Unit 3: Confronting Systemic Anti-Black Racism in Canada

“Any critical engagement with racism requires us to understand the tyranny of the universal. For most of our history, the very category “human” has not embraced Black people and people of color. Its abstractness has been colored white and gendered male…If indeed all lives mattered, we would not need to emphatically proclaim Black Lives Matter.”

– Angela Davis

Canadians widely believe  their country to be free of racism. In fact, “a 2019 survey indicates nearly half of Canadians believe discrimination against Black people is “no longer a problem” – even as 83% of Black people in Canada say they are treated unfairly at least some of the time” (DasGupta, Shandal, and Shadd, 2020). Countering the mythical Canadian narrative of diversity and inclusivity this unit explores the pervasive reality of anti-Black racism in Canada, specifically systemic anti-Black racism in the domains of healthcare and policing. Next the unit critically examine imposed whiteness and the negative impacts of the centring of white perspectives.

Topics to be explored

• A lack of access to healthcare and related negative health outcomes (e.g. physical and mental).
• Disparities in Black reproductive and maternal health.
• Racial profiling of Black communities and bias against Black people within the Canadian criminal justice system.
• The adultification bias and its consequences for Black youth, particularly Black young women.
• Misogynoir and the implication for Black women.
• Imposed whiteness–from the ‘white gaze’, white saviourism to internalized white supremacy.