Understanding And Dismantling Racism

by Joseph Barndt

Overview

No issue has so daunted American life and history as that of race. Joseph Barndt's powerful, personal, yet practical work reframes race and racism in a new way for a new century and offers tested ways to address it. The clearest and most practical primer on race and race relations around, this book takes specific account of our society's ongoing failure to dismantle racism, the failure of the multicultural diversity model, and the need for a deeper understanding of racism's pernicious but embedded roots.

Barndt's unique book offers an historical account of racism, especially in white America, and its various personal, institutional, and cultural forms. Without demonizing anyone or any race, he also offers new, specific, positive ways m which people in all walks, including congregations, can work to bring systemic racism to an end. Also included are helpful analytical charts, definitions, bibliography, and exercises for readers, particularly to trace their own history of racism and change.

About the Author:
Joseph Barndt has been a parish pastor and an antiracism trainer and organizer for thirty years, much of the latter work being done with Crossroads Ministry, Chicago

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781451411775
Publisher:	Augsburg Fortress, Publishers
Publication date:	01/12/2009
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	1 MB

Table of Contents

Preface     xi
Introduction     1
The Happiness Machine-A Fable     1
The Dross of Racism     3
The Happiness Machine and Current Reality     4
A Book for White People     6
And Also a Book for People of Color     7
The Work of Crossroads Ministry and People's Institute     8
Language and Terminology     8
Other "Isms"-The Happiness Machine's Multiple Consequences     10
Writing an Ending to the Fable of the Happiness Machine     11
The Continuing Evil of Racism     13
The Complex and Bewildering Tangle of Racism     13
Our Colonial and Racist Beginnings     15
From Colony to Nationhood: The Deepening of Racism     17
Resistance to Racism: The Better Side of a Bitter History     25
The Civil Rights Movement: The Resistance Rewrites History     29
The Continuing Evil of Racism in the Twenty-First Century     33
Detecting and Measuring Twenty-First Century Racism     42
The Twenty-First Century: A New Beginning     48
Defining Racism     55
The Need for a Common Definition of Racism     55
Introducing a Definition of Racism     58
Exploring Prejudice     60
Exploring Race     62
The Misuse of Power by Systems and Institutions     73
Summary     82
White Power and Privilege     85
From "Black Like Me" to "White Like Me"     87
White Power: Not the Same as White Privilege     90
A Closer Look at White Power     91
A Closer Look at White Privilege     95
Responses to White Power and Privilege     107
Conclusion: You Can't Take It Off     110
Individual Racism: The Making of a Racist     111
Power[superscript 3]: Racism at Its Worst     111
"Go Home and Free Your Own People"     112
What and Who Is a Racist?     115
"Racialization": The Mass Production of Racists and Victims     120
Racial Identity Formation: The Shaping of Superior and Inferior Races     123
The Making of a White Racist     126
The Four Walls of Racism's Prison     129
Summary and Conclusion: None of Us Are Free     141
Institutionalized Racism     143
The Misuse of Power by Systems and Institutions     143
Taking an X-Ray of the Happiness Machine     144
The Nature and Purpose of Institutions     145
Defining Institutionalized Racism     151
How It Got That Way: A History of Institutionalized Racism     154
How It Stayed That Way: New Forms of Institutionalized Racism     157
How to "See," Identify, and Analyze Institutionalized Racism     165
Conclusion: The Possibility of Authentic Institutional Transformation     182
Cultural Racism     185
What Is Culture?     187
The Creating of Race-Based Cultures     190
Defining Cultural Racism     195
The Race-Based Cultures of Communities of Color     204
White Cultural Identity in the Twenty-First Century     207
Dismantling Racism     219
A Time to Tear Down...and a Time to Build     219
Building Antiracist Communities of Resistance     221
Planning a Jailbreak: Organizing to Dismantle Racism     231
Introducing a Tool to Measure Institutional Change     233
The First Half of the Continuum: Where Are We Now?     236
Principles of Organizing to Move Forward     243
The Second Half of the Continuum: The Three Stages of Institutional Transformation     255
Conclusion: Toward a Racism-Free Twenty-First Century     262
Notes     269
Additional Resources      277
Index     285