Blazing a Trail: Key Lessons from Equity-Centered Community Design
// Kate McEntee, PhD Candidate at Monash University, Teaching Associate, + Participant of the Equity by Design Immersive in New York City (June 7–9, 2019)
The other day I was on a hike and part of it cut through a field in which there was no clear path. As I was walking in this part, I kept my gaze down at my feet to watch where I was stepping. I became aware that I was avoiding stepping on the small wildflowers and choosing instead to step on the wild grasses. I was saving the wildflowers from the crushing fall of my feet because I liked looking at the flowers. Grasses could be crushed because they did not register in my perspective, perhaps I implicitly decided they appeared sturdier and thus easier to step on. I was uncomfortable recognising this choice. Maybe the grasses were an important food source and the flowers useless? Or maybe the flowers were actually an invasive weed? How was I to know? As I continued walking it was clear to me how I had to choose somewhere to put my feet. Whether I stepped on grasses or flowers, if I wanted to walk through this field I had to make a decision without being sure if I was causing harm or not.
Although my bias for wildflowers over grasses might be an oversimplified analogy, it points to how when we cannot find a path we rely on our personal experiences and knowledge, whether consciously or not, to move forward. As with many people, events over the last 10 years have significantly heightened my own recognition of and attention to the deeply pervasive everyday racism perpetrated and experienced in the United States. This continually developing awareness has led me to focus my academic and professional practice on addressing issues of race and equity through design. For the last 4 years I have been actively building projects to help make people — myself, my communities and the public — more aware of the influences of bias, privilege and power in their lives, work and decision making, while continuously watching, learning and listening from others involved in this work.
It is my attempt to move through the field of practicing equity with small, slow steps and try to be thoughtful about where each step lands. There is a need to balance the efforts to advance practice, with the uncertainty of how to best proceed. There are times in this work when it feels like moving through an unmarked field, and other times when we are able to connect with a clearer path that supports ways we might cause less harm as we move through ‘the field’.
Connecting with Equity-Centered Community Design through Creative Reaction Lab’s Equity by Design Immersive in New York this past June was a moment for me to connect with a group helping to blaze a trail. I was overwhelmed by how the leaders modelled a path for engaging in this work, both their depth of thought and experience in approaching issues of equity, and highlighting their own learning process through delivering this work. Practicing equity and maintaining accountability was expertly modelled. Through this experience I grasped the respect gained by leaders being open about missteps, the complexity in seeking to center lived experience and rigour with which equity can be maintained in the smallest of moments. These are three of the instances that impressed upon me a path to follow.
In describing the importance of Equity Designers, Founder, President, and CEO Antionette Carroll shared an experience of being inappropriately asked to speak on a panel about Indigenous representation in design and cultural appropriation at a conference where she was a speaker. Through this example she was highlighting the importance of including leaders and voices with lived experience. She did not feel comfortable being considered a representative of Indigenous peoples issues, as a non-Indigenous person. While telling the story Antionette informally referred to the colour of her skin as an indication she was not an Indigenous person. Later in a private feedback box, one of the participants commented that referencing her skin colour should not be used as a method to determine indigeneity. Antionette publicly shared this feedback with the group, and along with an apology, her response included, “That was never my intent, but again we are talking about impact over intent.”
This action modelled the need to center impact over intention, and was a particularly impactful demonstration of not assuming as a ‘leader’ your intentions are assumed and allow leeway, but rather doubling down on the importance of ensuring you are holding yourself equally accountable as any other person in the space. It also provided a moment of recognition that this practice is not solely something to be done ‘out there’, where we need to be vigilant about equity issues with others, but also as a deeply personal, individual, moment-by-moment practice. That piece of feedback could have been read, and used to ensure a similar comment was not made in the future, but rather there was impressive respect gained from the vulnerability of using it to apologize and publicly recognize an inappropriate comment.
The NYC Immersive also happened to fall during the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots. The organizers wanted to recognize the importance of this event for the local community where we were meeting, and began one morning with a moment to share the history and significance of the anniversary. In leading this, Learning and Education Manager Hilary Sedovic began by recognising as a straight cisgender woman it was, “not my story to tell, and I’d like to offer to the room if someone else wants to tell this story”. This action modelled centering lived experience. It was significant because it demonstrated even if one might ‘know’ more from an academic or researched perspective, it made space for the voice of lived experience to speak first (for example, somebody shared the often untold and incredible story of Stormé DeLarverie). Coming from an academic context, I often encounter articulate and compelling work about the histories and contemporary impacts of injustices. Scholars, journalists and activists can do excellent work around this, but if not centering lived experience, the work is missing something essential and perhaps also perpetuating inequity. Systemically, using the ‘knowledge’ of other people’s stories can serve to increase one’s own recognition and power, rather than supporting or empowering the people affected.
In my own work I have had the experience of ‘knowing’ the content in the room, but being aware that I was not the person with lived experience. I have found it difficult to navigate how to honour lived experience while leading a workshops or discussions and have previously chosen to avoid certain topics, afraid that I could not facilitate the content. Hilary’s example not only offered a concrete tool to use in group experiences, it also modelled and provided a direct experience of the equity principle of centering lived experience and expertise. In highlighting how this work is a process of reflection and learning, Hilary shared her own reflections on the event. In striving to be a Design Ally, she reported experiencing an internal conflict of how she may have “unexpectedly put people on the spot” by not forewarning the group she was going to share about the Stonewall anniversary. She shared that in the future she would want to allow more time for people to consider sharing, and provide an opportunity to collect stories privately as well, to make a more welcoming space to share lived expertise.
Lastly, over the course of the three days together there were several small but impactful moments focused on the use of language and setting norms. Taking the time to meaningfully discuss what might seem small points, such as the use of certain phrasing, resulted in prepared content needing to be cut. This included changing language such as using the term “community of focus” rather than “target community” and “being provoked” rather than “being triggered”. The group spent time trying to understand how to make space for different opinions. A participant voiced their discomfort in being asked to respect different opinions, when those opinions may be rooted in other people’s oppression. When we ask people to step into personal and vulnerable spaces, how do we make that space safe for all participants? Is that possible? What does it mean to ask another person to offer respect or even to ask for people to allow a difference in opinion?
In our Immersive this question was ultimately left unresolved. I appreciate we did not rush to ‘fix’ but recognized in this context it was unable to be resolved, yet still important to address and consider in future contexts. While unfortunate to miss out on prepared content, this action magnified how easily we can slip into compromising our behaviour and/or language in the process of ‘achieving’ an end goal. Instead the choice was made to stop and address these matters, even if it decelerates planned progress.
Equity practice is an emerging field within design, as well as many other disciplines. There is a need to share the work in a way that is accessible and understandable while maintaining the serious challenge of what it means to activate and maintain equity work in practice. This balance can be hard to establish. There is a need to invite people in, while also not diluting the complexity of the work. As the field builds, some of the path that has been modeled by Creative Reaction Lab includes the willingness to be vulnerable as a leader and admit fault in sensitive issues, understanding centering lived experience is a complex process that goes against established norms of learning and expertise, and the value in making space to veer away from the project objectives to maintain accountability and standards of practice.
Kate McEntee is a social design researcher. She is currently a PhD candidate in the WonderLab at Monash University department of Art Design and Architecture (MADA) and Teaching Associate. Her research investigates how we might approach human-centred design with greater awareness of and responsibility for identity, power and systemic inequity.
