Departmental D&I activities have continued through the pandemic. We have now had three D&I Grand Rounds so far this year with more to come in 2021. Back by popular demand, Ada Gregory will be giving round 2 of her Bystander Intervention lecture to help those of us act when our friends, students, and colleagues are confronted with racism, sexism, homophobia, etc. This is one of the most difficult skills to learn, and it takes a great deal of courage, so this should be great session.
A group of six intrepid residents is embarking on a large project to look at health disparities in neurology. More details will come as the project unfolds, but it’s important to know that this topic is being addressed within our department. This project fits within this year’s theme of “Equity” as it will tackle the systemic inequities in neurological care.
The Underrepresented in Neurology Teleshadowing program, under the direction of Victoria Stabile, remains very popular. We are working through a long wait list of students to give them all the opportunity to participate in the program, introducing college students to the marvelous career choice of neurologist. Thank you to the faculty and APPs who have volunteered to host students in their telehealth clinics!
The School of Medicine Moments to Movements Campaign continues. Four task forces with different target populations (staff, students, faculty, and post-docs/grad students) have been working for the past 5 months to develop action plans to address systemic racism at Duke. Plans were due last week, so we will await the reports from these groups as they become available. As residents and fellows are not part of the School of Medicine, there was no task force to address GME concerns, specifically. However, these reports will include GME, particularly as they are primary teachers for the med students, and the GME office is working toward similar reforms to address GME trainee concerns.
A brief reminder as we’ve covered this subject before: the holidays are once again upon us, and I encourage everyone to keep in mind that the department is home to Christians, agnostics, atheists, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims, and Jains (probably others as well, but these were documented on our census this spring). Not everyone is celebrating the same holidays.
Along these lines, here is a link to help with your meeting planning for next year. I know it’s hard to remember to check, but you can have the holidays imported onto your calendar so you can choose not to schedule meetings during religious holidays.
If you weren’t looking, you probably missed this, but the Associated Press changed its convention a few months ago so that the word “Black” as applied to the racial group, will now be capitalized. The AP indicated that they were still debating what to do with “White,” and I have not heard that a final decision has been made yet. They stated that they didn’t want to capitalize white because white supremacists were in favor of it. This link explains their arguments. https://apnews.com/article/9105661462. Shortly thereafter, journals, such as Neurology and the associated AAN publications not only followed suit, but opted to capitalize “White,” as well This might seem like a really minor discussion, but as we know, language matters, and the discussion of these issues feeds into a broader conversation about how race is conceptualized. Here’s a good discussion of the issues.
My personal opinion is that White ought to be capitalized. This quote from The Center for The Study of Social Policy captures my view reasonably well:
To not name ‘White’ as a race is, in fact, an anti-Black act which frames Whiteness as both neutral and the standard … We believe that it is important to call attention to White as a race as a way to understand and give voice to how Whiteness functions in our social and political institutions and our communities. Moreover, the detachment of ‘White’ as a proper noun allows White people to sit out of conversations about race and removes accountability from White people’s and White institutions’ involvement in racism.
Safe and Happy Holidays!
Andrew