Dear MOMA,
My name is Aneth Naranjo and I’m currently a freshman at John Jay College. More than being a college student, I’m a Latina living in the United States. Living in this country, it’s difficult to find representation of my community in cultural institutions, especially in places of authority. In the recent years, institutions have been more aware and have made a bigger effort to diversify and integrate their staff so it’s representative of our culturally diverse country. It has come to my attention that your senior staff, and staff in general, are predominantly white. While I’m sure that each employee has earned their spot, I would also like to challenge you to build a more diverse staff. There are many museums that lack a diverse and integrated staff, but I picked this museum because MoMA because currently you’re very influential to all audiences and also because like your name suggests, you’re modern and in the modern world we are more aware that representation in all fields is important. Being a person of color and seeing that almost everyone in an authority position is white is discouraging as a young kid. It feels like you can’t never get there because you don’t look like the people in those positions. This is why a culturally diverse staff is important. We should want all kids, no matter their ethnic background, to aspire to be whatever they want. We shouldn’t set up barriers by not making an effort to diversify and integrate all staffs in all cultural institutions.
Thank You,
Aneth Naranjo
