I want to share a bit about a book I just finished: Our Hidden Conversations: What Americans Really Think about Race and Identity, by Michele Norris, the creator of The Race Card Project.
I first read about this book in The New York Times, and as soon as I read the story, I knew I had to have the book.
More than a decade ago, Norris began asking people to participate in a project that she eventually called “The Race Card Project.” The prompt was simple: Race. Your story. Six words. Please send.
Initially, she printed 200 little black postcards with those words on the front, and just left them everywhere she traveled. They started to come in slowly, and then “a trickle became a tide.” (As a letter writer, I also love her support of the USPS: she said that her parents were both postal workers, and she enjoyed supporting the Postal Service. As she says, “Who says snail mail is dead?”)
She was amazed at how people were able to convey complex, intimate stories in just six words. She writes, “Taken together, the stories revealed an obscured truth. People weren’t running away from talking about race; a lot of them were desperate to discuss it through the prism of personal experience.”
In order to keep the conversation going, she created a website where people could submit their stories online; and, subsequently, “Anything Else?” Ultimately, she collected stories from over 100 countries; as well as poems, pictures, and historical documents to support their 6 words.
This book is a compilation of those words, first and foremost, but also the images and stories that came along with them. It is definitely challenging to read some of the stories, but there is also lots of hope in the book, and lots to learn, too, hearing from so many different voices.
I was really struck by something she said at the end of the introduction. She writes, “People who share their stories feel seen, heard. They don’t necessarily get validation or empathy or understanding. I have found that few are looking for that. What they want is an on-ramp to discuss topics that are often portrayed as toxic or taboo. What they also get is an opportunity to learn about someone else’s journey. The stories are powerful in their simplicity. Even if you are offended, surprised, saddened, or unmoved, you have glimpsed inside someone else’s vulnerability. That is a potent thing.”
She closes the introduction with these words: “I am not naive enough to believe that this automatically leads to enlightenment or changed minds, but I do put stock in Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.’s assertion that a mind stretched by a new idea or sensation never fully shrinks back to its former dimension.”
For that reason alone, reading and sitting with the words and the stories in this book is definitely worthwhile.
Here are 60 words for your consideration; check out the book for many, many more.
1. Black is beautiful. LOOK AT US!
2. Fearful of offending, I say nothing.
3. Afraid of Blacks, wish I wasn’t.
4. With kids, I’m dad. Alone, thug.
5. Entered world of race after 9/11.
6. Successful, Black, gay. A family’s shame.
7. Who will your children play with?
8. No one is colorblind. Don’t pretend.
9. “But where are you really from?”
10. “White privilege” makes me feel invalid.
Happy Lutheran 