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October 30, 2024
March 2023
A question I have been pondering for a while now is are we looking at codeswitching from a neurotypical lens?
Code Switching is used as a survival technique for people of the Global Majority. We use it to adapt to an environment in which we are not the dominant social identity group.
When you search “Code Switching” you will find definitions like “the practice of alternating between two or more languages or varieties of language in conversation”. But its more than just this, it’s about having to assess a whole room; a whole situation and being able to assess your level of safety at every given moment based on your past lived experiences.
I mentioned last week that I have been rewatching the Netflix show “Dear White People”. In the show Logan Browning’s character Samantha White mentions during a conversation that “Code switching isn’t just trying to fit into something you’re not. Sometimes it’s trying to fit into what some people perceive you as.”
In the show Samantha was specifically talking about the Black experience which is a very specific and important experience that the show highlights really well, but I couldn’t help but think about how we need to be more specific and start to raise the question of how the process of code switching shows up or doesn’t show up when the intersection of neurodivergence comes into play.
What happens when you can’t code switch?
We all know that when an environment is truly inclusive there shouldn’t be a need to code switch, but I think anyone from the Global Majority can tell you that we are a long way from that. Organisations with “be your authentic selves” in their values would be in for a shock if we were to really tell them what we thought and the things we see. So unfortunately, code switching is essential for our survival.
Being neurodivergent for me meant walking into rooms and assessing the safety for my survival, knowing code switching needed to happen. My answers to everything were planned in my head before I would speak. In fact, my whole day would be planned out including who I would and wouldn’t engage with. I would plan to busy myself to not get into trouble.
Then bam….
My mouth would open, someone would say something, and my impulsiveness would take over. My need for justice would take over…but so would my ADHD. Therefore, my ability to code switch went out the window.
I would see the looks from my Global Majority colleagues who would look at me with awe. Pulling me up to whisper, “Hannah, you are so brave. Well done” but I would also see my white colleagues, senior leaders and mangers giving me the look.
So I knew what was coming.
I would be called into a room later to be asked why I was so ‘angry’, I would be excluded from more meetings, or the gaslighting would be taken up a notch.
My race needed me to code switch, but my ADHD wouldn’t allow me to so what was I supposed to do?
People who are neurodivergent are often labelled or perceived as “abnormal”, “disruptive”, or “unprofessional”. Then, when we overlay that with the labels that are given to the Global Majority it makes for a very different experience.
When we think of neurodiversity, we don’t think of it intersectionally enough and when we think of code switching, we don’t think of it intersectionally enough either.
By looking at the things that neurodivergent people of the Global Majority must do purely to survive (but are not afforded the same kindness and tenderness that white neurodivergent people are), we might actually start to make a real difference.
These things are costing people their jobs, their lives, and their education.
If we aren’t talking about neurodiversity intersectionally then we aren’t really talking about it all.
Hannah