (and had lesbian parents--a twofer!), at her second daycare her best friends were a girl of mixed black/white/native American heritage and a lily white blond girl. Her current closest friend is from a family on exchange from the Mediterranean, so very brown. We've talked about the differences in skin color between all of her friends. It might be harder with my son b/c his class is very very very white at the moment.

Her daycare also took the time to talk about MLK day (and even did a play about Rosa Parks) and they've talked about Kwanzaa, so she is getting it there too.

Funny story: My husband and I met in Africa and we have a house full of African stuff. I am always going into class and talking about Africa. One day my daughter asked me (in total confusion) why we weren't black if we'd lived in Africa. A teaching moment.

I think we can still do more though, and we probably will. I might also mention this chapter to the kids' teachers. I hated the first chapter of this book (annoying) but the past two have been nicely backed up by data. Although I can't figure out why they mention some researchers by name and others only by university. It seems to put all the expertise on a few individuals when many people are involved. But that is the scientist in me talking and wanting full on citations!

[Suzie]

I have been lurking for a long time but I thought I would post because my approach seems a little different and it doesn't feel so wrong. I found it interesting that 'all I see is people' is construed as a negative approach. I am a 'white' Australian (a term I have NEVER used and intend to never again use as it is inaccurate and by it's very nature non-inclusive) and so is my husband - but my heritage is Indonesian (of which I am very proud although it is impossible to tell from looking at me) and (we recently found out) my husbands' is possibly Middle Eastern (anecdotally Bedouin - a family of red haired, fair skinned folk with darker skinned, dark haired family members punctuated through the last 3 generations - that I have been able to observe. The anecdote involves a red-haired, fair skinned merchant seaman falling in love with a Bedouin woman). My daughter, 4, is olive skinned with dark brown hair - elements of her father and me. When we talk about skin colour we talk about, quite literally, how we are all different. Every single one of us. My skin is the lightest, then my daughters slightly darker and then my husbands slightly darker again. It, to me, is a truism that people are people because talking about the way we look like - no two people ARE the same. And kids are so literal - could it be so wrong to state the obvious? And I don't see this as invalidating someone's heritage because skin colour doesn't necessarily reflect a person's heritage. 

I think this attitude comes from more than Australia's multi-cultural environment because our treatment of our True Australians is ghastly. Maybe it has something to do with our history and education where we are taught we were a colonized country so all new to the country and all visitors to this country. I don't feel any 'ownership' of Australia so all must be as welcome as I have been. And yes, I was born here. It eats at my soul when people assume 'ownership' of this country - it seems to suggest some people have more right to it than others. Anyway, I digress.

I haven't yet read NurtureShock and maybe i am missing the point. And I accept my approach may be wrong, but I truly hope it won't be damaging. And this discussion will give me much to think on...