Cultural Competency
Through our work, and with you our alumni, we seek a deeper understanding of the ways in which race, power and privilege affect our ability to create whole communities. How can our work intentionally build bridges in a country suffering from widening racial and socio-economic divides? Following are a number of articles that we found helpful in grappling with that question.
Readings
ACCESS (Arab Community Center for Economic and Social Services), 2006. "Building Capacity Through Diversity: Towards a more diverse and just environmental movement in Michigan." ACCESS Environmental Program. Open PDF.
Aguilar, Orson. 2005. “Why I am not an Environmentalist.” San Francisco Chronicle. Thursday, May 19, 2005.
Brown, Adrienne Maree. 2005. “Rainbow Warrior.” Grist Magazine. March 15, 2005.
Cronon, William. 1996. “The Trouble with Wilderness; or, Getting Back to the Wrong Nature.” In Uncommon Ground: Rethinking the Human Place in Nature, W. Cronon Ed. New York: Norton. P. 69-90
Curtis, Janet. 2007. "Confluence: Toward Whole Environmentalism." Written for Center for Whole Communities. Download PDF
Jones, Van. 1996. "Blacks Deserve More Ink in Green Coverage." Reprinted in Black Energy from Coop America’s website.
Martinborough, Sam. 2007. “Out of the Mouths . . .” In “Mass Sings: A Publication of the Massachusetts Chapter of the American Choral Directors Association.” January 2007. Download PDF
McIntosh, Peggy. 1988. “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack.” From Working Paper 189. “White Privilege and Male Privilege: A Personal Account of Coming To See Correspondences through Work in Women's Studies.”
Merchant, Carolyn. 2003. "Shades of Darkness: Race and Environmental History." Environmental History 8(3): 380-394
White, Evelyn. 1999. “Black Women and the Wilderness.” Reprinted in Nature Writing: The Tradition in English. Edited by Robert Finch and John Elder. 2002. W.W. Norton & Company.
Consultants
There are many consultants who work on cultural competency and diversity issues with particular reference to the environmental movement. Two with whom we have had very positive, productive experiences are:
The Kenian Group: Contact Iantha Gantt-Wright at (301) 292-6677 or iantha at keniangroup.com, or visit their website at www.keniangroup.com. Iantha is currently organizing Summit 2007: Diverse Partners for Environmental Progress October 8-10, 2007, in Charlotte, NC.
OpenSource Leadership Strategies: Contact Gita Gulati-Partee at 919-824-3914 or info at opensourceleadership.com or visit their website at www.opensourceleadership.com.
Other
As part of its Cultural Compentency Initiative, the Alliance for Nonprofit Management has a comprehensive resource list on cultural competency. We have found it hugely helpful if a little overwhelming!
"The Color of Fear" is a groundbreaking film about the state of race relations in America, as seen through the eyes of eight North American men of Asian, European, Latino and African descent.