E(race-ing).

So, in thinking about race and how I come in contact with it everyday, is almost a laughable statement. Dare I say, insulting. But in order to recognize this is I have to realize the way my body is labeled in our society and more so our community puts me in a position that I cannot over look race. It is constantly in my face and influences how I navigate spaces. I haven't been granted the privilege to not think about it. 

 

Race in every way that it can come up, has always been an area of anxiety for me, as I have flashbacks of race conversations and Black History conversations. I also, on a regular basis reflect on my first experiences at Bryn Mawr and how racialize they have been. From the very first moment I stepped foot on Bryn Mawr’s campus I was reminded of ‘my place’ in race. On an admissions tour, my mother and I were constantly asked if we were aunt and niece. At the end of the tour, one of the admissions officers came to us and said, “ Will you be the first in your family to go to college?”. Race thrown in my face, assumptions made and yet another damaging memory in regards to my race. Unfortunately, this was not the end. 

 

My freshman year at Bryn Mawr was the year of the confederate flag and the mason dixon line. It was a year that I cried a lot of tears and was constantly confronted with
“ I can’t learn when your angry” and “ you're just an angry black girl”. Again, race dealing with me and being thrown in my face in very traumatic and hurtful ways. 

 

I spent this summer working at the bookstore and constantly being questioned on whether I was a student at Bryn Mawr College or not. I then had to explain that Bryn Mawr was the only school I applied to coming from a small progressive school educational history. Which allowed me to have a very different understanding of what race meant and how I could interact with it. But somehow, Bryn Mawr constantly reminds me of where I am and what I look like. It is beyond me to think, to fathom that for some race doesn't ever come up and if it does it is only in contrast to my hurt and my trauma. Race is a construct that doesn't allow me any mobility in how I am represented nor can I ever forget it as is effects every aspect of my life especially my education.