Responding to racist incidents: Types of racist incidents
A racist incident is any incident which is perceived to be racist by the victim or any other person (The Stephen Lawrence Inquiry 1999, Recommendation 12).
Racism occurs when someone experiences discrimination, victimisation, harassment or prejudice because of their actual or perceived race or ethnicity.
Racism can manifest in different ways, including interpersonal racism, institutional racism or structural racism. It may be:
- overt: deliberate and intentional
- covert: subtle acts that undermine or discriminate
Many of these behaviours can also be carried out online using social media and messaging platforms.
Examples of racist behaviour
Examples of racist behaviour include:
- isolating, excluding or marginalising someone because of the colour of their skin, nationality or ethnicity including culture, religion and language
- verbal or non-verbal abuse, such as threats, name-calling, gestures and racist jokes
- using racist language or behaviour, including non-verbal communication such as gestures, looks, or written communication
- spreading rumours and gossip which may either draw on stereotypes about ethnicity or on their lack of conformity to these stereotypes
- taking things from someone or damaging property, motivated by prejudice against their ethnicity or perceived ethnicity
- mimicking someone’s accent, dialect or speech pattern
- physical assault, including hitting, tripping, pushing or kicking
- sexual harassment and abuse on racial grounds
- racist text or images such as posters, notices or graffiti
- incitement of others to behave in a racist manner
- offensive behaviour such as wearing racist symbols
- refusal to co-operate with other pupils because of their ethnicity
Microagressions
Racial microaggressions include:
- consistently mispronouncing someone’s name or using an anglicised version of it because it is ‘easier’ to pronounce
- making assumptions about someone’s heritage based on their perceived ethnicity
- making statements about someone of a particular ethnicity based on cultural stereotypes
