New exhibit highlights the origins of racism and bias

By Alejandra Pulido-Guzman - Lethbridge Herald on March 27, 2025.

Herald photo by Alejandra Pulido-Guzman Staff members interact with their newest traveling exhibit which examines racism and discrimination in Canada Wednesday at the Galt Museum and Archives.

LETHBRIDGE HERALDapulido@lethbridgeherald.com

A travelling exhibit that examines racism and discrimination in Canada has arrived at the Galt Museum and Archives, to challenge visitors to examine their own way of thinking.

Tyler Stewart, curator for the Galt Museum and Archives, says even though the exhibit examines a serious topic, it’s done in a way that is playful, dynamic and interactive.

“We’re very excited to have this exhibition here, which was designed and produced by the Ontario Science Centre and the research and development was thanks to the Canadian Race Relations Foundation,” says Stewart.

He says that “Behind Racism: Challenging the Way We Think,” shows how the mental processes that help us think and act quickly can lead to racism and discrimination.

“It’s important for us to acknowledge that racism exist, it is around us all the time, but there are things we can do about racism, and that is what this exhibition is really focused on.”

He adds that the exhibit is focused on where racism comes from and what we can do in our individual lives to challenge racism and to challenge the different biases and prejudices that we encounter in everyday life.

“This exhibit explains how it’s a natural part of our brain to form a bias or a prejudice because of the way our brains have evolve essentially to help us survive,” says Stewart. “But our brains are conditioned by social factors.”

The exhibit showcases how what we feed our brains affects the way we think about the world. It’s meant to highlight the need to be aware of the social factors that help form the biases and prejudices we have, to stay cognizant of them and be able to fight against inadvertently forming racist opinions and prejudices.

After first opening in Toronto in 2022, the exhibit has travelled across the country to many different museums and galleries. Now at the Galt Museum and Archives, the exhibit will run until Oct. 5.

“I think one of the fun things about this exhibition is that there is a lot of interactive and engaging components in it,” says Stewart. “It is a dynamic experience, where there are lots of hands-on activities, games and challenges that I think it will maybe flip your brain in an interesting way.”

He adds that the exhibit could help people challenge their belief system, something that they may have learned without necessarily realizing that they were being biased or racist.

“Through exhibits like this we are not trying to call people out and say that you’re racist, but we want to call people in and say, let’s think about how racism is happening in our community and what we can do about it,” says Stewart.

Solutions and actions are part of the exhibit and offer an opportunity for visitors to think about what they personally can do about racism within our community.

“We hope that people walk away understanding that racism exist in our community, but there are things that we can do to change that,” says Stewart.