In the classroom -- Communicating against prejudice

Deirdre Newman

It’s OK to yell in Joey LaMer’s intercultural communication class at

Orange Coast College. In fact, it’s encouraged if it means that you are

standing up for your beliefs.

The class tackles provocative issues, such as prejudice against

African Americans and homosexuals, in a discussion-oriented setting.

LaMer challenges students to try to see the world as others do to

reduce the likelihood of prejudice.

“I think the class is more important now than 10 years ago,” LaMer

said. “I think prejudice and intolerance have gone underground because of

political correctness.”

LaMer has been teaching intercultural communication at OCC for the

past 10 years in an informal setting that is conducive to expressing

opinions -- a couch set up in a semicircle with another semicircle of

chairs above it so everyone can see everyone else.

“It makes all the difference in the world,” LaMer said. “If someone is

sitting in rows, no one’s going to turn around and respond. It really

does force the students to take responsibility for what they’re saying.”

LaMer, a petite, spunky professor, bops around the room, poking and

prodding the psyches of her students to elicit their most honest

reactions.

Students spend the first few weeks of class exploring their world

views, so they become aware of how they see the world differently than

others do.

As the class shifts to discussing various prejudices, the environment

becomes more volatile -- to LaMer’s delight.

“It usually takes until midsemester, and then it explodes,” LaMer

said. “A lot of teachers are afraid of that, but no, that’s what you

want.”

On a recent Friday morning, students engaged in a heated debate about

Christianity and homosexuality. The students have become so comfortable

with each other that one student admitted his homosexuality and

apologized to another student for lying about it earlier in the semester.

When another student, Isaac Bailey, made a comment that homosexuals

lead sinful lives, LaMer was instantly in his face.

“Are you God?” she shouted, stressing the importance of qualifying

opinions as beliefs, not fact.

“If you say it’s truth when someone else doesn’t believe, then you’re

making a judgment,” LaMer said.

Bailey, 20, apologized for his statement before the class ended.

After the class, Bailey, a conservative Christian, said he enjoys

being exposed to other people’s views.

“It’s like you don’t really understand your own argument if you don’t

listen to the other side,” Bailey said.

Jason Phillips, 19, said taking LaMer’s class has a positive effect on

other people.

“She makes us think and see things differently, so when she sends us

into the world, we tell our friends and so on,” Phillips said. “I think

she’s changing the world single-handedly.”

LaMer said her ultimate hope is that students become “social warriors”

-- not just being against prejudice, but working to erase it.

* IN THE CLASSROOM is a weekly feature in which Daily Pilot education

writer Deirdre Newman visits a campus in the Newport-Mesa area and writes

about her experience.