Before he cancelled his office hours for the term, President Hanlon met with a few #Fight4FacultyofColor activists. When he asked what he has done to "educate" himself since the Freedom Budget protests in 2014, he replied that he had read Michelle Alexander's "The New Jim Crow" and Ta-Nehisi Coates' "Between the World and Me." While both are highly-acclaimed and important texts, neither of them address racism in higher education. Furthermore, these books are limited in that they treat race and racism as if they are male-specific phenomenon.
As a queer, Black former-student of President Hanlon, I am neither impressed nor surprised by this. How are you going to launch a campaign for "inclusive excellence" and "academic rigor," when you do not seem to hold yourself to either of those standards?
Over my last six terms at Dartmouth, it has become very clear to me that the administration only really responds to things if they:
B) Have the potential to become a PR nightmare
Since the former is clearly not applicable, here is a list of 5 Books that Phil Hanlon Should Read Before Hosting Another Panel on "Diversity and Inclusion".
1. Sister Outsider by Audre Lorde
2. This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color
3) Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love, & So Much More by Janet Mock
4. Another Kind of Public Education: Race, the Media, Schools, and Democratic Possibilities by Patricia Hill Collins
5. Woman Hollering Creek: And Other Stories by Sandra Cisneros
