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The Miner’s Canary: Enlisting race, resisting power, transforming democracy. Lani Guinier & Gerald Torres.
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The Miner’s Canary:Enlisting race, resisting power,transforming democracy Lani Guinier & Gerald Torres
“Race for us is like a miner’s canary… the canary’s distress signaled that it was time to get out of the mine….Those who are marginalized are like the miner’s canary: their distress is the first sign of a danger that threatens us all…”(p.11)
The three dimensions of power • Direct force or competition. Winner takes-all • Indirect manipulation of the rules to shape the outcome • Mobilization of biases or tacit understandings that operate to exclude or include individuals/groups in the collective decision-making or conflict.
A Critique of Power-Over Strategies • Problems with the Individual-Access Model: First-Dimension Rules • Problems with Outsider/Insider Dynamics: Second-Dimension Rules • Loss of an Outsider Role: Third-Dimension Problems
What are the authors trying to argue? • How do the authors try to explain the argument? • Do the authors assume the “white, middle-class woman” norm? • What are the strengths and weaknesses of the argument? • How can we apply the authors logic and/or findings towards a diversity training manual?
The Affirming Power of Struggle • A reconceptualization of the meta-narratives of power over • A commitment to sharing power in ways that are generative, that build from familiar settings, and that emphasize human agency within an organized community, and… • A willingness to engage with internally embedded hierarchies of race and class privilege
What are the authors trying to argue? • How do the authors try to explain the argument? • Do the authors assume the “white, middle-class woman” norm? • What are the strengths and weaknesses of the argument? • How can we apply the authors logic and/or findings towards a diversity training manual?