Critical Reflection 5: Bringing Differences Together for One Shared Reality

Oppression is a widespread reality for various groups in society, but theorists struggle with not only a definition for the term, but also how being oppressed shapes a human being and the way they view the world. For example, Iris Marion Young first begins defining oppression by identifying an array of groups that may encounter oppressed experiences, and declares that “all oppressed people suffer some inhibiton of their ability to develop and exercise their capacities and express their needs, thoughts, and feelings. In that abstract sense all oppressed people face a common condition. Beyond that, in any more specific sense, it is not possible to define a single set of criteria to describe the condition of oppression…” (Young 50). Instead of attempting to discover a common definiton to label all oppressed groups with, Young categorizes oppression into five categories: exploitation, marginalization, powerlessness, cultural imperialism, and violence to measure and accurately explain the oppression each group faces (Young 50). Similarly, Ada Isasi-Diaz also declares the same five categories to define oppression, but, unlike Young, she mentions the oppressed in the sense of their conscious awareness of their oppression and “who struggle for their liberation” from it (Isasi-Diaz 46). Furthermore, Isasi-Diaz explains her association with being both oppressed and impoverished in her daily life, because as a middle class Latina, she has both faced economic exploitation and must fight for those who are impoverished even though it may bring down her status of adequate poverishment (Isasi-Diaz 47).

Isasi-Diaz continues into the concept of lo cotidiano, which can be interpreted as “the immediate space — -time and place — -of daily life, the first horizon, of our experiences…it’s where we first meet and relate to our material world…the way in which we relate to our reality… and how we understand and evaluate our relationships with reality…” (Isasi-Diaz 48). Lo cotidiano can enhance critical consciousness; if one can understand how an oppressed person sees the world based on their history, then self-reflection and identification of societal problems is more effective than basing one’s critical consciousness on statistics or observations of a particular population. At the Spahr Center, my community partner this semester, utilizing lo cotidiano can be useful in understanding the lives of the clients we assist. A man once approached our mobile site who appeared weathered and homeless, as he had tied several bags and other personal belongings onto his bike. He asked for some supplies and was very friendly and voiced his gratitude for the mobile site. We found out later on that he was a regular at the site, and his pattern of appearance, receiving supplies, and expressing gratitude can attribute to his economic status and marginalization as a homeless person. At my community partner, there are other strategies I can use to observe lo cotidiano among the clients that come to the Spahr Center. Isasi-Diaz refers to lo cotidiano as the “family relationships and to our friendships; to the way we relate to our neighbors and to our different communities; to our experience of power and powerlessness…” (Isasi-Diaz 49). At my community partner, imagining the perspectives of the clients and relating theirs to mine in the ways in which we experience reality will grow my critical consciousness and make me evaluate the comparisons and contrasts of our communities. Furthermore, another way to utilize lo cotidiano is to use the diverse realities that the clients and I experience and create social structures that are based on shared meanings of life (Isasi-Diaz 50). The Spahr Center clients and I may find that, despite all of our differences, we want the same things out of life and without lo cotidiano, we may never know that.