DART Dictionary

Transnational Family

A family who live part of each year in a different country. Children may be cared for by different people in each country, or the whole family may move together.

Stereotype

An oversimplified generalization about a particular group, which usually carries derogatory imp

Black people:

Black people refers to a racialized classification of people, usually a political and a skin color-based category for specific populations with a mid to dark brown complexion. Not all Black people have dark skin.

BIPOC:

BIPOC. The acronym stands for "Black, Indigenous and people of color."

Class:

Class: Class refers to how much wealth you have access to through property, inheritance, family support, investments, or other wealth not directly associated to wage earning.

Cultural Racism:

Cultural Racism is the imposition of one racial group's culture in such a way as to withhold respect for demean, or destroy the cultures of other groups.

Cultural competence(y):

Cultural competence(y) is the ability to interact effectively across various facets of diversity, to flex with differences. Cultural competence is what we need to be inclusive. It requires (1) being self-aware of your own culture, assumptions, values, styles, biases, attitudes, privilege, etc.; (2) understanding others' cultures, assumptions, values, styles, biases, attitudes, privilege, etc.; and (3) based on this knowledge, understanding your potential impact on others and interacting with them in a situationally appropriate way for greater effectiveness and inclusion.

Culture:

Culture: A set of shared ideas, customs, traditions, beliefs, and practices shared by a group of people that is constantly changing, in subtle and major ways.

Diversity:

Diversity: the unique differences among individuals in a group based on which we may be treated differently in society. Ethnicity is not the only way in which we are diverse as a group. There are countless visible and invisible facets of diversity. Furthermore, a person cannot be "diverse" (as in "diverse candidate").

Equity:

Equity: An approach that ensure everyone is given equal opportunity; this means that resources may be divided and shared unequally to make sure that each person can access an opportunity. Equity takes into account that people have different access to resources because of system of oppression and privilege. Equity seeks to balance that disparity.

Ethnicity:

Ethnicity: A group of people that identify with one another based on shared culture.

Indigenous:

Indigenous: A person or group of people whose culture, identity, and often spirituality are rooted in a particular place.

Microaggressions:

Microaggressions: Subtle, often unconscious everyday behaviors that often unintentionally denigrate someone from a historically marginalized or non-dominant group. They are small, but if experienced chronically, a person can feel, "death by a thousand tiny cuts."

Privilege:

Privledge: The access to resources a person has, consciously or not consciously, by virtue of being part of a dominant group in society. It is the freedom from stress, anxiety, fear or harm related to your identity

Race

Race (versus Ethnicity): Race is both a false construct that historically and currently conflates skin color and ancestry with behavior and culture. However, though race is a false construct, its existence is a widely held assumption and has real consequences for all people.

Race

Race: A social construct that categorizes and ranks groups of human beings on an arbitrary basis such as skin color and other physical features. Historically, it has been used as a rationale for colonization of other peoples lands, enslavement, and war and oppression's by one group against another. The scientific consensus is that race in this sense has no biological basis in the human species.

Racial identity

Racial Identity: how one is classified by other people and by social institutions. In addition it includes how one comes to understand and feel about ones racial groups membership.

Socioeconomic status:

Socioeconomic status: The amount of money you earn in wages each month or year. This can change rapidly.

Stereotypes

Stereotypes (versus Generalizations): Stereotypes refer to the widely held, oversimplified ideas we hold about a person based on their identity. Usually, stereotypes are based on assumptions, popular opinion, or misinformation, are generally negative, are sweeping and simple, and are often characterized by words such as "always" and "never." Generalizations, on the other hand, are based on observable experiences within a community, are not necessarily negative, are helpful and intended to guide people in their actions, are complex, and are often qualified by words such as "often," "sometimes," and "may.

Inclusion:

embracing, leveraging, and celebrating the strengths of our diversity and ensuring everyone feels welcomed and valued for who they are. Inclusion is not merely tolerating differences or overcoming differences to focus on "our common humanity." Diversity is what we are, and inclusion is what we do

Colorblindness:

Colorblindness: The process by which a person attempts to ignore the existence of race or skin color in service of seeing past race and just seeing the person. This de- emphasizing of race, however, ignores the real, lived experience of people of color in the US and ignores their experience.

Intersectionality

Intersectionality refers to the interconnected nature of identity such as race, class and gender, and the interdependent systems of power and privilege that result from the interconnectedness. For example, a heterosexual black female-identified person may experience power and privilege differently than a queer black female-identified person oraheterosexualwhitefemale-identifiedperson. Asalientquoteonintersectionalityis Audre Lorde's quote "There is no thing as a single-issue struggle because we do not live single-issue lives."

People of color (POC)

People of color is a socially created category referring collectively to people who do not identify as only white or Caucasian under the current U.S. Census ethnicity categories. This is the preferred and most inclusive term, currently. People of Color does NOT automatically include people who identify as Black.

Prejudice

Prejudice: An attitude, opinion or feeling formed without adequate prior knowledge through or reason. Prejudice can be prejudgment for or against any person, group, or gender.

Racism (Racist)

Racism: An attitude, action, or practice of an individual or institution, backed by societal power, that undermines human and legal rights, or economic opportunities of people because of specific physical characteristics, such as skin color.

Social identities:

Social identities: As compared with individual identities, this denotes memberships in groups that are defined by society are shared with many other people and have societal advantages and disadvantages attached to them. These identities include gender, economic class, racial identity, heritage, religion, age group.

System of Oppression

System of Oppression refers to systems of power in society that advantage certain groups over others, and include ideologies such as racism, sexism, heterosexism, etc. (collectively "the isms")

White people:

White People: A socially created "racial" group who historically and currently receive the benefits of racism in the United States. The category includes all the different ethnic groups of European origin, regardless of differences in their histories, ethnicity, or cultures.