“Subordination of people of color by white people.”39
White(ness): “Inequality and privilege are the only real components of whiteness. Without racial privilege there is no whiteness, and without whiteness, there is no racial privilege. Being white means being advantaged to people of color, and pretty much only that.”40
White privilege: “A form of domination; hence it is a relational concept. It positions one person or group over another person or group. It is a concept of racial domination that enables us to see this relationship from the perspective of those who benefit from such domination.”41 “I have come to see white privilege as an invisible package of unearned assets that I can count on cashing in each day, but about which I was ‘meant’ to remain oblivious. White privilege is like an invisible weightless knapsack of special provisions, assurances, tools, maps, guides, codebooks, passports, visas, clothes, compass, emergency gear, and blank checks.”42
Key People
Robert Amico (1947– ): Amico is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at St. Bonaventure University in New York. His book The Problem of Criterion won the 1995 Choice Award for Outstanding Academic Book. His current research is on racism and social justice; in addition to writing Exploring White Privilege (2016), he also edited Antiracist Teaching (2015). Twitter @rpamico
Peggy McIntosh (1934– ): McIntosh was the former associate director of the Wellesley Centers for Women (of Wellesley College in Massachusetts) and was the founder of the National SEED (Seeking Educational Equity and Diversity) Project. She was also cofounder of the Rocky Mountain Women’s Institute. McIntosh is widely recognized for coining the term White privilege in the 1988 paper “White Privilege and Male Privilege.”
Paula Rothenberg (1943–2018): Rothenberg was a Senior Fellow at the Murphy Institute at CUNY (City University of New York). She previously served for 7 years as the director of the New Jersey Project on Inclusive Scholarship, Curriculum, and Teaching at William Paterson University in New Jersey, where she was also Professor of Philosophy. Rothenberg published eight books that address social inequality and social justice. www.paularothenberg.com
Tim Wise (1968– ): Wise is known for his public approach to his publications, having given talks in every state in the United States and at more than 1,000 college and high school campuses. Wise self-identities as an antiracist essayist, author, and educator and is the author of seven books. Wise is one of five people who were interviewed for a video exhibition on race relations in America. The video is featured at the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, DC. www.timwise.org; Twitter @speakouttimwise
Works Cited and Further Reading
Amico, Robert. 2016. Exploring White Privilege. New York: Routledge.
Arcidiacono, Peter, Josh Kinsler, and Tyler Ransom. 2019. “Legacy and Athlete Preferences at Harvard.” Working Paper 26316. Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.
Carnevale, Anthony, Jeff Strohl, Artem Gulish, Martin Van Der Werf, and Kathryn Peltier Campbell. 2019. “The Unequal Race for Good Jobs.” Washington, DC: Georgetown University.
Halley, Jean, Amy Eshleman, and Ramya Mahadevan Vijaya. 2011. Seeing White: An Introduction to White Privilege and Race. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield.
Horowitz, Juliana Menasce, Anna Brown, and Kiana Cox. 2019. “Race in America 2019.” Washington, DC: Pew Research Center.
Kendall, Frances E. 2013. Understanding White Privilege: Creating Pathways to Authentic Relationships across Race. 2nd ed. New York: Routledge.
Lipsitz, George. 2006. The Possessive Investment in Whiteness: How White People Profit from Identity Politics. Revised and expanded ed. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.
McIntosh, Peggy. 1988. “White Privilege and Male Privilege.” Working Paper 189. Wellesley, MA: Wellesley Centers for Women.
Rothenberg, Paula. 2000. Invisible Privilege: A Memoir about Race, Class, and Gender. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas.
Rothenberg, Paula. Ed. 2008. White Privilege: Essential Readings on the Other Side of Racism. 3rd ed. New York: Worth.
strmic-pawl, hephzibah. 2015. “More Than a Knapsack: The White Supremacy Flower as a New Model for Teaching Racism.” Sociology of Race and Ethnicity 1(1):192–97.
Wise, Tim. 2011. White Like Me: Reflections on Race from a Privileged Son: The Remix. Revised and updated ed. Berkeley, CA: Soft Skull Press.
See also White Privilege Conference (www.whiteprivilegeconference.com) and the corollary journal, Understanding and Dismantling Privilege (http://www.wpcjournal.com).
Notes
* Photo of Rothenberg unavailable.
1. Rothenberg (2008).
2. Amico (2016:2, emphasis in original).
3. Amico (2016:22).
4. Rothenberg (2000:172).
5. Wise (2011:3).
6. Lipsitz (2006).
7. Ibid. (3).
8. Wise (2011:85).
9. Ibid. (179, emphasis in original).
10. Rothenberg (2000:1).
11. Wise (2011).
12. Rothenberg (2000).
13. Wise (2011).
14. Ibid. (144).
15. McIntosh (1988:5).
16. Rothenberg (2000:111).
17. Ibid. (122).
18. Amico (2016:53).
19. McIntosh (1988:3).
20. Ibid. (3).
21. Rothenberg (2000:198).
22. Ibid.
23. Wise (2011).
24. Amico (2016).
25. McIntosh (1988:3–4).
26. Amico (2016:38–39).
27. Ibid.
28. Ibid. (69).
29. Ibid. (86).
30. Wise (2011:86).
*
