Jordan West is working to make students feel uncomfortable.

As the graduate assistant for the six-week Conversations About Race and Ethnicity sessions in the Office of Multicultural Affairs, West said she is bringing in her experience to open the floor for critical thinking on race and ethnicity.

“If we’re ever going to make changes truly on a global level — even here at the institution at Syracuse — we have to be able to be comfortable being uncomfortable,” she said.

West has experienced this “comfort” growing up in a diverse home — her mother is white and Jewish and her father is African American and Baptist. As a result, issues related to race and ethnicity are deeply rooted, even from her early years when she said she was pressured to choose just one identity.

Having grown up in this environment, West finds it important to keep up with the active social climate, but feels her primary role is offering a safer space for mutual connection through dialogue.

West said this dialogue is important not only in helping students coexist, but also in tackling controversial topics such as “white privilege.”

“I don’t know that there’s a solution to the fact white privilege exists because we can’t erase some of history,” she said. “I think it really starts with people having conversations and reflection.”

West witnessed many instances of racial inequality during her time as an undergraduate student at the University of Maryland, College Park. She recalled serving as a key witness in a case where two students were beaten badly by police officers and said this experience shattered her preconceived notions that police were always well-intentioned.

Now, she hopes other students will share their own stories about social and racial injustices, so the Syracuse University community can experience the true benefits of celebrating diversity.

“I genuinely think that if we say we can have a diverse campus, a diverse world, a diverse state, a diverse area or community, then it says we have a lot of people here, we have a lot of difference happening,” West said. “I would push that conversation a little bit further in saying, ‘But are we talking with one another?’”

Published on November 5, 2014 at 12:01 am

Contact Jesse: jlnich02@syr.edu