Critical Race Theory, Racial Microaggressions, and Campus Racial Climate for Latina/o Undergraduates

Abstract

In this article, Tara Yosso, William Smith, Miguel Ceja, and Daniel Solórzano expand on their previous work by employing critical race theory to explore and understand incidents of racial microaggressions as experienced by Latina/o students at three selective universities. The authors explore three types of racial microaggressions—interpersonal microaggressions, racial jokes, and institutional microaggressions—and consider the effects of these racist affronts on Latina/o students. Challenging the applicability of Vincent Tinto's three stages of passage for college students, the authors explore the processes by which Latinas/os respond to racial microaggressions and confront hostile campus racial climates. The authors find that, through building community and developing critical navigation skills, Latina/o students claim empowerment from the margins.

Ethnic Student Organizations in Engineering: Implications for Practice from Two Studies

“…Unlike traditional models that are devised from a "fixing the student" perspective, we contend that students of color bring to their engineering education unique perspectives, knowledge, and cultural wealth from which the field of engineering can greatly benefit [13] . We acknowledge that the climate on PWI campuses is often unwelcoming climate for students of color [14,15] , and racial microaggressions are commonplace [14,15] . As a result, American and Latina/o students engineering students at these institutions often experience feelings of exclusion from in the dominant campus culture.…”

‘Most Challenging? To Fit in with People While Remaining Myself.’ Social Integration of Second Generation Turks within the Dutch Higher Education Setting

“…But I did have 'normal' friends, I mean people with whom you talk. [23; male; university student] At inter-personal level, Turkish students regularly become targets of racial jokes and (un)conscious acts of ignorance which are documented forms of 'microaggressions' (Yosso et al 2009). In these contexts, the act of telling a joke is intentional even though the racist beliefs are coded as humour.…”

The Shaping of Postcollege Colorblind Orientation Among Whites: Residential Segregation and Campus Diversity Experiences

“…Indeed, the Warikoo and de Novais (2014) in-depth study of white students at two highly selective colleges suggests that the predominant diversity frame promoted in higher education institutions can overlap with a colorblind frame, developed prior to college, purporting that race should not matter. 1 Precollege experiences with segregation and racial isolation help foster among white students racial primes reflecting ingrained stereotypes, racial bias, and symbolic racism (Sidanius et al, 2008), colorblind perspectives (Bonilla-Silva, 2014), and even pathological aversion toward black men (Smith, Yosso, & Solórzano, 2007;Yosso, Smith, Ceja, & Solórzano, 2009) among white students. In other words, prior to college, "the racial priming socialization process exposes Whites to countless daily racial stimuli that they unconsciously, yet systematically, internalize as racist attitudes, stereotypes, assumptions, fears, resentments, discourses, and fictitious racial scripts" that are dehumanizing toward people of color (Smith et al, 2007, p. 561).…”