Is This Racist
Examples
“Yo, Is This Racist?” has run for over a thousand episodes, so it’s hard to choose one example. However, hosts Andrew Ti and Tawny Newsome explained how (and why) their podcast works in an interview with Chicago’s WBEZ radio, found here (Links to an external site.). (Unfortunately, a transcript is not available; please contact me if you need one.)
Other podcasts and advice columnists tackle some of the same issues. Danny Lavery, writing as Dear Prudence for Slate.com, runs a podcast with a different guest co-host each week. Usually the co-hosts represent different identity positions from Danny’s (as a White trans man), enabling a nuanced discussion of fraught situations. Here he and guest Aya de Léon, a Black author and activist, discuss a letter from a reader who is a lesbian but plans to never come out because of various factors in her home country. https://slate.com/human-interest/2019/07/never-coming-out-of-closet-dear-prudence-advice.html (Links to an external site.) Start at Minute 50, duration 17 mins. (Unfortunately, a transcript is not available; please contact me if you need one. You can also check out Dear Prudence’s written columns for other examples; he handles a lot of questions about gender and sexuality in particular.)
Task
For this assignment, you should share some of your best ideas from your Diary of Systemic Injustices assignment with your team. What instances of injustice did you analyze that really felt interesting or poignant to you? Is there one that seems ambiguous, or not easily resolved without a conversation to explore it more fully? Were there any that you still feel uneasy about, like maybe you don’t fully understand it yet and could benefit from others’ perspectives?
“Meet” as a group (in whatever way best suits everyone) to discuss possibilities. Were there two situations that were closely related you could compare? Or is there one that stands out as something you want to address as a team? You will want to start by selecting a scenario and also a concept. You can ask “is this racist?” but you might also choose another concept to explore. For example, sexism, religious discrimination, xenophobia, transphobia, orientalism, classism, or other forms of bias that are connected to structures of power are all viable options. Any of our course concepts are fair game–a “yo, is this intersectional?” entry could yield something really interesting.
As you begin to plan how your podcast will go, keep in mind that you will not only be expected to apply your chosen concept to the situation you choose, but as you discuss, you should also be honing your definition or understanding of the concept itself. Part of what makes the podcast “Yo, is this Racist?” compelling is that its producers and listeners are constantly using their application of the theories about racism to reassess what racism is, based on how it is manifested.
As you begin to produce the podcast, you will want to identify how best to present the situation you have chosen, and script out how opinions about it will be expressed. That could be just a bulleted list of topics to cover, or a full script; it’s up to you to determine what works best for your group. Remember that this is a dialogue, and that the conversation should evolve as you delve into your subject. You can frame the discussion either as a conversational analysis of the situation, a discussion about differing opinions on the same situation, or as a conversation about what the person or people (or systems) involved did or should have done.
IF YOU ARE DOING THIS AS A WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT RATHER THAN AUDIO OR VIDEO:
The written option will be graded by the same criteria listed below, but the measure of “production quality” will be slightly different. The assignment should be of the same length and substance of the podcast described above, but should be reconceived as a lengthy column or feature in a magazine. If you are working as a team, you might use as your models conversations hosted by magazines between intellectuals which are then transcribed into a column. Usually this kind of column has pull quotes and pictures for visual interest, and I would encourage you to incorporate that into your blog post as well. If you are doing the written assignment solo, it will likely look more like a lengthy op-ed about a particular event or situation. If you have concerns that your idea for this alternative assignment will not meet the expectations of your instructors, please reach out so that they might be addressed. If you have a proposal for a slightly different way to approach this assignment (like a documentary short film, something like that) please discuss it first with me and your TA so we can set alternative criteria and ensure it meets the goals of this assignment.
Most people talk at about 100-200 words per minute, so to reach equivalency with a 10-12 min podcast, let’s say this written option needs to have a minimum of 1500 words.
Submission
Your podcast must be submitted on your section’s class blog.
- For audio, as an mp3, with the full transcript in the post
- For video, embed from YouTube or Zoom
- For written, post the text, images, and pull quotes directly into the blog. If a pair of you wrote it together, make sure it’s clear who’s “speaking” when. You may want to include some images and/or audio or visual clips as well. See ODEE’s U.OSU support documentation (Links to an external site.)for help embedding files. For audio and video, the transcript should be part of the blog post, preferably under a “read more” cut, rather than uploaded as a file. One group member should make the post, and the names of all members should be clearly listed in the post.
Evaluation
This assignment will be given a group grade, meaning every member of your assigned group will receive the same grade based on the quality of the final product. They will be assessed according to the following criteria (point totals out of 150):
- To what degree does the podcast identify an interesting and useful situation to analyze? (20)
- To what degree does the podcast aptly identify concepts and key issues about the forms of bias and structural injustice relevant to the situation? (20)
- To what degree does the analysis insightfully apply approaches learned in this class? (45)
- To what degree is the analysis presented interesting, nuanced, and thought-provoking? (45)
- To what degree is the production quality serviceable for the purposes of this assignment? (20)

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