Our Philosophy

Cambridge Diversity Consulting believes that diversity training, as it is traditionally implemented, can be dramatically improved. Much of the time, diversity training in schools and in the workplace aims to produce an appreciation for difference — different cultures, different foods, different beliefs. While this is important, we must do more. In order to move forward into greater understanding, we find three major areas for improvement:

1. We must move away from approaches that are too simple and even condescending. Cultures and behaviors are extremely complex. They cannot be reduced to simple stereotypes.  In addition, no one person can represent or speak for an entire group of people. We must appreciate complexity by understanding connections between histories, cultures, and motivations rather than by getting to know a country’s cuisine. Sensitivity cannot be forged in an afternoon by telling people to be more sensitive, but the foundation for thinking more globally and holistically will allow people to become truly sensitive through increased understanding. 

2. We cannot ignore painful histories as if they never happened. When we think about categories of difference, we must always consider the power dynamics of racial and ethnic categories in history, in law, in immigration policies, etc. Even young children can learn about the reality of history in a responsible way. In schools, organizations, and businesses, we have a tendency to avoid talking about power or politics for fear of fomenting conflict. The opposite is true; we must consider power and political processes in our places of work and learning so that we may gain true understanding, cooperation, and productive engagement.

3. Traditional diversity training does not question common conceptions about race and ethnicity. We move beyond these common (mis)conceptions by teaching about the latest anthropological and psychological theories in a fun and interesting way. We get people to question their most basic beliefs about race and ethnicity and therefore forge powerful new understandings. These new understandings bring people of all backgrounds together in a way that simply telling people to respect one another does not.

We propose an alternative model, based on years of researching the anthropology and psychology of race and ethnicity. We believe that in taking racial groups as biologically natural, many of us reproduce myths about race and diversity.  These myths then inform our interactions, our policies, and our thinking. Social scientists like anthropologists, sociologists, psychologists, and economists often see through these myths but have yet to make a big impact on thinking outside of university and research institutions. Cambridge Diversity Consulting integrates insights from all these disciplines and brings them into arenas in which so many of us live, work, and teach.  We base our consulting services on several basic principles:

1. Racial groups are not biological realities. There is no single gene that makes a person African-American, White, Asian or Latino. This is not to say that people don’t physically resemble their parents — of course they do. But physical features considered racial (skin color, hair texture, nose shape, etc) are found in a spectrum around the world and evolved in relation to specific environmental conditions. Learning in an interactive and exciting way about biology and culture and human migration can break up our commonsense notions about the biological realities of racial groups.

2. The way that people in the United States tend to think about racial and ethnic groups today is a product of a specific history — a history based on slavery, immigration paths, legal decisions, housing patterns, and other subtle practices.  Because of this, race and ethnicity may be quite differently conceived in other places. Brazilians, for example, often talk about how there are no distinct racial groups in Brazil — everyone is all “mixed.” Nonetheless there was recently a case of two identical twins applying to the University of Brasilia. One of them was admitted as “black” under newly implemented affirmative action laws and the other was denied entry because he was classified as “white.” We can help understand the complex and often conflicting ways that race serves multiple purposes both within and across societies.

3. Because racial categories are not biological but rather socially and culturally constructed differently in different places, we must examine how they come to seem so natural. We believe that these categories appear natural because of the many subtle ways that the categorizations are reproduced in simple everyday activities — in television and movies, music, dress, and language. Something even as seemingly harmless and pleasant as a Disney children’s movie might give us pause. The hyenas in The Lion King, for example, talk with a dialect that is strikingly similar to inner-city youth. Might children begin to associate such those mean and deceitful ways of the hyenas with those people who actually speak that way? While this example may seem too subtle to even notice, we will show that its repetition can be quite powerful. We use examples from popular culture such as this to open up dialogue about examples that are not only important, but also concrete and interesting to think about.