Valerie J' Pruegger, Ph'D'

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Perceptions of Racism andHate Crimes in Calgary

• Valerie J. Pruegger, Ph.D.
• Jerilynn A. Kiely, M.A.
• University of Calgary
• City of Calgary, Community Vitality Protection

Funded by Prairie Centre of Excellence for
Research on Immigration and Integration
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Why explore this issue?

• Hate crime on the rise
• New legislation
• Systemic racism
• effects understudied
• Community safety
• Increasing diversity
• Earlier studies with youth

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Why use Action Research?

• Community people as active participants
• Goal Community-centered tool for problem solving
  
• Explanations/solutions from everyday lived
  experience
• Local, action-oriented approach to change

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Who participated?

• Males 53
• Females 32
• Age 12-15 years
• SES Medium
• School Performance
• Average, Above Average
• Ancestry Asian,
• South Asian, N. European
• Religion Other, Islam/Muslim, Protestant
• Sexual Orientation

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Definitions ofRacism/Hate Activities

• Dont know
• More inclusive definitions
• White vs. Non-white discrimination
• Emotional responses

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What did they say?

• If youre not their kind, youre an alien.
• Being unfair. Even though youre right, the
  teacher says youre wrong because of what you
  look like.
• People make jokes. They say You come from a
  stinky world.
• Someone puts you down because youre different.

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Experiences with Racism/Hate Activity

• By teachers
• Hard to define
• Name-calling,
• fights
• Defenders
• Isolation
• Language issues

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What did they say?

• Our science teacher discriminated against our
  whole ESL class. She treated us as if we were
  unintelligent.
• When I ask my teacher she says Go talk to your
  ESL teacher, I dont have time for this.
• I was walking home, a kid called me Paki. He
  said Im going to beat you up.

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Experiences withHate Groups

• No understanding
• Familiar through TV, Social Studies
• Fear of rival groups from home
• Hate groups only treat Black people differently.
• Ive heard of the KKK through the
• Jerry Springer show.

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What didthey say?

• Ive heard of them from newspapers only. There
  arent many of them and they stone houses.
• Ive heard of the Nazis and the KKK. They killed
  Black and Chinese people.

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Impact ofRacism/Hate Activity

• No impact
• Emotional
• Social
• Employment opportunities unaffected

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What did they say?

• Employment
• I dont think itll affect my education or jobs
  because Im going to speak English really good
  and then Ill have more chances. Ill be no
  different than anyone else and Ill even be
  better!
• There is an advantage for basketball players.
  That is, sometimes the colour of your skin can
  actually help you in getting a job, like Black
  men in the NBA.

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WitnessingRacism/Hate Activity

• Being laughed at
• Name-calling
• Aggression
• Exclusion
• Not an issue

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What did they say?

• In class, when we were reading, someone called
  sheet shit and everyone started laughing. That
  person started crying. I wanted to help but
  couldnt because my English was not so good
  either and theyd make fun of me too. I would
  have wanted to tell them, Mistakes are made, so
  dont laugh.
• At school theres a boy that everyone calls fat
  and ugly and Jell-O-Man. I felt bad, but
  didnt want to help him because he was laughing
  at himself.

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Intervention Strategies

• Talk it out
• Fight back
• Enlist others
• Learn English
• Diversion
• Ignorance
• Unsure

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Racism-FreeZone

• Absence of negative behaviours
• Living in peace and happiness
• Everyone free and accepted
• Friendly, happy people
• Fun and games
• Racism illegal
• Another place lonely island, science fiction
  world, another planet, playground, sandbox,
  heaven, like it was back home...

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What did they say?

• It would look like a science fiction world,
  everyone would have the same skin colour to avoid
  problems, it would be like a sandbox.
• It would be like a playground, can interact and
  have fun.
• It would be like the crayon commercial and youd
  be able to make a rainbow.

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What did we learn?

• Need for training
• Need to let go
• Perceptions of racism in North America

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Next Steps

• Bring youth and service providers together
• Build youth-driven solutions
• Create racism-free zone
• Create reporting web-site
• Report available