Erin N. Winkler is Associate Professor and former chair of the Department of Africology at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, where she also serves on the Advisory boards of Childhood and Adolescent Studies; Ethnic Studies; and Latin American, Caribbean, and US Latino/a Studies; and is affiliated faculty in Urban Studies and Women’s Studies. She earned her Ph.D. in African American Studies at the University of California-Berkeley and was a postdoctoral fellow in African American Studies at Northwestern University. She is author of the book Learning Race, Learning Place: Shaping Racial Identities and Ideas in African American Childhoods (2012). She has recently consulted for the new Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture in training museum staff to have productive conversations about race and racism with visitors of all ages and backgrounds.

Abstract:
Rethinking Notions of Diversity: Children’s Understandings of Race

Racial diversity and inclusiveness are often held up as core values by schools, parents, and other adults educating, raising, and working with children in the United States. However, racial segregation is the norm in the United States, and this segregation disproportionately affects kids, who tend not to move outside of their residential areas in their daily lives as much as adults do. Even for children who do have more racially diverse schools or neighborhoods, there is a lack of true diversity in the racialized representations coming from the broader society, including media, curriculum, textbooks, and more. What does this mean for children’s ideas about race? In this presentation, I will discuss how adults’ well-intentioned notions about how to talk (or avoid talking) with young children about race often backfire, actually increasing racial bias in children.