This week Bowdoin Student Government (BSG) kicked off the second annual No Hate November, a month of programming dedicated to eliminating bias and increasing mindfulness on campus. This year’s No Hate November focuses on the problem of microaggressions—smaller instances of bias that students may not recognize as harmful.
BSG President Chris Breen ’15 said that BSG was looking to move the conversation away from larger bias incidents to focus on more everyday occurrences.
“After talking with Associate Dean of Multicultural Student Programs Leana Amaez, it seems that the conversations always tend toward microaggressions or smaller actions that build up over time,” he said.
Breen gave the example of a student of a particular race being singled out in a class discussion and asked to speak for his racial group as a whole—an incident that was not necessarily malicious, but was stil inappropriate.
Breen noted that BSG also chose to focus on microaggressions due to a lack of larger, more overt bias incidents on campus this semester. Last year, No Hate November was initiated after malevolent racial symbols and language were found on whiteboards in Brunswick Apartments and a homophobic remark led to violence against a student outside of Joshua’s Restaurant and Tavern.
The programming for this month began on Monday, when a representative from the William Winter Institute for Racial Reconciliation, Jennifer Stollman, came to campus to lead a discussion titled “Ending Discrimination Based on Difference.”
Also on Monday, Esther Nunoo ’17 and Michelle Kruk ’16 gave Food for Thought talks on their own experiences with bias and microaggressions on campus.
Nunoo performed a slam poetry piece about her experience with “the things we don’t talk enough about at Bowdoin,” from race to class to religion to the backgrounds from which students come.
Nunoo said she hoped her performance would inspire students to think more about these complicated, often-ignored issues.
“I just wanted to get people thinking about discomfort and why we keep silent,” she said.
BSG has been collaborating with the Office of the Dean of Student Affairs, the Multicultural Student Program and various student groups to organize No Hate November.
Other events for the month include a shoe memorial to honor victims of police brutality, which took place yesterday in Smith Union and a slam poetry performance in partnership with the Bowdoin Music Collective on November 20. Instead of the photo exhibit that hung in the Union last November, this year a poster display in the Union will allow students to write in things that “we do not tolerate” at Bowdoin, such as hate or ignorance.