The dialogue that is diversity

The differences that encompass our society, whether they be our individual beliefs or outside appearance, are what make us strong as a community; a whole is made up of many, many parts. However, such a platitude cannot be taken seriously without attempts to further prove or disprove said commentary. A discussion is necessary in order to further understand the importance of knowing who we are as people, students, faculty, politicians, activists, women, transexual, transgender, asexual or even just simply being. Knowing what or who we are, however, is only the beginning of rationalizing this whole concept that is existence. Once we know who we are, (if we can ever be realistically “sure”) we must know who we are in regards to the people around us—our communities. How can we define ourselves when we’re among our family versus when we’re among our peers or coworkers? Our professors or classmates? Such identities change among environments and can vary throughout time. That being said, a dialogue is more than just important—it is a necessity for our livelihood. Without an issue being constantly addressed, analyzed, reviewed, argued against, argued for, the issue will simply die and be left forgotten once again. This is why the Sedehi Diversity Project (SDP) is essential.

This year, I had the privilege to see the production at its finest moment yet in which the following contributors brought to stage a controversial epic: Aran Abilock Clemmons, Bree Booth, Christopher Chin, Alissa Liebler, Emmia Newman, Tati Rosario, Nikk Tetreault, stage manager Emily Donegan and director Evan Brooks. What exactly is the SDP? What does it mean to be a part of such a spectacle, and how can someone participate?

Graciously, Professor Troy Dwyer, faculty advisor for the production, allowed me to see the last showing of the SDP and allowed me to take pictures during the production as well! Like previous productions of SDP, the performance involved interviews with several anonymous individuals about their thoughts and feelings on campus in general and about specific events, such as the Town Hall meeting that occurred last year.

What was particularly different about this SDP production was the use of their own words in the protest. The actors would literally step out of character and say “Hey, it’s me” or “and this is me saying that. My own words.” It was a rare approach that I hadn’t seen before—more personal in comparison to previous productions—which seemed to be the goal of the composition. Like previous SDP interpretations, it revealed its focus mainly through questions, which involved race, gender, sexuality, religion, and especially tolerance. The responses ranged from deceptively innocent to horrifyingly ignorant and the crowd’s reactions were particularly telling, spanning from encouraging cheers to utter defiance at the ludicrousness of the whole spectacle. No one however, denied such thoughts to be untrue, but instead deemed them to be frightfully honest. The actors were unafraid and brave with their statements, easing in and out from one character to another in regards to various precarious situations. These situations ranged from stranger interactions, ignorant comments and their effect on targeted individuals, and those who generally were not affected by the events around them and yet still wanted to learn and contribute to that.

Created in 2006, the Sedehi Diversity Project was originally a protest piece done by students, named after the founding director Desir’ee Sedehi ’08. Presented annually during Orientation Weekend, the aim of the project is to bring up and continue the conversation of diversity on campus. This conversation does continue as the SDP Blog is up and running with commentary and analyses of not only the performance but how students see the campus currently. Students and faculty are encouraged to visit this blog and continue the conversation. On the blog, various situations and identities are discussed that the SDP could not fully discuss such as the term Misogynoir, which is a distinct misogyny that is directed towards black women specifically. The term was coined by Moya Bailey in order to properly describe the targeted misogyny in primarily American culture. Until now, I was ignorant such a term existed and didn’t fully understand why it would. However, this only further demonstrated the importance of the diversity project and the continuation of the conversation. The fact is, people remain unaware of terms like Misogynoir, and continue to remain ignorant of the issues that arise on our campus daily. The purpose of the Sedehi Diversity Project is to bring to light these issues and make people aware of what’s happening around them. Ignorance is apparent everywhere, and should by no means be taken as a crime. But not informing people of what’s going on, or worse, forcefully denying them said information is a crime far worse than simply not knowing.

The project also focused on the concept of privilege and what that means in a society, specifically our campus community. For instance, what does it mean to be Jewish on a campus where it seems to be the majority of the population, yet you came from a background where no one was Jewish? Or more of an issue, what is it like to be Muslim or of different race than the dominant white Christian/Jewish culture of our community? A particular subject of interest was also the concept of class diversity, or economic diversification. Classifying it as an invisible prejudice, the not-so recent rise in tuition revealed many situations where students have parents who are unable to pay for their continued Muhlenberg education. It was quite remarkable how all of these issues and more were addressed through questions and answer dialogue, demonstrating the power of confronting these situations.

Photo courtesy of Lauren D. Mazur