The Problem with Inclusion: Time to Shift to Belonging

January 26, 2021

By Dwight Vidale

NAIS

“Hummus…what’s that?” I remember asking my 9th grade white peers as we sat around the lunch table for the first time, aware of their looks and smirks because I did not know what it was. In my Afro-Caribbean immigrant household, hummus was not on the menu. This was one of the first othering experiences I had as a Black student at a predominantly white independent school. And it certainly was not the last.
 
Not knowing about hummus wasn’t the only thing that set me apart. When I stepped off the school bus for the first time as a high school student, I quickly realized that I had never been in such proximity to white kids. My limited interaction with white people centered mostly around attending my mother’s annual workplace holiday party, where I would exchange awkward hellos with her colleagues and their kids while I waited to receive my gift from the company Santa. As I walked around my independent school campus, I felt hyper-aware of my clothing, walk, and accent, and I worried all day if there would be more questions to which everyone knew the answer but me. I often returned home feeling unsure, self-conscious, and certain that I did not fit in.
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