Episode # 133

The Inner Work of Racial Justice, with Rhonda McGee

Last week’s episode was all about QAnon and how conspiracy theories can divide us as a nation. One of the things we think we can do to bridge the divide is bring mindfulness and skills around living with mindfulness into conversations about race, racism, identity, and beliefs - and to do that, we got to speak with an incredible law professor named Rhonda McGee.

In speaking with Rhonda, we learned not only about the role of law in helping - and hurting - racial divides, but we also discussed the role of mindfulness in helping people come into a grounded space to do this work in the first place. Once we added in her own brand of racial awareness called ColorInsight, we left this conversation with not only some reframed concepts but a deeper understanding of why we all need to be doing this work.

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“I felt some responsibility as a law professor to help give my students better than I got to help train lawyers who can do better than lawyers in the past, around actually helping be vehicles for social transformation, as opposed to just restoring and recreating the hierarchy. So, that's part of why I do what I do.”
Rhonda McGee

What to listen for:

How her background in law drew her into mindfulness - this part will blow your mind
For those who are new to mindfulness and new to meditation, Professor McGee leading us through an actual few minutes of meditation!
ColorInsight and what it means to hold race in our bodies
How we can all navigate criticism - from Black people about catering to Whiteness, from White people about being racist for naming White as a race - in a more mindful way

About Rhonda: RHONDA V. MAGEE is a professor of law at the University of San Francisco. Also trained in sociology and mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR), she is a highly practiced facilitator of trauma-sensitive, restorative MBSR interventions for lawyers and law students, and for minimizing the effects of social-identity-based bias. Magee has been a visiting scholar at the Center for the Study of Law and Society and a visiting professor of law at the University of California, Berkeley.

Where to pre-order Dear White Women: Let’s Get (Un)comfortable Talking About Racism: https://thecollectivebook.studio/dear-white-women

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