Shawna Racino, Post 1

My name is Shawna Racino. I am a Psychology and Women’s Studies Major at SUNY Fredonia. I would say that my ethnic heritage is Polish. Though I was not not born in Poland, nor do I speak polish, a lot of my family’s traditions and way of living derives from the Polish heritage. For example, my mother makes homemade pierogis every Christmas and Easter and my Papa speaks fluent Polish (which is extremely hard for me to understand when he gets upset about somethings and just rambles on). If someone was to ask me what my race was, that would be a tricky question to answer. I don’t really like to consider race as black or white. I would respond that I am part of the “human race”. Everyone under one group. I first became aware of ethnicity/race in the early years of high school. I was born and raised in Fredonia, which is a predominantly white community. There were only two African American kids that went to my school (not completely African American, they had at least one white parent), and it was clear by the way many of the students treated them, that they were not seen as equals to their white peers. Many of the students would make comments about these African American students. Always pointing out the color of there skin. Kids in my school used extremely racists comments all the time, as if it was okay. I never understood why/how my peers ever thought that making fun of a different race was okay?? These students would usually laugh off the negative comments that the white students made; but I could tell that these comments really hurt these students. And I believe that maybe these students didn't say anything because they thought they couldn't stop the negative comments. One of the African American students used to be my neighbor, (before my family moved) and him and I were really good friends and I was frustrated that these negative comments were being addressed towards such an amazing person. I was never really taught much about ethnicity and race growing up. My Papa is extremely racist and makes negative comments about pretty much every ethnic group there is. It really irritates me how ignorant he is, but I can’t change his ways. He grew up in a completely different time than I did, and has completely different views of the world; there is no way I could change the way he thinks now. Anytime he makes a racists comment, I just completely ignore it. In a lot of psychology books that I have read they state that racism is taught through our relatives and how they act toward another race. I am so glad that anything my papa said never effected the rest of the family. No one else agrees with his ways. As I have said, my school was mostly a white school and so were the teachers that taught there. So we were never taught much about ethnicity, race or diversity because my school lived in it’s own bubble that thought those issue didn’t need to be address. My views of ethnicity has changed since I have gone to college. I am constantly in the Center for Multicultural Affairs office on campus and I get exposed to more ethnicities/races than I ever have in my high school. I really like the opportunities that the CMA has offered me. I meet so many different people from so many different backgrounds and I love them all. I am glad I out to expand my horizons after high school.

I'm really in the mood for some pierogis now!