University of Wisconsin-Madison senior Claire Zhuang was walking along State Street late one night when she encountered a couple of men who called out to her, trying to get her attention. Homeward bound after a long day, she was not interested in their advances.
“I think they were a bit intoxicated … I walked past them and I didn’t respond and all of a sudden one of the guys, he gets mad, and he says, ‘Hey, I bet your name is ‘Ling Ching,’ or something like that,’” Zhuang recalled. “I didn’t even know how to respond.”
Though she didn’t reply that night, partly out of a sense of self-preservation, Zhuang said she wishes she had.
“It just felt like an unnecessary assumption about what my name was and also my ethnicity,” Zhuang, whose ethnic identity is Chinese American, said.
It was this instance, coupled with the experiences of minority students around her, that spurred her to create “I, too, am UW-Madison,” an online photography project launched Monday, with the intent of opening up a dialogue about race and discrimination.
Modeled after a Harvard College campaign with a similar title, Zhuang said her project aims to illuminate the experiences of students of color on UW-Madison’s campus, highlighting stereotypes and assumptions these individuals frequently face.
With support from the Asian American Student Union, Zhuang spent the week before spring break photographing students holding a whiteboard depicting a message related to a time they felt racially stereotyped. She also accepted submissions from those who were unable to attend the photo shoot but wished to participate in the project.
In light of the development of UW-Madison’s new diversity plan, Associated Students of Madison Chair David Gardner said Zhuang’s project is critical in illustrating the experiences of minority students on campus and helping to create awareness about not only blatantly racist incidents, but also “microagression.”
“[Microagressions] are the subtle comments, something like ‘Where are you really from?’ implying that your home is not your home,” Gardner said.
Zhuang said she plans to further collaborate with ASM and its Diversity Committee as her project expands.
For more information, visit www.itooamuwmadison.tumblr.com.
