Was That A Microaggression?
If you are not an expert in spotting a “microagression,” you are not alone. This article and its companion articles, we hope, will transform you from a microaggression newbie into a microaggression maven. Buckle up.
The concept of “microaggression” was first theorized by Dr. Chester Middlebrook Pierce, a prominent Black American psychiatrist, and his colleagues in 1969. [1] This period in American history was burdened with “macroaggressions,” a term that Dr. Pierce used to describe cross-burnings, lynching, beatings and other “gross, dramatic, [and] obvious” manifestations of racism against Black Americans. However, Dr. Pierce also understood that more subtle—and more frequently occurring—manifestations of “proracist behavior” existed. Dr. Pierce called these manifestations “microaggressions,” which he and his colleagues defined as “subtle, stunning, often automatic, and non-verbal exchanges which are ‘put downs’ of blacks.” [2]
Developments in the Definition of Racial Microaggression
Since the term “microaggression” was coined, several psychologists and others have elaborated on the phenomenon. One of the most popular contemporary formulations of “microaggressions,” developed by Dr. Derald Wing Sue and others, defines microaggressions as “brief and commonplace verbal, behavioral, or environmental indignities that communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative racial slights and insults toward people of color.”[3]
Dr. Sue and others further developed microaggression research by describing the following three forms of microaggressions:
- Microinsults:Communications that convey rudeness and insensitivity and demean a person’s racial identity.
- Microinvalidation: Communications that exclude, negate or nullify the psychological thoughts, feelings, or experiential reality of a person of color.
- Microassaults: An explicit racial derogation characterized primarily by a verbal or nonverbal attack meant to hurt the intended victim through name-calling, avoidant behavior, or purposeful discriminatory actions.
For The Avoidance Of Doubt
To be sure, microaggressions can be based on factors other than race, such as one’s ethnicity, gender, transgender status, sexual orientation, disability, weight, religion and socioeconomic status. Microaggressions may also be based one’s bi-racial or multi-racial identity.
Illustrative Examples
To help gain a better understanding of microaggression, below are a few illustrative examples of racial microaggressions in the Big Law context, using a hypothetical Big Law firm (the “Firm”).
| Example | Explanation |
| The Firm’s [web site/ external branding / internal branding] excludes any depiction of Black attorneys working at the firm, when there are several Black attorneys, including partners, at the firm.
| · This example conveys the message that Black attorneys are not welcome at the Big Law firm and that Black attorneys do not exist. · In terms of microaggression theory, this stylized example is an example of environmental microinvalidation. |
| A Big Law Firm partner says, to a Black staff member, that America is not racist because a Black president was elected twice. | · This example suggests that America is cleansed of its racist past, which spanned centuries, including approximately 256 years of slavery, because of two non-unanimous votes. · In terms of microaggression theory, this stylized example is an example of a verbal microinvalidation. |
| A Big Law partner tells a Black associate to eat more fried chicken to gain weight. | · This example promotes a racial stereotype (that Blacks eat fried chicken), fails to recognize that fried chicken is associated with negative portrayals of blacks, and suggests that the associate’s weight is not welcome. · In terms of microaggression theory, this stylized example is an example of a verbal microinsult. |
We hope you found this post informative! If you are interested in examples outside of the Big Law context, there are several resources that will help you. For example microaggresions.com has an entire collection of microaggressions.
Sources:
- Ezra Griffith, Race and Excellence: My Dialogue with Chester Pierce 138, 163 (1st ed. 1998); see also The Chester M. Pierce, MD Division of Global Psychiatry, About Us Page (available at http://www.mghglobalpsychiatry.org/chesterpierce.php).
- Chester M. Pierce, Jean V. Carew, Diane Pierce-Gonzalez, and Deborah Wills. “An Experiment in Racism: TV Commercials” Education and Urban Society 10.1 (1977): 61-87
- Sue, Derald Wing, Christina M. Capodilupo, Gina C. Torino, Jennifer M. Bucceri, Aisha M. B. Holder, Kevin L. Nadal, and Marta Esquilin. “Racial Microaggressions in Everyday Life.” American Psychologist 62.4 (2007): 271-286
- Pierce, C. M. (1969). Is bigotry the basis of the medical problems of the ghetto? In J. C. Norman (Ed.), Medicine in the ghetto (pp. 301–312). New York: Meredith
- Chester Pierce, a professor of psychiatry and education at Harvard, first introduced microaggressions in 1969 in referring to incessant “offensive mechanisms” aimed at Blacks on a daily basis and “which are designed to reduce, dilute, atomize, and encase the hapless into his ‘place.’ The incessant lesson the black must hear is that he is insignificant and irrelevant” (Pierce, 1969, p.303)
- Pierce introduces the concept of microaggressions in 1969 in Chester Pierce, Is Bigotry the Basis of The Medical Problem of the Ghetto? in MEDICINE IN THE GHETTO 301, 301–14 (John C. Norman ed., Appleton-Century-Crofts Press 1969).
- Pierce, C. M. (1970). Offensive mechanisms. In F. B. Barbour (Ed.), The black ’70’s (pp. 265–282). Boston: Porter Sargent.
https://www.apa.org/monitor/2009/02/microaggression
https://hbr.org/2020/07/when-and-how-to-respond-to-microaggressions
https://www.cct.org/2016/10/how-microaggressions-keep-hurting-and-how-to-interrupt/
https://www.vox.com/2015/2/16/8031073/what-are-microaggressions
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12552-017-9214-0
https://www.nas.org/academic-questions/30/1/the_pseudo_science_of_microaggressions
https://nature.berkeley.edu/garbelottoat/wp-content/uploads/sue2008.pdf
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/03/smarter-living/how-to-respond-to-microaggressions.html
https://library.cod.edu/antiracism/microaggressions
OMITTED LANGUAGE:
In one of Dr. Pierce’s studies involving microaggressions, [4] he and his colleagues analyzed the role played by television commercials in reinforcing and promoting racist attitudes and behaviors. Dr. Pierce’s study theorized that television commercials contained a plethora of microaggressions against Black Americans, such as Black Americans (i) having less command of technology, (ii) having less command of space, (iii) never initiating or controlling actions, situations or events, (iv) having fewer positive contacts with each other and (v) having less involvement in family life.
[1] Dr. Pierce was a Black American psychiatrist who, among other things, served as a Commander in the U.S. Navy, was a professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, a professor of education at Harvard University and a member of the faculty of the Harvard School of Public Health. Dr. Pierce devoted a significant part of his life to studying extreme environments and how Black Americans cope with racism. See Ezra Griffith, Race and Excellence: My Dialogue with Chester Pierce 138, 163 (1st ed. 1998); see also The Chester M. Pierce, MD Division of Global Psychiatry, About Us Page (available at http://www.mghglobalpsychiatry.org/chesterpierce.php).
[2] Chester M. Pierce, Jean V. Carew, Diane Pierce-Gonzalez & Deborah Wills, An Experiment in Racism: TV Commercials, 10(1) Education and Urban Society 65 (1977). In this paper, the authors define racism as a mental and public health illness in which skin color determines whether or not one is expected to operate from an inferior or superior vantage point, resulting in a situation where “[Black Americans and white Americans] are proracist, in that that they permit, insist, encourage, and sustain that the black will be dependent and deferential (in regard to time, space, energy, mobility) in all interpersonal interactions.”
[3] Derald Wing Sue, Christina M. Capodilupo, Gina C. Torino, Jennifer M. Bucceri, Aisha M. B. Holder, Kevin L. Nadal & Marta Esquilin, Racial Microaggressions in Everyday Life: Implications for Clinical Practice, 62(4) American Psychologist 271-286 (2007).
[4] Chester M. Pierce, Jean V. Carew, Diane Pierce-Gonzalez, and Deborah Wills. “An Experiment in Racism: TV Commercials” Education and Urban Society 10.1 (1977): 61-87. In this paper, the authors define racism as a mental and public health illness in which skin color determines whether or not one is expected to operate from an inferior or superior vantage point, resulting in a situation where “[Black Americans and white Americans] are proracist, in that that they permit, insist, encourage, and sustain that the black will be dependent and deferential (in regard to time, space, energy, mobility) in all interpersonal interactions.”
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