social structure

Below is a note I sent to the SJSU College of Social Science on April 22, 2021.

Dear College of Social Sciences (CoSS) family-

We are all shocked and saddened by the tragic events in Minneapolis, Minnesota over the past few days. As human beings, many of us are overwhelmed by the complexity of the situation and the intense emotions it has created. As members of an institution that strives for social justice, we may feel discouraged and outraged. And, as social scientists, we are wondering how our disciplines and our knowledge can contribute to solutions.

So began a message I sent to the college a few days after George Floyd was murdered on May 25, 2020. Yesterday – April 21, 2021 – Mr. Floyd’s killer was convicted on all counts of murder and manslaughter. Three posts in my Facebook feed sum my reactions:

“Truthfully, the fact that we HAVE to be so on edge about the verdict, the very real possibility that killing an unarmed Black man in plain view of the world might go unpunished is what makes me sad. And mad.”

“When each count was read I started sobbing, and I felt all of this bittersweet grief, sadness, relief, disbelief, anger – all of it at once. This verdict is so small when you think about it, it should have felt like a slam dunk. The reaction of relief is such an indictment on our country that we have been forced to expect so little. Change needs to come faster. Not another Black or Brown person brutalized by police. Systemic racism needs to be addressed systemically.”

“Actions have consequences. If #DerekChauvin had only complied with #GeorgeFloyd‘s request to let him breathe, or if he complied with the requests of the crowd who told Chauvin that he was killing George Floyd, or if he only complied with the officer who suggested turning George Floyd over he wouldn’t be in jail tonight convicted of murder. So often the victims of police violence are blamed for their own deaths because they didn’t comply. Police officers have the ability to comply as well. They need to comply with their training. They need to comply with the law. They need to comply with basic humanity. They need to comply with their duty to care for those in their custody. I’d only he had complied.”

After reading these posts I decided to get a burger at a Black-owned place in Berkeley to continue to reflect on the day’s events in my spiritual hometown of Minneapolis. [Originally from Atlanta, I now live in Oakland. I am a Black man, for those new to the college who have never seen me while we are in the pandemic]. It was great, as usual, and my heart felt lighter on the drive home. Halfway there, however, I pulled into a left turn lane behind an old Nissan Maxima with temporary tags. Two Black men were the occupants. A new Audi Q3 slowly backed up in front of them when it could not get through the yellow light. The Nissan blew its horn, and the Audi blasted its horn in answer. When the light turned green the cars exchanged horn blasts again. The Audi’s back up lights were still on, so it occurred to me that the Audi would slam into the Nissan when the driver hit the gas. I steeled myself to bear witness and possibly take action if that happened and the police were called. Daunte Wright’s ghost flashed before my eyes. Luckily, however, the Audi shifted into drive, and sped off. I breathed a sigh of relief. At the next light the Nissan turned right, and the Audi and I kept going straight. I let out another sign of relief.

This incident and my reaction connect to a section of a message a BIPOC dean colleague at another institution sent to her college: 

“For the Black members of our community [the verdict and other surrounding events] have deep and painful resonance to every aspect of their lived experience, down to the existential questions they ask themselves every minute that they move through the public sphere and navigate the very real possibility that they will experience violence and even death. 

The verdict today represents a critical turning point in our reckoning at the intersections between policing, public safety, otherizing of Black Americans, racial and social justice, accountability, and the rule of law. But the work is very far from over. One verdict in one case does not change the broken system that is so ingrained in our 400 year history, in the very fabric of American life, and in the daily lives of Black people. There will be more lost, there will be future injustices, and there will be continued pain and grief. 

But I remain hopeful that we are in a new moment in history. The arc of history is indeed very long but today it took one small bend towards justice.”

Let’s all hope that this moment will indeed be a significant turning point in efforts to make the USA live up to its ideals. This includes paying new attention to #StopAsianHate, as well as continuing other efforts to make American society more inclusive and equitable for those who are BIPOC, Jewish, LGBTQ+, and members of other marginalized groups. In the meantime, please take good care of yourselves and each other, and please do not hesitate to contact me with reactions to this message or ideas for SJSU to hasten its goal of becoming an anti-racist multicultural institution.

In solidarity,

Walt

A couple of postscripts: 

P.S. #1 Shortly after I got home I received a text message about the shipping of advance copies of my new book Sparked: George Floyd, Racism, and the Progressive Illusion. I co-edited this anthology with SJSU CoSS assistant professors Wendy Thompson Taiwo (African American Studies) and Amy August (Sociology & Interdisciplinary Social Sciences). It will be released to the general public on May 18. It may be of interest to those who’d like more information about the racial dynamics of Minnesota.

P.S. #2 After getting the text I re-watched a digital story by CoSS assistant professor Nikki Yeboah. “Sister, I’m OK” is powerful!

There are 21 essays in the “Wonderful/Wretched Memories of Racial Dynamics in the Twin Cities, Minnesota” special feature I edited in the summer of 2020. Short shareable link: http://z.umn.edu/WWseries.

On Friday, May 29, 2020 I sent the following message to the San José State University College of Social Sciences.

***

Dear CoSS family-

We are all shocked and saddened by the tragic events in Minneapolis, Minnesota over the past few days. As human beings, many of us are overwhelmed by the complexity of the situation and the intense emotions it has created. As members of an institution that strives for social justice, we may feel discouraged and outraged. And, as social scientists, we are wondering how our disciplines and our knowledge can contribute to solutions. I have three thoughts about steps we can take.

First, keep doing the job we are here to do. We are all educators, be we faculty who have direct instructional duties and student mentorship roles, ACCESS staff who advise students about both academic and life choices, or departmental and dean’s office staff who professionally engage the public as well as faculty and students. By continuing to excel in your jobs, you keep SJSU functioning as an institution of higher education that creates and disseminates knowledge about our social worlds and solutions to social problems. Thank you!

Second, many of you are very interested in racial and economic justice issues, which are at the forefront in the developments in Minneapolis (and in other cities around the country in protest of George Floyd’s death). There are many resources on the web about what you can personally do to help. Here are a few links, but there are many other groups and ways you can get involved. Feel free to send me a note if you would like to discuss anything of interest.

Finally, you can continue to educate yourself. Ibram X. Kendi provides this reading list, and certainly others in the college have additional suggestions. In particular, I recommend the article “Your Black Colleagues May Look Like They’re Okay — Chances Are They’re Not.” It articulates why this has been an especially tough week for those of us who identify as Black or African American. You may want to send a note of support to Black/African American friends and coworkers.

Some of you know that Minneapolis is my spiritual hometown. I lived there for 14 years while on the faculty at the U of Minnesota. Although a Southerner by birth and resident of Atlanta, GA from age 2 to 22, I eventually developed a strong identification as a Midwesterner, and now specifically see myself as a Minnesotan…even though I’ve now lived in California for five years. [My Facebook page lists my hometown as Minneapolis.] I’ve been checking in with Twin Cities friends all day today. They are all doing OK, and are working to support each other.

I am also doing OK, as I am energized by helping others get through the difficult times caused by COVID-19 and various social instabilities. And we WILL get through this disheartening period, and then redouble our efforts to make the world a more just and democratic place.

Be well, everyone!
Walt

Pacific Standard magazine has a new series on understanding Generation Z. The intro to the series notes,

We hear a lot about how Gen Z represents a new kind of generation: digital natives drastically different even from Millennials, who already had the Boomers scratching their heads. Are they really any different? How have they been shaped by—and responded to—new technology, recent history, and a shifting economy?

This project—a collaboration between Pacific Standard and Stanford University’s Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (CASBS)—draws on Stanford’s “Understanding iGen,” for which researchers did deep interviews with college students in the United States and the United Kingdom, while also drawing on behavioral data, consumer trends, and a series of surveys. Through publishing the results of these efforts, we hope to approximate a portrait of this generation, and an idea of where they’re leading us.

Each week, we’ll publish a new series of stories looking at a particular area of focus in our efforts, considered from different perspectives. Sign up for our daily newsletter to follow along and let us know your thoughts on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

Should be interesting…even though my generation — Generation X — was skipped in the intro; it seems that Gen X is the omitted generation.

Wired magazine is reporting that San Francisco, CA could become the first United States city to ban its agencies from using facial recognition technology. The article notes that for critics of facial recognition technology, “[i]n the hands of government…it enables all-too-easy access to real-time surveillance, especially given the availability of large databases of faces and names (think your driver’s license or LinkedIn).” The city’s Board of Supervisors is considering a new ordinance that would implement the ban. Additionally, “the ordinance would require city agencies to gain the board’s approval before buying new surveillance technology, putting the burden on city agencies to publicly explain why they want the tools as well as the potential harms. It would also require an audit of any existing surveillance tech—things like gunshot-detection systems, surveillance cameras, or automatic license plate readers—in use by the city; officials would have to report annually on how the technology was used, community complaints, and with whom they share the data.” There should be very spirited debate about this proposal!

CityLab has posted a new article with several maps about how Americans commute to work. There is sociological variation in the data. For instance, “(e)ducation is [a] piece in the picture of how Americans get to work. People are less likely to drive to work alone and to use alternate modes in metros where more adults are college graduates…. The same basic pattern holds for class. Across metros, the share of workers who are members of the knowledge-based creative class is positively associated with using transit (0.56), biking (0.62), or walking (0.56) to get to work, as well as working from home (0.50), and it is negatively associated with driving alone to work (-0.44), and the same holds for the local concentration of high-tech industry jobs. But the reverse is true for the working class. Across metros, a higher concentration of working-class jobs is positively associated with driving alone to work (0.36) and negatively associated with using transit (-0.48), biking (-0.39), and walking to work (0.32).”

The article concludes with “[w]e are cleaving into two nations—one where people’s daily lives revolve around the car, and the other where the car is receding in favor of alternative modes like walking, biking, and transit. Little wonder that bike lanes have emerged as a symbol of gentrification and ‘the war on cars’ has become a way to call out the so-called urban elite.”

Over the weekend I received an email about free rides on Lime scooters and bikes to the polls on election day next week (November 6). It appears that other ride sharing services and public transit agencies are also providing free rides. Hopefully these actions will enable more people to participate in the important civic duty of voting!

The Atlantic magazine has launched an interesting new podcast series about the intersections of technology and society: in 8 episodes, Crazy/Genius “asks big questions about everything from online dating to blockchain to space exploration. Is technology moving us forward or backward? How did we get here — and where are we headed?” Up first: “Why Can’t Facebook Tell the Truth?”

Conservative college students sometimes report that their ideas are not welcome on campus. A Chronicle of Higher Education collaboration with This American Life explores a University of Nebraska skirmish involving conservative students that made national headlines.

“Once upon a time in America, unions were a force to be reckoned with. In 1954, labor union membership in the United States hit a peak of 34.8 percent…” So begins a Pacific Standard introduction to a series on the status of labor unions in the Unites States. “Today,” the introduction continues, “the footprint of unions has shrunk dramatically due to both the general decline of traditionally unionized private-sector industries in this country, and more concerted efforts to weaken unions. In 2017, only 10.7 percent of U.S. workers belonged to a union.” Check out the site for several additional articles, such as “What caused the decline of unions in America?”