"But I Really Did Fear for My Life": Unpacking "Allyship" in the Aftermath of Compounded Macroaggressions

• In Event: The Paradox of Balancing Well-Being in Predominantly White Informal Learning Spaces: Legitimizing Black/Brown Autoethnographies

Abstract

Purpose
I am a Black female critical literacy educator for social justice. My research is deeply committed to improving the literacy development, experiences and lives of Black children and families from urban and low-income households. Social justice work is urgent, meaningful, rewarding, transformative, and free of dull moments. At the same time, this work is draining and requires intentionality toward self-care and restorative practices, especially because the expectations for Black women in the academy tend to be more demanding than White female colleagues. After a demanding academic year, I attended a nature-based writing retreat. This was a great experience, until I experienced compounded macroagressions and White “allyship” that went wrong. This paper unpacks the roles of well-intentioned White “allies” who engage in macroagressions with colleagues of color.

Theoretical Perspectives
This research employs Matias and DiAngelo’s (2013) “emo-cognitive explorations of White neurosis and racial cray-cray” to analyze my interaction with a White female colleague after traumatic macroagressions during an academic writing retreat. Specifically, I experienced reckless endangerment by 2 White male drivers (a newly licensed, inexperienced driver and his trainer) during a jeep sunset tour on the top of a mountain, and I literally (not to be confused with metaphorically) feared for my life. The inexperienced driver lacked adequate control of the jeep, and we nearly fell off the side of the mountain, more than once. When we arrived to the top of the mountain, I explicitly told both White male drivers our trip was dangerous and they would need to find another route to take us down the mountain. Fortunately, we arrived safely to the bottom of the mountain. The next day, however, I was stranded by a different set of drivers (from the same company) for two hours. I have several reasons to believe these incidents were connected. After recounting the details of the events and brainstorming solutions, a White female colleague, who positioned herself as an “ally,” she suggested I omit my language that “I feared for my life” when reporting to the White facility owners/operators. In seeking to understand the emo-cognitions that undergird these dynamics, like Matias & DiAngelo, I ask, ‘What is the condition that compels whites to perform these behaviors, and how does it impact people of color?’

Methods & Data Sources
This research employs critical autoethnographic methods. Amidst the aforementioned experience, one sistascholar, a Black female, instinctively knew to record the event on her cell phone, like Diamond Reynolds (girlfriend of Philando Castile). The recording was later transcribed and analyzed. Using the recording and our personal reflections after the event, I crafted a critical autoethnography of being a Black academic in spaces with White colleagues, whiteness, and White allies.

Significance
Upon this painful yet therapeutically necessary moment, we courageously name our condition to break racial cray-cray and begin a collective healing (Matias & DiAngelo, 2013). This work has implications for scholars of color and their White colleague allies who aim to solve problems in solidarity.

Author

• Sakeena Everett, University of Illinois at Chicago