ECS 6624 and 7624
Whiteness Theory and Education
Fall Semester 2003, Mondays 4:35 - 7:35
Instructor: Audrey Thompson
Dept. of Education, Culture, and Society
Whiteness theory seeks to make white cultural assumptions and privileges visible so that whites do not assume that their own position is neutral and generic. It is consistent with the aims of multicultural theory but is also distinct from multiculturalism. Multicultural theory involves fostering an appreciation of cultures other than the dominant culture; in its more radical forms, multiculturalism also involves problematizing the assumptions of the dominant culture. Because multicultural approaches are concerned with displacing white culture from its position of dominance, they usually do not focus on white culture as a distinctive culture or identity. Whiteness theory focuses specifically on whiteness as a set of cultural practices and discourses, an identity, and a position of privilege — a position that, to a considerable extent, is gained at the expense of people of color.
Whiteness theory is particularly important for educators, because white cultural norms are systematically enforced (usually without any recognition that they are white norms) in the schools. Teachers and administrators who can deconstruct the whiteness of their practices, policies, and pedagogy (including teachers and administrators who are not white) are better positioned to see why prevailing educational patterns might not work for many students. Even white educators who are fully committed to multiculturalism often fail to see how their own investments in white culture as a universal culture get in the way of their good intentions vis-a-vis students of color.
Among the topics with which the course will be concerned will be the various strains in whiteness theory (which include material, discursive, institutional, and personal/relational theories), whiteness as a theoretical framework for conducting research, whiteness in relation to teacher identity, whiteness in relation to textuality and the curriculum, and the politics of different approaches to whiteness education (such as the “allies” approach).
The reading list has not been finalized, but will include both books and articles. The work that I am considering using in the course includes the work listed below; however, the final list will not include all of the books listed (there will probably be two books) and will add articles beyond those listed here. Some of the articles listed below may be omitted, depending on how many new articles end up being added to the list.
Articles:
Lerone Bennett, Jr., “Tea and Sympathy: Liberals and Other White Hopes,”
in The Negro Mood and Other Essays (Chicago: Johnson Publishing
Co., Inc., 1964), 74-104.
Judith Butler, “Endangered/Endangering: Schematic Racism and White
Paranoia,” in Reading Rodney King, Reading Urban Uprising, ed. Robert
Gooding-Williams (New York: Routledge, 1993), 15-22.
W. E. B. Du Bois, “The Souls of White Folk,” in W. E. B. Du Bois:
A Reader, ed. David Levering Lewis (New York: Henry Holt & Co.,
1995), 453-65. [Orig. 1920]
Richard Dyer, “White,” Screen 29, no. 4 (Autumn 1988): 44-64.
Elizabeth Ellsworth, “Double Binds of Whiteness,” in Off White:
Readings on Race, Power, and Society, ed. Michelle Fine, Lois Weis,
Linda C. Powell, and L. Mun Wong (New York: Routledge, 1997), 259-69.
Marilyn Frye, “White Woman Feminist,” in Willful Virgin: Essays
in Feminism, 1976-1992 (Freedom, CA: Crossing Press, 1992), 147-69.
Henry A. Giroux, “Rewriting the Discourse of Racial Identity: Towards
a Pedagogy and Politics of Whiteness,” Harvard Educational Review
67, no. 2 (Summer 1997): 285-320.
bell hooks, “Representations of Whiteness,” in Black Looks: Race
and Representation (Boston: South End Press, 1992), 165-78.
Julia Kailin, “How White Teachers Perceive the Problem of Racism in
Their Schools,” Teachers College Record (1999).
Louise H. Kidder, “Colonial Remnants: Assumptions of Privilege,” in
Off
White: Readings on Race, Power, and Society, ed. Michelle Fine, Lois
Weis, Linda C. Powell, and L. Mun Wong (New York: Routledge, 1997), 158-66.
George A. Martinez, “Mexican Americans and Whiteness,” in The Latino/a
Condition: A Critical Reader, ed. Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic
(New York: New York University Press, 1998), 175-79.
Peggy McIntosh, “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack,”
Peace
and Freedom (July/August, 1989): 10-12.
Minnie Bruce Pratt, “Identity: Skin Blood Heart,” in Yours in Struggle:
Three Feminist Perspectives on Anti-Semitism and Racism, by Elly Bulkin,
Minnie Bruce Pratt, and Barbara Smith (New York: Long Haul Press, 1984),
11-63.
Christine E. Sleeter, “How White Teachers Construct Race,” in Race,
Identity, and Representation in Education, ed. Cameron McCarthy and
Warren Crichlow (New York: Routledge, 1993), 157-71.
Books:
Neil Foley, The White Scourge: Mexicans, Blacks, and Poor Whites
in Texas Cotton Culture (Berkeley: University of California Press,
1997).
Linda Gordon, The Great Arizona Orphan Abduction (Cambridge:
Harvard University Press, 1999).
Matthew Frye Jacobson, Whiteness of a Different Color: European
Immigrants and the Alchemy of Race (Cambridge: Harvard University Press,
1998).
George Lipsitz, The Possessive Investment in Whiteness: How White
People Profit from Identity Politics (Philadelphia: Temple University
Press, 1998).
Sherene H. Razack, Looking White People in the Eye: Gender, Race,
and Culture in Courtrooms and Classrooms (Toronto: University of Toronto
Press, 1998).
David R. Roediger, The Wages of Whiteness: Race and the Making of
the American Working Class History (London: Verso, 1991).