Emily Bernard says her best writing starts in the classroom. Take the UVM professor and celebrated author’s powerful essay on race, “Teaching the N-Word.”

“The N-word came up in discussion, and hung there, like the elephant in room,” recalls Bernard, a professor in UVM’s English Department, of her African-American biography class. “It was clear to me that we needed a discussion — and the experience that followed deeply informed my writing.”

The essay was named one of the year’s Best American Essays, and continues to be taught in schools across the nation. The piece — which marks its ten-year anniversary this September — will appear in her first collection of essays, Black is the Body, scheduled for Spring 2016.

“I write about topics that I want to teach,” says Bernard, who will serve as a judge for the 2015 PEN literary award for best biography. The PEN awards are among the most prestigious literary prizes in the country. “For me, writing is about exploring the big questions. Students are, naturally, a source of inspiration, because our discussions follow me outside of class. Ultimately, you hope what you have to say can help others.”

The focus of her collection is race in America, including the “contradictory nature of the black American experience,” says Bernard, who directs the Critical Race and Ethnic Studies program at UVM. “We are deeply American — this country was largely built on our backs — but also somehow always ‘out of place.’ To be black in this country is to constantly be questioning your relationship with this America.”

Bernard explores generational changes in racial attitudes through family stories, from her grandmother down through her twin daughters. “So much has changed in four generations: segregation, civil rights, a black family in The White House, and the recent pain of Ferguson and Eric Garner’s killing,” says Bernard, who has written four books, including one on Michelle Obama. “And, clearly, the changes must continue.”

One of the most powerful antidotes to racism is “interracial intimacy,” says Bernard, who grew up in Nashville. “When people of different races share experiences, there is an intimacy and understanding that develops that is crucial for mutual liberation from the shackles of racism.”

She sees her classroom as one of these spaces. “I want to illuminate what already exists inside my students, which is the capacity to be human — and to enlarge their vision,” says Bernard, whose books explore historical examples of successful interracial partnerships.

At the end of each semester, Bernard gives her students a challenge: “I ask them to be brave, particularly in these times, because they have a responsibility — and the power to make a change. Past generations have done their marches and taken the risks — and now it’s their moment to take a stand on issues of race and equality — to their friends, to their family, to whomever,” she says.

“And what most of my students realize when they leave UVM is they have nothing to lose and everything to give.” 

Read more stories from UVM's Humanities Center publication.