Racial microaggression in the nursing workplace: operationalisation of whiteness

Abstract

Australian healthcare workforce consists of a large proportion of immigrant, racially and ethnically minoritised nurses. Such diversity provides context to study the complex social relations of work among these nurses amidst social inequities. Social relations of work are the amalgamation of nursing as work shaped by social exchanges, organisational culture, and power relations. This article explores how whiteness affects social relations within a nursing workplace. Ethnographic fieldwork, participant observations and semi-structured interviews were used to collect data in a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. Analysis was supported conceptually by intersectionality. The findings demonstrate microaggressions, whereby immigrant, racially and ethnically minoritised nurses experienced a lack of support at work, a situation of double jeopardy from both unaddressed racism and unfair performance management. Senior nurses engaged in microaggressions in their communications and unequal distribution of resources and opportunities. These practices rendered the workplace clinically and culturally unsafe but disturbances in social relations of work among nurses also point to implications for patient care. Introducing cultural safety holds promise to mitigate the impact of whiteness, offering options for how diversity in nurses can be supported through equitable opportunities for learning and development, recognition of skills and identities, and promotion of constructive communication within the workplace.