EDIT: Please accept my sincere apologies for not including a Trigger Warning for eating disorders within the book review. It was an oversight on my part and I will ensure I learn from this moving forward, Sadia.
Cheers Sadia, that was a very interesting read. Personally, on the terms, I find POC a very useful and inclusive catch all. My wife is Chinese, I'm Anglo-Indian-Bengali-Cockney, our kids are mongrels...we all see and refer to ourselves as People of Colour...it's a useful shorthand/catch-all. As you say, there are times when being more specific is appropriate/more helpful.
I use it too because it’s useful and much better than the alternatives and I like the collegiate feeling it gives me when talking about shared experiences.
The reasons I can tail against it at times because it a. Centres whiteness and Eurocentricity and b. It suggests that only those that are non-white have a race/ethnicity and whiteness is the default and standard. That’s why for example in fiction, only POC character’s’ races are mentioned.
It’s complex when you delve into it but mostly I’m with you! It’s a useful term.
Also I was going to mention Camilla Parker Bowles wading into the Dahl controversy. But out of respect to you, I edited it out 😊.
EDIT: Please accept my sincere apologies for not including a Trigger Warning for eating disorders within the book review. It was an oversight on my part and I will ensure I learn from this moving forward, Sadia.
Thanks so much, I really enjoy your newsletters. “Diversity is a fact, inclusion is a choice” is great and a very useful phrase to remember!
Thanks so much for reading and taking the time to comment. It’s so lovely to know you’re enjoying the newsletter! 🙌🏾🙌🏾
Thanks for writing and sharing this - it was really helpful and clear.
Thank you so much for taking the time to comment 🙏🏾 and I’m so glad you found it useful 🙌🏾.
I really appreciate all the work you have done here, such valuable and important reading and lessons to learn and keep learning in anti-racism x
Thank you so much. It’s great knowing that you found this issue useful 🙏🏾. Thanks for reading and so glad you’re here 🙌🏾 💛.
Cheers Sadia, that was a very interesting read. Personally, on the terms, I find POC a very useful and inclusive catch all. My wife is Chinese, I'm Anglo-Indian-Bengali-Cockney, our kids are mongrels...we all see and refer to ourselves as People of Colour...it's a useful shorthand/catch-all. As you say, there are times when being more specific is appropriate/more helpful.
I use it too because it’s useful and much better than the alternatives and I like the collegiate feeling it gives me when talking about shared experiences.
The reasons I can tail against it at times because it a. Centres whiteness and Eurocentricity and b. It suggests that only those that are non-white have a race/ethnicity and whiteness is the default and standard. That’s why for example in fiction, only POC character’s’ races are mentioned.
It’s complex when you delve into it but mostly I’m with you! It’s a useful term.
Also I was going to mention Camilla Parker Bowles wading into the Dahl controversy. But out of respect to you, I edited it out 😊.
*rail, not tail!
And thank you for reading and commenting Ant! Appreciate it and you :)