The implicit bias we carry inside us and the messages we receive about race from multiple outside sources were the focus of a discussion in the latest Community Conversation on Race.

About 25 people from the Abington Friends community, Jenkintown, Cheltenham, Abington and other local towns took part in the program, which was held this past Thursday at the Uptown at the Piazza in Jenkintown. Toni Graves Williamson, AFS Assistant Head of School for Equity and Inclusion; Deborra Sines Pancoe, Associate Director of the Friends Council, and AFS English Department Chair Mary Lynn Ellis facilitated the conversations. They used film clips, small-group discussions and group exercises to explore questions of race and bias.

The program leaders began the discussion with a list of community norms, including “assume good intent,” which helped ease the participants into speaking openly about their personal experiences with racist messages and memories from childhood. The stories, which could be discomfiting, were shared first in small groups.

To demonstrate the difficulty of changing one’s unconscious thought process, the group went through an exercise that asked them to get up from their chairs and walk around the room. The participants were asked to follow simple commands — to move around the room or stop in place. Then, they were asked to reverse those actions — to stop when hearing the word “move,” and to move when hearing the word “stop.” Extra reverse commands were layered in until it became clear that only a heightened sense of awareness and deep concentration held any hope of bringing change to one’s thought processes.

A film clip featuring cultural commentator Jay Smooth explored ways to respond to racist comments. He stressed the value of a response that focused on “what you said” and not “what you are” and reminded the audience that it takes practice to eliminate pockets of prejudice buried within.

The Community Conversation on Race was the third in a recent series of events that Abington Friends, Friends Council and the Race Institute for Educators have helped to sponsor. About 280 people attended a screening of the film “I’m Not Racist … Am I?” at the Hiway Theater in Jenkintown in early November. On December 7, organizers followed up with a Community Conversation on Race that was held at AFS. More community conversations are planned, and people are welcome to join at any point.