Intellectual Privilege

It’s been over a year now since I last wrote a blog post. There are many contributing reasons to that ranging from being too busy, being caught up in my own life and having nothing of value to really waffle on about.

The last year has been an amazing learning journey for me, for many reasons, and perhaps one day I will find the time to waffle about all of it in a blog. But for now I want to talk about something profound that has recently become clear to me on many levels lately. Privilege or you might prefer the terms, advantage or benefit. Due to my own course of study (Diploma in Human Development, current paper is Gender Development) and also because of a women’s empowerment programme I have joined called WAVE (Women Against Violence Education) privilege is something that has been made clear to me.

Now, I could talk about all the different facets of privilege that are out there such as male privilege, white privilege, heterosexual privilege, thin privilege, able-bodied privilege, Christian privilege, adult privilege and much more, but then all I would be doing is repeating what others have said. No, I want to talk about a kind of privilege that I have yet to see talked about. Intellectual privilege.

In recent times, I have had a lot to do with people who perhaps have not had the same opportunities as me in terms of education, have a learning disability such as dyslexia, or are not naturally intellectual people. All of these are ok and I want to stress that I am NOT of the opinion that any of these people are a deviation from normal, however, interacting with them has reminded me that my ride has been that much easier for me because I am an intellectual person. And I felt a need to remind myself, and hopefully others, of this privilege. So let’s crack into it.

 

As an intellectual person:

1.       I understand new terms and concepts easily.

2.       I often avoid the societally imposed embarrassment of having to ask for simplified explanations.

3.       If I do have to ask for explanations, I can articulate myself in such a way that ensures I still “look” intelligent to my peers and I can easily paraphrase a concept back to people using big words to show my understanding and further solidifying my intelligent status.

4.       I find it easy to intellectualise information for my own benefit.

5.       If people refuse to accept my views and opinions on a subject, I can put it down to their ignorance.

6.       When I speak, people pay attention and listen to me, unless I am a woman or person of colour, then I need to attract their attention first.

7.       At school, I got the most out of our education system and teachers paid me more attention.

8.       At school, I did not have a learning disability that encouraged teachers to label me, ignore me, punish me and therefore afford me less time and attention which in turn left me further behind my peers.

9.       Teachers publically awarded me for my high marks at school, boosting my self-esteem, and gave me a sense of superiority in my eyes, my parents’ eyes and my teachers’ eyes.

10.   I was not subjected to public humiliation when I scored low on a test or struggled to finish my homework.

11.   If I offer an answer to a question and I get it wrong, I can put this down to a new learning experience rather than my own lack of intelligence.

12.   When I need to explain my thoughts, feelings or emotions, I have a wider vocabulary that allows me to articulate myself clearly and more easily and people tend to take me seriously.

13.   In a group learning environment, I keep up with the teaching and group conversation easily without feeling confused or overwhelmed.

14.   I can seek new information on topics of interest to me with relative ease and I can also filter the new information easily.

15.   Reading and writing are “second nature” tasks and come easily to me.

16.   Spelling and grammar are also “second nature” to me and I rarely need to second guess myself about the spelling of a word or the grammatical structure of a sentence.

17.   I do not normally need to ask other people the meaning of words. If I do not know a word, generally, I am able to work out its meaning via the context it is used in.

18.   Reading a standard A4 sized document only takes me a matter of moments and I generally do not have any trouble understanding it which means people don’t stare at me about how long it takes me to read something because I can usually finish reading within a socially acceptable time.

19.   I am not subjected to social expectations and pressure to be able to read and understand documents.

20.   I do not have to worry about signing something that I do not understand because I am too embarrassed to ask for clarification.

21.   I can freely participate in group learning and not feel the need to sit quietly at the back of the room because I cannot keep up with my peers.