IHSI Diversity Committee Monthly Resources
Each month, the IHSI Diversity Committee shares resources and learning opportunities with the rest of IHSI staff. Curating and sharing these resources allow us to educate ourselves on various topics related to diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice. As an institute devoted to promoting all forms of health, we want to share these resources more broadly with our campus and community stakeholders. We hope that you will find them as useful as we have.
Inclusive Meetings
This month, Bridget Melton, IHSI Director of Strategic Initiatives and Communications, highlights a resource that has helped her think differently about how language is used – and abused – in our society. Bridget shared that she started reading articles from Worthwhile Research & Consulting after seeing them cited a couple of times. It applies linguistic anthropology, a social science centered on language, culture, and social meaning, to real-world problems. While it’s overall a consulting business, their articles have helped her understand how language contributes to our mental models and helps us make decisions.
Please take a look at this small sampling of articles, which use very concrete and current examples of the power of language and how language influences the way we think. Each article takes less than 5 minutes to read!
This article points to three words that are commonly used in inaccurate ways: deportation, babysitting, and craftsmanship. The author gives tips on what you can do to commit to reflecting reality and upgrading to more accurate terminology.
“When we use the word deport accurately, it means that only non-citizens who have gone through due process and found guilty are deported. When members of the current US administration (and most of US media) use deport, it is often a distortion. A word used to make it sound like only non-citizens who are criminals are involved and that the correct procedures are being followed. But that’s just not true.”
This article gives specific examples of how erasure can show up in every day life, including the workplace, and how to recognize and sometimes reverse it.
“In our everyday communications, erasure usually shows up in ways that aren’t purposely designed to serve a particular agenda. But even when erasure isn’t intentional, it has negative consequences, both in and out of the workplace.”
"And sometimes I see this kind of erasure used to minimize the contributions of someone seen as lower status. For example, “the problem was solved in time,” when it was one person who did 98% of the work to solve the problem. When we reflect reality, we use language that accurately describes who did what, so we can have real accountability when someone has been inappropriate or give credit where credit is due."
Calling a pilot a “stewardess”
This article explains how people can use the power of words to strategically disrespect and marginalize, and how you can use language principles to call in and educate.
“When I first watched the video of this exchange, I gave him the benefit of the doubt, and thought this was just another example of an unconscious demotion, like the kinds that fill my examples database. After rewatching, though, I now believe that his “slip-up” was actually purposeful, and political theater designed to appeal to a segment of his constituents.”
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