Navigating Authentically in K12 with James Tyson-Channer

Today I'm talking with James Tyson-Channer the interpreter & Kimberly DI'Nitta about how they authentically navigate working in a K12 setting in their skin and the experiences they face in that setting. It's a great conversation about a space I dont work in. Join the conversation. 

Transcript

 Welcome to f I'm honest. On today's episode, we are talking to the interpreter by day, James Tyson Channer and the illustrious Kimberly DI'Nitta, the drag performer by night. and we're talking to them about how they navigate working in a predominantly black K-12 setting as the only black and interpreter and the problems that they face in their skin as their self, but also, And their observations.

So I personally never work in K-12 settings, so I was particularly interested in this perspective. So come on in the room, let's talk about it. Welcome to, if I'm honest, a podcast where we address and discuss issues in the sign language interpreting profession using an anti-racist lens. Here we intentionally take up space and we say the thing, we name the thing that previously hasn't been named in Efforts to change, challenge and dismantle problematic narratives in our field.

And we do this because an anti-racist interpreter is just a better interpreter period. I'm your host, keisha osborne, and I've been having these conversations. For over a decade on an individual level, I think it's high time that we expand the conversation to include you. Let's talk about it. Hi honey.

Welcome to the podcast. You reached out to me a while back and you said that as a black gay man who works in the K-12 space and who was also Caribbean, you bring something special to the conversation and I said, I'd love to hear who you are. You know how you enter this field or whatever you want to tell us about, your conversation that you think is necessary that we have in this space.

Well, first, thank you so much, keisha, 

for. This platform for all of us to engage in this, conversation. So first I to introduce myself. My name is Kimberly DI'Nitta. I'm a well-known drag performer here in the DC area. I'm a former Ms. Gay Arlington by trade. I'm an interpreter, and at night I throw a wig and I'm a drag queen.

So I'm just here to talk about just some of my experience as an interpreter in the K12 setting and as a drag performer and how I've navigated those 

experiences. Sure. So what, what have you seen so far, like, as someone who shows up authentically as you do, in the interpreting space in the K-12 space?

What has been your experience? Yeah, so, 

you know, um, one of the things, keisha, that you talked about in your previous videos was, um, especially Black History Month especially in, in the K-12 setting, we have a lot of black history month assemblies and you know, the goal is to provide an inclusive environment for our kids.

And, one of the things that I realized that when those requests come or,  interpreters are set to do those, um, assignments, they kind of back off and they say, well, I don't wanna do that assignment. And, you know, that could be of, for various reasons, but   what I've experienced is it's give it to James, let James kind of do it.

And, you know,  as a black interpreter, working predominantly in a black and brown school,  it's always a goal of mine to make sure that things are represented correctly, especially for the black history month assembly. Mm-hmm. Audience is very very very important. So when interpreters don't want to do those assemblies, it hurts the kids.

Sure. And it hurts the other staff members. So,  I guess how can we be more of a collaborative team? Sure. So it's, it's been really hard to get a lot of pushback from people 

so, I think this is an interesting conversation because there's such a huge push for a skin match essentially. Like where, if it's a Black History month, if it's Hispanic History Month, it's women's heritage month, right?

The, the appropriate representation applies here. And so in this situation, you're saying in the K-12 space, in the school that you work at, those non-black interpreters are saying, Nope. Nah, I'm good. Like I'm, I'm not comfortable doing that. And so my number one question to you is like, are you the only black person in this space? 

I am the only black person in this space. Yes. So, so that's important. And so then you can't really do the whole thing by yourself. Right. And so what would you. What, what would it be better for,  that situation? Like is this one of those situations where you're like, we, we really can't find another black interpreter because they don't work here.

Like what, what kind of support do you, think that white interpreters should be able to provide? You know,  

that is a good question.  I, I guess one of the things, especially in the K through 12 is our leadership and,  what is our leadership doing to provide,  diversity and how can,  if we have a diverse pool of, of interpreters, black and brown interpreters mm-hmm.

We all push in and, and, and, and, and help with those, those assignments.  So I really think it really starts with our leadership team first. Those, that demographic in our schools or in our cohort,  we maybe need to find agencies,  who can service those requests. And maybe we should ask the procurement office, do they have,  contracts with black and brown agencies?

So 

that's what we, yeah. So what, what's the problem with them saying, nah, I'm not doing it. I'm not, I don't wanna do it. Is it because you felt find it to be too long? Or what is, what is your feeling about it? I 

guess my feeling is, you know,  this is a three hour, two, three hour assembly 

and Right, right, right.

There's a lot 

of,  information, a lot of trauma, and I need to be able, as a black interpreter to,  to be able to interpret those kind of messages. I need to have some kind of rest time.

Preferably with an interpreter who identifies as black, you know? So we can learn from each other, we can team each other. If I'm not understanding, if I'm not understanding something, they can get it. So really that collaborative effort. 

Yeah. Yeah, I think, I think this is interesting because like so often, you know, the answer to,  the question that happens within our field is like, it depends, like it depends on, you know, a lot of different things.

And so this is one of those situations where I feel like I hear you saying that this is one situation where if we can't get a skin match or culture match, an identity match, if we can't get that, I still need the support. And so, The interpreters on your team aren't stepping up to do it. That's rough. 

And you know, how, how does that make me feel as the interpreter being the only like interpreter and the scheduler at the school?

So, you know, you're kind of at this impasse, what do you do? You know, um, if they're not gonna do it, do I have to do it? You know, who, who does it? Who does the burden fall on? Right? 

Does that make sense? Yeah. It kinda sounds a little bit like, um, Abandonment, right? Like, under the auspices of, of it being well intentioned, right?

Like, I, I am not. And I have heard that I should not do this thing right. And so, mm, sorry James, you're stuck doing this thing by yourself. And so there's like this huge like lack of support. Yeah. Do you think it has anything to do with you personally? I don't. I mean, I, I don't, I don't 

feel, I don't think so.

Um, maybe that's just me saying to make myself feel good. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um, but you know, this has been something, I mean, it hasn't been the first time that, you know, something like this has happened. Um, there's been other situations,  maybe not the same situation, but definitely other situations where yeah, but they all kind of fall right within the same umbrella.

But,  you know, there's been other situations within, not just my school district, but other school districts where this happens quite regularly. And where do the black in, how do black interpreters feel? 

What do they do? So what do, what is it that you actually feel? 

I feel angry. I, I, I'm angry that we, there is no pool of interpreters to service those requests cuz at the end of the day, you know, we're educational interpreters and we have to service those students. Whatever's on the iep, you know, all access to everything. And my thing is when we say we don't wanna do it, we're denying access to a student. Sure. Student. And we're denying, and let's take it further, we're denying access to a black deaf student. And, you know, that's, that, that, that's rough, that, that's hard.

You know, as an educator, you know that, that's rough to know. It's hard to know, so. Mm-hmm. It's always important that we're following the iep and when we're in the higher interviewing people, that house has to be kind of, Okay. This is a black and brown school, so it's appropriate to place, skilled black and brown interpreters in that school.

Even the load. Does that 

make sense? Mm-hmm. Yeah, it does. It makes a lot of sense. I, I'm wondering too, like, I think about the space, the K12 space, and, and I can see how problematic that is, especially because like, it's kind of like you're following the rules or the new rule of being politically correct to detriment.

And so I'm also wondering like how else you see kind of like problematic be I don't work in the K-12 space. I remember when I graduated I was like, absolutely not. I came to grad school, right? Cause I was like, ah, I'm not dealing with nobody's kids.  I, I'm not gonna be able to do it! I also was very concerned about being a language model.

 As an L 2. It wasn't a space that I found myself in voluntarily. So I'm wondering, I don't actually know what the, the, the ethos is and the, the, the environment is like, you know, I, I expect that as the only black person who is male and gay and dresses in drag, that you also probably experiences some trifling shit.

 So what is your experience like, you know, as someone with a bunch of marginalized and intersectional identities, like what has your experience been like? You 

know,  I was talking to you and I were having this conversation about, um, how people perceive me as a drag performer. And,  the one word that we used was a lurking.

And one of the things that I, I, I, I've realized, especially with white women, and I walk in a room and they know that I do drag. We never have a conversation about that, but they're always looking. And I remember this one time I was interpreting for an event with older interpreter. And we're engaging casual conversation.

And,  you know, the interpreter looked at me and she said, so how's the cross dressing been going?

And you know, keisha, it's one of those things where, Do I give her a pass? Mm-hmm. Cause here's the thing I understand back in the day, that was a term that was acceptable. Sure. That was term that was used. But now, in 2023, yeah. We didn't, you don't use those terms anymore. Right. And so, um, give her a pass.

But at the same time, I'm an interpreter. She's an interpreter. Shouldn't they stay abreast on evolving language? In theory.  In theory, yeah. In theory. So that has always been difficult for me, how people perceive me, how they place me, because I, you know, here's the thing. I, as you can see, I, I can't be placed anywhere, you know, I can't box, so I am all in everything.

And. I have to tell you, it is that word cross-dresser 

for me. Mm, right. Absolutely. I think I, I also think,  just your identity and how you show up, you look gorgeous, by the way.  Thank you. I, I, I also think it's interesting because of the current climate that we're in, where we've got this push y'all across the country where they're trying to, you know, band drag and they're trying to, you know, monitor things.

 Are you experiencing any of kind of that backlash since you work in the K-12 space? 

Absolutely. You know, um, you know, I live here in Virginia and, um, Southern Virginia and things are a little, little conservative. Mm-hmm. Current climate. Um, Our, our governor ain't having it, our governor.

He, he, he ain't, he ain't having it. And,  we have parents unfortunately who don't know that I do drag, but I'm a very feminine boy. And when they see that, I've had parents say, I don't want my kid with that interpreter. Yeah. And that's, and and it's usually, um, it's never the black and brown parents. It's always the,  the white parent.

And it's more so. The mothers. Um, so I don't know if I, I don't know, to be honest, keisha, I don't know what it's, mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. 

I dunno what it's, yeah. So when I was experienced, like, how do, how do you get support from the interpreters that you work with? Do you feel like you are work in a supportive space?

I don't, I don't, you know, it is a constant battle.  I, I know that things are changing slowly and I definitely on the active grounds on, implementing and helping that change. But, you know, keisha, there comes to a point in, as a black interpreter, I'm tired. I, I'm tired of saying the same thing over and over and over again.

Mm-hmm. So,  one of the things that I did was,  join our equity teams and see how I can be better change, and it, one thing that you're doing, keisha, is making this information accessible to white people. So,  these equity teams, that's my thought process. 

Yeah. So this is actually feeling a little too much like an interview to me and less like a conversation.

And I just wanna talk about the K-12 space. Like what is interpreting in that space? Like as someone who is you, right? Like what are you experiencing from your teams? What are you experiencing from, you know,  maybe administratively, like what is happening in that environment that  is absolutely problematic.

 That systemically needs to be addressed and has to kind of be addressed by the individual interpreters that you're working with. My question is, like, I, I wanna talk about the interpreting space, right? Like, I expect that there are some problematic things that you observe from your,  white teams,  in terms of, of diversity and equity and inclusion or, or, or even,  that are just racialized things in what you've observed with the kids, what you've observed.

 Just as a human being in this space, as a, as a, a team, like what has been your experience, like, what's problematic in this K12 space? You know, 

one of the things that I, I definitely,  see is of course I do work in the black and brown school. And,  I remember a particular incident, um, there was an interpreter there, a kid who wanted to join.

Um, Um, cultural, cultural club. Okay. And,  the request was for a, that that culture's interpret, that, that cult, the interpret from that culture. Okay. And, um, what was 

the culture? Uh, Hispanic. Okay. Mm-hmm. 

Hispanic. And,  I sent it out to the team and I said, you know,  I think that it's best that, you know, we get an Hispanic interpreter because that is their request.

And just cuz I know, within those clubs, they're gonna go between languages. So,  I, I got a lot of pushback,  from my team and I got pushback from our, my admin. My leadership team and one thing that my leadership team said to me is, well, what are you going to do to make sure that we have Hispanic interpreter?

And of course we don't have those demographics on our team, so it's like, oh, what do we do? Of course, I gathered up my resources and I found Hispanic interpreter to come, and I have to say interpreters did not like that. They said, well, am I not good enough? And I'm like, well, do you know Spanish? No, well, I'm not sure what to tell you.

And people get really their feelings about this is not about your skill level honey. This is just about what the dynamic of the room, about our presence and how, how, how does our presence affect the room. And I think as a scheduler, I always have to be cognizant sure of things because, you know, our kids are gonna learn that at some point.

So I find this interesting because you, you got pushback on hiring a Hispanic, a cultural match for this particular club, but you got like complete abandonment on black history among assemblies. It's like,  well, how, well, hold on. What is the perspective on black issues or black things in comparison to,  Hispanic things, right?

They're like, we can, we can do this job, right? Like, we don't know Spanish. We can do this job.  And I'm just wondering if, if there's a, a more tangible observation that you've made, like amongst your team of why that kind of contradictory behavior happened. You know, I, 

I, I don't know. Yeah.  It's always one of those things where you kind of, kind of replace in your mind, why is this happening?

Or is there something that I did to cause this? Mm-hmm. And I just, honestly, I just think people are just scared. Yeah. They don't know what to do. Mm-hmm. They honestly just dunno what to do again. There's been, you know, um, very little support and I think, you know, as time goes on, I think things are changing.

But, you know, you said, you say this often, it's slow things, slow 

time. So I kinda love the compassion of, of that statement of people don't know what to do. You know, it's not that they,  have this malicious intent all the time,  which,  we do need to give a breath to that, that is a reality. But there's sometimes people just don't know what to do and sometimes just don't have the self-awareness to recognize I don't belong in this space.

 Which I think I covered in a, a previous episode. Like people just don't know. They don't belong in this space.  And they don't know how to be supportive when there's this thing that is taboo. And I feel like I, I, I keep thinking about them not wanting to do the Black History month assemblies, right?

Like this three hour long assembly. I, I, I, I wonder, you know, what the mindset is. Is it, is it this kind of, I don't know, I wanna say arrogant, but like, just I'm not doing it. Well, you know, it's black, so it's your thing, or is it. I don't wanna make a mistake. What do you think,  what is your observation?

 

And, and I'm gonna maybe expand on that a little bit. Um, when it came to the assembly, you know, keisha, I don't care if it was 30 minutes. I don't care if it was happening. Yeah. I don't care. I think that the content is so happy. Sure. And teaming. Okay. 2020. Mm-hmm. I'm resting and I'm doing, when I'm interpreting such heavy content, am I actually resting or am I trying to recover from the content that I just interpreted?

Sure. That's good. So when they 

switch, maybe I'm just not, I, maybe I haven't had the time to ready myself to go up there. Maybe they're talking about, I don't know, maybe there's a scene where they're whipping the slave. That's woo. Yeah, that's rough. Right. You 

know? Right. 

Um, so I, I, I, I think having, um, black interpreters for that and providing breaks with each other, and if I'm experiencing something that interpreting, Hey, are you okay?

Mm-hmm. Everything good? No. Um, and just providing that extra layer of support. It's, it's, it's, it's rough. Um, again, especially when there's, you are the only black interpreter Yeah. In that's, I have an added responsibility, you know? Um, in a black school with black educators and black principals and black deaf teachers, it's, it's, it's a lot of pressure.

Yeah. 

It's a lot of pressure. Pressure. I appreciate that. I, I also, we just had an episode,  that I know that you heard, uh, about the N word, right? And you talk about working in this predominantly black or brown space. And I think initially I had planned to put your commentary there, but I think I'd like to put it here, especially because of where you work and the environment you work in and the fact that you are the only black person on your team.

Like how. Do the white interpreters navigate in group shared language amongst black students, deaf and hearing. How have you observed that at your school? That's 

a good question.  I have been a witness to conversations where the interpreter, the hearing student uses that word. Sure. And when we hear that word, I, we understand what it means.

We, we understand what it means. Term up endearment.  And I've seen the, the white interpreters casually just sign the N-word. And when you have a conversation with them, I think the, the go-to is, well, I'm just doing my job. I'm just that word. I didn't do anything wrong. And I'm like, Okay. Okay. I understand what you're saying, but listen to what I'm saying.

Sure, sure. No, 

you're wrong. Yeah. Yeah. I think I, I wanna know, as, as someone who has witnessed it, who's been a witness to this, like what's the impact on you? I think this, I think this words falls in such this really delicate place that people wanna treat it like it's a regular word, right? Not that it is enacted violence, and so I.

Interpreters are thinking, this is my job, and not thinking that this is going to impact you or it's going to impact,  everyone in the room. Right. Like every black person who could overhear it or, or see it in the room. And so,  my question to you is like, you know, what was your experience in seeing that?

Definitely, 

 Definitely traumatized. Um, and, and in, in the setting, it, it just so happens to, it just so happens to be a history talking about the civil rights. And I, I, I think with that, that layer, um, hearing that, seeing, hearing and seeing the interpreter sign it and say it, um, it hurts. Sure.

Because it tells me a couple things that. During their planning time, maybe they interpret the interpreter did not use their planning time accordingly.  It just tells me that, well, you probably were doing this, whatever this subject for a while and, you know, probably didn't do your research. Mm-hmm.

Cause you probably asked, asked me questions or asked a scheduler. Mm-hmm. Could I come in a team with you for that class? Mm-hmm. And share some, share some signs. And so, I hear that and I see that I have to kind of stop myself and say, okay, well what do I do now? Yeah. I step in as the team or do I not, and if I do step in, what are the implications of that?

Sure. Am I be reported? Yeah. You know,  and I will, I will. I be called aggressive. I've been called aggressive. I mean, there's.

Yeah. Yeah. That's, that's a lot. That's a lot. So why do you work in K-12? Like Yeah. Why do you work there in that space? I, yeah, so 

I, I love kids. I, I love seeing the kids go from, you know, little babies and they go, go all the way that they go the way to high school and you see them just go off and it's, it's, it's just so amazing.

And you get to see from when they had no language and now, You know, they're graduating with, you know, with their high school diploma. So, and really giving back to our black and brown kids.  A lot of black and brown deaf kids don't have access to a black interpreter. And I, I, I've gone to many schools and the kid would say, me, you really, it's, it's interesting.

And kids never see a black interpreter. Yeah. 

Yeah. That's good. Yeah. It's, 

I, I, I love seeing that. And, you know, the kids can say, you know, I had my first black interpreter and like this interpreter was so great. This interpreter really supported me. And that's all, that's what I'm about. That's really what 

I'm about.

I love that.  I think it's interesting too,  because I. I don't see those people until they get to v R s or they get to college or they get to, you know, a different environment where adults are. Right. Cuz that's where I work with the adults. I don't get them until then and I always find it to be kind of alarming that they get to me and in their adulthood and they have that same experience.

So I can imagine that. I think it's great to be part of the formative experiences at with interpreters. I think that could be pivotal. That's great. 

One of the things that I, I, I, I, I firmly believe in is kinda being in the middle, and I think being in the middle that. Brings in healing. And I think that, you know, keisha, this platform is the middle.

 And I think it's where everybody comes in and start engaging in all kinds of conversations. And I, I'm so happy that,  all the interpreters from around the country can come in and listen to things that you have to say. And interpreters in rural eras, interpreters in big cities, interpreters everywhere.

So,  We are engaging in conversation and I, the goal is to continue engaging in these very vital conversations. 

Yeah, I appreciate that. I, I'm, I'm hoping to be a conversation starter. I think I say it in my intro, I say it over and over again on the, on the Instagram, like, I wanted this to be a place of conversation, especially because too often in this field, we don't have oversight.

Right. So we have people, interpreters operating in kind of silos where no one can see that they are being problematic. And then we have these adults that get to us, those who work with adults, and to have all this trauma from interpreters. And it's like, can we mitigate them racialized traumas?  That we, they already have audism, right?

Like they already experienced that kind of oppression. Is there a way for us to mitigate those traumas but also mitigate our own, right? Like, I don't wanna experience trauma for my teams either. So I'm hoping that this space creates the kinds of conversations that allow people to rethink or to think differently about how we engage in the.

Work world,  and in K-12, in government, in medical, in mental health, like all the settings of interpreting so that we can do a justice to every human involved. Right? And I think so often we forget. That there's a bunch of humans involved and we don't consider it. So if we don't have the conversation, you know, and I appreciate your perspective, I appreciate that.

What you're bringing to, as someone who is coming from a setting that I don't work in, right? Like I don't know what your experience is. I don't know, you know, what it's like to work in K-12 or what the negative experience is that interpreters are giving those kids or their teams who work in those settings with them.

Like, I have no idea.  And so we. We all need your perspective, like we need to see kind of inside. And I get that we're limited to just your school cuz you can only bring your school to the table. But like, you know, what else is happening all over the country? Well, what are the experiences of people? So like this should be a space where conversation happens and hopefully change happens.

It's wonderful, keisha. It's, it's, it's wonderful. Well, I thank you so much for,  being on the, the, the podcast and like sharing your perspective and your experiences and getting all glammed up for us cuz Wow. Amazing. And hope to see you next time. 

Yeah. Thank you so much keisha. And listen, y'all, this is going to be the biggest platform in the interpreting community.

We are manifesting that cuz keisha, you are doing the damn thing. So thank you, thank you, thank you for always providing a platform, not just for me, for all black and brown interpreters and, you know,  like I said, healing takes place in the middle. Yeah. And keisha. This is a well needed platform and you're bringing everybody together.

So,  thank you. Thank you, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. 

Thank you. Well, thank you. See you next time. This has been, if I'm honest, I'm your host, keisha osborne, and this is a place where we have hard conversations. Until next time.