By Kathy Bryan
There is no need for a preamble this month. During the month of June, Über Moms Paused for a Cause, and the book club members voted to read White Fragility: Why is it so Hard for White People to Talk about Racism by Robin Diangelo.
Robin Diangelo is a white woman and has a PhD in Multicultural Education; her area of research is “Whiteness Studies and Critical Discourse Analysis, tracing how whiteness is reproduced in everyday narratives” (https://robindiangelo.com/about-me/), and her book White Fragility came out in 2018. Her work and experiences have a far longer history than that. In White Fragility she looks at white fragility, a term she coined, and its dynamics, and then looks at “how we might build our capacity in the on-going work towards racial justice.” https://robindiangelo.com/publications/. This book provided us with our most insightful, thought-provoking, challenging read to date. And it is also one of the rare books I will be telling everyone I know to read.
We decided to divide into small groups to discuss the book, as we felt it was vital that we all had an opportunity to speak and to listen. We were, again, delighted with the turnout. We would like to thank everyone for attending and also for being so patient whilst we addressed some technical issues. These unfortunately meant that our discussions were delayed in starting. It was testament to the book and to the readers that our meeting went on long past its scheduled end. Despite a late finish, we were only able to scratch the surface of what the book had to offer and what we took away from it. In hindsight, we were being overambitious hoping to talk about the entire book in one sitting; even with a gremlin-free start it would not have been possible to do so without selling the book and our members very very short. So we will look to arrange a follow up meeting. Read next month’s book club article for details of when, as August is already, for many, fully booked. Please note also that if you were unable to attend the meeting on 9th July, and would like to join the followup, you’re more than welcome to. All this said, it’s still fair to say that everyone at the meeting got something from the book. We have all been made to look at ourselves, our families and friends, our community, our world, and our understanding of these and our history, education, and that of everyone. Whilst it is a book that looks primarily at the United States, it is not a book only for Americans, and everybody can get something from it. So please do read it, and join us later in the year to look at it again!
Book Club going forward:
We are planning that once a quarter we will have an open book club meeting and discuss a book that addresses a specific topic. The next open meeting will be in October. If you have an idea for a topic or indeed a specific book to suggest please contact me at kathybryan@ubermoms.de .
Next month’s book:
A Long Petal of the Sea by Isabel Allende
Kathy Bryan
Kathy Bryan is a stay at home mum with 15 years experience of raising three independent, loving, fun-filled, maddening children. Prior to moving to a village south of Munich, she lived with her family in the middle of England. Being a firm believer that being a stay at home mum does not mean you have to forget who you are, she was always busy in the village, both as a Governor at the school and helping organise village fetes amongst other things. Since arriving in Germany and getting settled here Kathy joined Über Moms and is an active member of the Runners Group and recently started Über Moms very own book club. When not chasing children to do homework or running the highways and byways around her village Kathy can be found sewing patchwork and working out ways to hide “another quilt” in the house.