A Thought Exercise:
Select a stereotype and try running it through this wheel and see how It would manifest itself in this cycle.
 

1. Stereotype: ‘All Indians are lazy’.
   Let's start with the idea that Indians are lazy. Who knows where that came from, but it's out there.
    

2. Prejudice
   This leads to the notion or attitude that if you're an Indian, you must be lazy, because all Indians are lazy.
    

3. Discrimination. How might that work?
   Well, if I was, say, in the HR department and had control over hiring, I might not come out and say it or even be conscious of it. It's not necessarily intentional, but a discriminating tendency might be operating subconsciously such that if I have the choice of two candidates who are otherwise equally qualified for the position, and I know that the one seems or looks Indian and the other one seems or looks white, I might be more inclined to go with the white guy because he'll show up on time, he's likely to value the work more, come in regularly, work harder when he is here because a prejudicial attitude is operating below the surface. I'm not saying that you necessarily know that these things are even happening, but these notions are so powerful, so ingrained and so naturalized, that the white guy just seems more eager to work here. He seems like he's got a good attitude, which leads to the north direction. 
    

4. Rationalization
   How does it lead here? Well, for that indigenous candidate, if this kind of selection process happens to them multiple times, and they're pounding the pavement trying to get work, but constantly getting the door closed on them, eventually they just give up looking. And they become one of the stats of the unemployed, or those on welfare, and they become the source for that rationalization expressed in some of our media outlets: If they wanted to work, they would just go out and get jobs.

That rationalization then fuels the continued circulation of that stereotype, so that for the next generation coming in, we have a nice, vibrant, healthy stereotype about Indians being lazy because the media is reporting it, and we have certain people we can point to and say, you see, look, look at the stats - the statistics support it. But without a broader context of understanding, we're not getting the full picture. 
 

When doing any sort of teaching or educational work, where do we get our information from?

A lot of us rely on media sources to tell us what's going on, what’s in the news. For analysis of certain events, we might look online. Teachers may be using textbooks. Regardless, each depicts ideas that are typically deemed trustworthy and truthful even though they're probably rationalizing certain notions.

A good example is the way that, for a long time, history textbooks described conflicts with Aboriginal people. If the Indigenous group in question was a military ally, they were usually described as that. That language was used. If they were resisting, then the fight was described as a massacre. In these ways, any sense of agency or autonomy is removed; the Indigenous people are merely allies or enemies. And by falling into friend or foe categories, we can more easily rationalize that they are either noble or bloodthirsty savages.

The other thing about stereotyping is it simplifies very complex processes. 
So instead of understanding the complexities of what motivated certain groups to act in certain ways at certain points in history, we only understand that they are either good or bad; they only fit into one of those categories.

When things were reported, were Indigenous Peoples noted to be law-abiding people? Were they described as being peaceful? This becomes the way that matters are discussed, instead of a more nuanced understanding of a whole event. 

This helps explain how difficult it is to break out of the cycle and how we go from stereotype to the actions which then reinforce stereotypes. It is this cycle that reinforces every step along the way.

So when we do our educational work, one of the questions that I like to ask people is:

Where in this cycle can we have the most effective intervention in breaking the cycle? 

"Ultimately," notes Professor Restoule, "we control our actions; we don't control our thoughts."

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Needless to say, breaking the cycle is easier said than done.