According to the authors of Critical Situations, communities are defined as “places where your strongest commitments lie” and “where you have your closest connections, your greatest pleasures, and your most serious problems.” Therefore, a community can be based off where you’re from to what you prefer to eat. If I had to chose between two communities it would have to be based off my skin color and how I live in it. I was born as an African American who happens to love tennis.
Quick! Name one good stereotype about African Americans…
Hard, isn’t it? I didn’t get to chose what race I came out as. Nobody gave me a list to chose from. I’m not saying that I wish I wasn’t African American, but I do wish people didn’t care. From the second I was born, I was placed under a group of stereotypes. This included things such as “black people love fried chicken” and “ black people don’t get sunburns”. Now don’t get me wrong, I will devour some fried chicken, but does it really matter? Being African American is just the labeling of a skin color not an assumption over a whole entire race. Sadly enough though, a lot of black do love fried chicken…So being stereotyped is something that came with the package.
For about four years now, I’ve been using tennis as my escape from the world. Not only did I get stereotyped from outsiders of my race, but from the ones inside as well. My etiquette divided me from them. No matter how much I wanted to be accepted, I simply just stood out too much. Therefore, my high school tennis team had been my sports community for the time being, and now I can thankfully say I am developing a new community of tennis lovers this year.
Ironic enough, you’d think a black girl playing tennis would set high status since there’s iconic players such as Serena Williams. Instead it’s the other way around for me. At my school, playing tennis created a wider division line between others within my race and I. Playing tennis, to them, was as if I was purposefully trying to isolate myself from them. Stereotypes have caused most African Americans to believe that these assumptions are how we should be; tennis not being one of them. However I believe humans are way more diverse and complex than to be put into clusters. To me, there’s nothing better than hitting a ball over a tennis net, and stereotypes shouldn’t have to overrule that. 
To overcome the hardships this school year I plan on joining a club/organization that promotes diversity, such as Division of Diversity and Community Engagement. Who deserves to be judged at first sight? Nobody.This club embraces and encourages diversity within the the UT community to embetter society surrounding it. Living in a place where stereotypes are eliminated is what I strive for. To join a group that wants to promote diversity and its growth is what I will stand by. This club can be useful for anyone else with the same values.