Image

Nilanjana Dasgupta, provost professor of psychological and brain sciences and founding director of the Institute of Diversity Sciences, was recently recognized by the Axiom Business Book Awards with one of four Outstanding Books of the Year honors for her recent publication, “Change the Wallpaper: Transforming Cultural Patterns to Build More Just Communities.”

Using a science-driven approach to social change, “Change the Wallpaper” argues that small changes to the local cultures around us are far more effective in producing structural change than symbolic acts, bias awareness training or relying solely on good intentions. 

“Wallpaper” is Dasgupta’s metaphor for the elements of culture that are hidden in plain sight in neighborhoods, workplaces, and educational settings, shaping our perspective of the world. They include the design of our physical environment; popular stories that explain social reality, provide morals and takeaways and guide our behavior; people we see in valued and respected roles who we may or may not relate to; and the tacit knowledge that some of us have the privilege to get ahead in life with little friction. These four types of situational nudges interact to compound advantages for some and disadvantages for others.

“For culture change to happen, we first must notice the elements of culture—the metaphorical wallpaper—that create inequality in small cumulative ways before we can learn how to avoid the negative elements and harness the positive ones in coordination with other people to move toward social justice,” says Dasgupta.

More information about the Axiom Awards can be found at axiomawards.com, and more information about Dasgupta’s book can be found at changethewallpaper.com.