DAY 15: Structural Racism/Wealth Gap

Poet and novelist Ben Okri has written, “Beware of the stories you read or tell; subtly, at night, beneath the waters of consciousness, they are altering your world.” Systems scientist Sally J. Goerner has added, “The stories we tell ourselves about how the world works form our greatest survival tool.” Stories hold tremendous power in our world, work, and lives. 

At Food Solutions New England, their narrative strategy and other capacity-building work have benefitted from the work of The Storytelling Project, which identifies different kinds of stories that have been told to advance or prevent justice: stock stories (maintain the unjust status quo), concealed stories (accounts of those who are marginalized and oppressed), resistance stories (stories of anti-racist struggles which also have lessons about resilience), and counter-stories (ways to interrupt the status quo and create transformational alternatives). For more about these different kinds of stories, see pages 7-9 of The Storytelling Project Curriculum.

• What is your racial autobiography? Think about the stories you most often tell about your childhood using a lens that includes personal, cultural, and institutional racism.

• Reflect on the stories that circulate in your work, studies, and community life. Who and what do these stories promote and privilege? Are they advancing racial justice? Are they uplifting those who are marginalized? Are they inspiring new possibilities for racial equity and liberation?

• In the South, the word “heritage” is often used to sidestep or ignore the racist legacy of its history. “The American plantation wasn’t the quaint village community you saw depicted in your history textbook,” writes culinary historian Michael Twitty, “it was a labor camp system for exiled prisoners of war and victims of kidnapping.” Challenge/disrupt the perpetuation of stock stories around you. Hold them up for critique. Propose alternatives.

• Look at your own community’s landmarks and important cultural sites and ask if they are honoring a racist event or idea. Make a point of telling the other side of those stories. Recommended Reading: The Cooking Gene by Michael Twitty

More Resources

• Opportunity Agenda's Messaging and Language Resource Tools
• Definition and Analysis of Institutional Racism
• The REACH Equity Screen for Content Creators
• Beautiful Ventures Network
• StoryScape Exhibition

Yesterday: Reflecting on Week Two
Tomorrow: Raising the Next Generation

Author Photo Credit: Calvin Center for Faith & Writing | Quote from Words of Change: Anti-Racism by permission of Sasquatch Books. Copyright 2020 By Kenyra Rankin. All rights reserved.

SIBA thanks its generous sponsors, who have made the 21-Day Racial Equity Challenge possible:

Many of the quotes used in the Challenge are excerpted from Words of Change: Anti-Racism by permission of Sasquatch Books. Copyright 2020 By Kenyra Rankin. All rights reserved.

Although SIBA has modified when appropriate for a bookseller audience, the majority of prompts and resources come directly from the 21-Day Racial Equity Habit Building Challenge created by Food Solutions New England (FSNE). We are so grateful for their extraordinary work creating this program and making it available to other organizations.