Anti-oppression workshop gets students thinking
VERONICA CARR STAFF
PHOTO: VERONICA CARR
An anti-oppression workshop sponsored by the Recycling and Environmental Group, the Womyn’s Centre and the UMSU took place on Friday, Oct. 13. The workshop was held to aid and inform students about oppression issues on campus and elsewhere.
The workshop was planned by Beau Burton, a third-year labor studies student and member of the Recycling and Environmental Group and Kim Parry, a co-ordinator for the Womyn’s Centre and a fourth-year women’s studies student.
“I [helped] organize this workshop because at the U of M there is a lot of visible oppression that people don’t really see as forms of oppression and I felt that it was a good idea to have a workshop that opened people up to the concept,” comments Burton. “Even if people just walk away with that idea, that one extra thought, we’ve helped plant a seed of change.”
Mike Tutthill, the formal provincial chair of the Canadian Federaion of Students, and an international development and religion student at the University of Winnipeg facilitated the event.
Approximately 25 people attended the meeting, including U of W students, U of M students, and a former U of M student still involved with the university.
The term “oppression” is primarily used to describe how certain groups are “kept down” by unjust uses of force, authority and/or societal norms.
Throughout the three-hour workshop, various discussions and activities took place to address oppression from both a global and personal standpoint. Issues like racism, sexism, homophobia, classism and ableism were explored.
Tutthill examined “the triangle of oppression” during the workshop, which demonstrated how something is properly classified as oppressive or not. The triangle represents the three different areas of oppression: systemic/institutional, ideology, and action.
Another activity called “the flower power” was observed. In this exercise a large flower was drawn on the board, each petal representing the “most powerful” of each category. The categories included sex, religion, race, age, and sexual orientation among others. After discussion the class came to consensus that a straight, white, 35- to 50-year-old Christian or Protestant male who speaks English, has a university education, lives in an urban Anglo-American or Europe country and is a fully able individual would have the most power in this world.
“Basically look at your prime minister,” commented Tutthill.
Kelly Ross, a third-year women’s studies student at the U of W said she would like to use the tools she developed to help her in the coordinator position at the U of W Womyn’s Centre. She says that “Although the workshop was good, I didn’t quite feel challenged enough, and that may just be because I already knew a lot of it.”
“I think it went really well, it was well-attended and people were really into it — even Mike [Tutthill] said that he usually doesn’t get such a compliant group and people are usually more resistant to the idea. So maybe we aren’t so bad that the U of M,” Parry remarked.
