Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in So You Want to Talk About Race, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Racism, Privilege, and White Supremacy
Confronting Racial Pain
Intersectionality, Oppression, and Social Justice
Cultural Appropriation
Summary
Analysis
Oluo recalls a conversation about lipstick in seventh grade, in which Oluo told a white girl named Jennifer that she liked her red lipstick. Jennifer, without thinking, quipped back that red lipstick would make Oluo look like a clown. Oluo was embarrassed and agreed, acknowledging her big lips. Throughout her adolescence, Oluo felt that much of her body was too much. Her hair was too poufy, her voice was too loud, her butt was too big. Oluo remembers another conversation about college applications, in which a boy told her that she wouldn’t have to try too hard because she’s black, so she’d get in. These perpetual reminders that she’s different make Oluo feel like she doesn’t belong.
In this chapter, Oluo expands on microaggressions: behavior or comments that seem harmless but actually trigger racial pain. She’s already given several examples of microaggressions (such as touching black people’s hair or cracking racist jokes), and she offers two more here to emphasize how often people of color face microaggressions on a daily basis. This is important because Oluo argues that small digs cause ongoing emotional strain when they come up all the time.
Themes
Oluo recalls a college scholarship conference for black and brown students that she attended in her senior year. For those two days, she realized that she didn’t have to make her voice quieter or eat less because she felt big. Nobody made fun of her name, and she forgot about the size of her hips. She felt like a fully-fledged human who could breathe.
Oluo’s memory illustrates how much emotional weight is lifted when a person feels like they fit in and they aren’t constantly called out for being or looking different. She implies that the opposite situation—in which a person is constantly reminded that they’re not like everybody else—is problematic, because it places a taxing burden on people to police their own behavior, which takes energy away from other things they might to pursue in life.
Themes
Racial microaggressions are “small daily insults and indignities perpetrated against people of color.” They feel similar to comments from hypercritical parents that make you feel “less than” good enough. To Oluo, microaggressions are psychologically harmful, but they’re also small (meaning people often dismiss them as mistakes or misunderstandings), cumulative (meaning one comment isn’t such a big deal, but repeated comments chip away at your self-esteem), frequent (many people use them), and often unintentional. Many people don’t realize they’re being oppressive when they act that way. Examples include telling somebody that they don’t sound black, cabs not stopping for people of color, and people who waiting to take the next elevator rather than share one with a person of color.
Before continuing further, Oluo offers a concrete definition and tangible examples of microaggressions. They show—like most topics Oluo has raised so far—that this issue is intersectional. People can face “small daily insults and indignities” for many reasons, ranging from their race, gender, or class to personal quirks that annoy their mothers. Oluo argues that microaggressions become more damaging the more frequently they come up. She’s going to justify this claim over the next few pages.
Themes
Oluo says that microaggressions are distracting and exhausting. Moreover, they make racist assumptions a part of everyday life. They reinforce perspectives that prevent people from getting jobs, and they reinforce white supremacy by separating and dehumanizing people. Oluo suggests some strategies for how to cope with microaggressions: she stresses the importance of saying what happened (for example, asking somebody where they’re really from assumes their race makes them less American). She also thinks it’s important to ask uncomfortable questions (such as pushing people to explain why they said what they did) and let them know that meaning well doesn’t make it better. It’s important to raise the issue, even if it’s uncomfortable.
Oluo thinks that microaggressions trigger feelings of defensiveness that a person has to manage as they go about their day, which distracts them and takes energy away from other things they want to accomplish. In a society that normalizes racism, racial microaggressions come up frequently, which places a tremendous toll on people of color. The more frequently a person has to deal with microaggressions, the more emotional energy they spend. This affects their ability to focus, which affects their ability to succeed in life, thus contributing to their oppression.
Themes
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Oluo thinks that it’s important to call out microaggressions when you witness other people using them but to take the lead from the person who’s directly being harmed. Sometimes, people have good reasons for not speaking out (say, it’s not a good time for them to confront the emotional burden). Oluo reminds people of color that it’s not their job to call out microaggressions, but they have a right to stand up for themselves.
Oluo’s warning underscores that people of color don’t always feel comfortable calling out microaggressions, because doing so involves even more emotional labor. She implies that microaggressions often go unacknowledged, meaning that they come up even more often than most people might assume.
Themes
If you’ve been called out for a microaggression, Oluo advises taking a pause (it’s easy to become overwhelmed and defensive), ask yourself why you chose to make that comment, if you’d make that comment to somebody of your own race, and why you felt threatened or uncomfortable. Don’t force people to acknowledge your good intentions (the effect was still bad), remember that it’s not just one comment (people of color face these all the time), don’t demand an education in why something is offensive, and apologize. Even if you don’t get it, acknowledge that you hurt someone. This is hard work, but it’s important to remember that the little things count when it comes to racial oppression.
As before, Oluo argues that often, conversations about microaggressions go awry because they force people to confront their own shame in unintentionally saying something racist, which makes them defensive. Oluo reminds the reader that microaggressions are damaging precisely because they place an unfair emotional burden on people of color, which inhibits their chances of success in life. Responses that demand more emotional labor from the insulted person thus exacerbate—rather than mitigate—the problem.
Themes
