By Terresa Moses
Racism Untaught is an educational framework developed to critically analyze “racialized” design and create anti-racist design approaches. The framework has been crafted into a tool kit that uses an intentionally revised design research model to investigate the design of societal oppression. The tool kit not only investigates elements of racism, but has now been expanded to examine elements of sexism and ableism, with the goal to offer more elements of oppression for critical analysis. This article investigates the first step of the Racism Untaught tool kit using the “strong Black woman” stereotype as the design challenge. I critically analyze how the trope has been designed within our societal normalities. I argue that this intersectional stereotype hinders Black women from contributing to society in a healthy and productive way due to the stress and pressure caused by this externally and internally racialized and misogynistic trope.
