White Privilege / Edition 4

Accessible and highly recommended

Picture a soldier. Picture a doctor. Picture a taxpaying American. Were any of these images black people? Probably not...even if you are black yourself. In our society the presumption is that people are white unless they are specifically raced otherwise. This presumption of whiteness as ¿the norm¿ and everyone else as ¿the other¿ - and the immense societal costs of this presumption - is at the heart of this collection, explored in 16 accessible readings designed to allow educators at different levels to initiate conversations about whiteness and white privilege in courses in many disciplines. It¿s divided into four sections, each with discussion questions: The Power of Invisibility exposes the hidden power of whiteness, and the advantages it provides to whites as a group without them ever having realize, much less acknowledge, that such advantages exist. The Power of the Past traces how and why the definition of ¿whiteness¿ has evolved and changed over the years. For example, there was a time when the Irish, Jews and Eastern Europeans (among others) were not considered white. ¿The Possessive Investment in Whiteness¿ demonstrates that long after slavery ended, public policy (even that supposedly designed to help minorities, like Urban Renewal) has systematically and adversely effected African Americans¿ ability to amass net worth, enhancing the rewards of past discrimination. Meanwhile, when white people start to feel disadvantaged or inconvenienced, they blame ¿affirmative action.¿ For example, in the Bakke case, where the plaintiff argued that medical school affirmative action programs disadvantaged white applicants like himself, neither Bakke nor the Court contested the legitimacy of medical school admissions standards that reserved five seats in each class for children of wealthy donors. Most universities give similar preference to the children of alumni, which again, rewards past discrimination. The Power of Privilege examines and enumerates the kinds of benefits - large and small - that white people take for granted, perhaps because they never even have to think about them. For example, as Peggy MacIntosh writes, ¿I can go shopping pretty well assured that I will not be followed or harassed I can swear, or dress in secondhand clothes, or not answer letters, without having people attribute these choice to the bad morals, the poverty, or the illiteracy of my race I can be pretty sure that if I ask to talk to the ¿person in charge,¿ I will be facing a person of my race.¿ The Power of Resistance attempts to answer the question: How can white people who do not wish to participate in the system find ways to use that privilege to combat racism and the system of privilege as a whole? Unfortunately, many discussions of whiteness end with ¿but I never owned slaves.¿ This accessible collection will go a long way towards trying to pry open such minds. Highly recommended! (For those already familiar with the first edition, this revised second edition includes two new pieces, ¿The Roots of Racial Classification¿ and ¿Privilege as Paradox.¿ )