What Does It Mean to Be White?: Developing White Racial Literacy by Robin DiAngelo

Author:Robin DiAngelo [DiAngelo, Robin]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Tags: Social Science, sociology, General
ISBN: 9781433131103
Google: 9x_4jwEACAAJ
Publisher: Lang, Peter
Published: 2016-11-15T23:57:31.594263+00:00

But let me be clear. I do not view myself as a bad person and do not feel guilty about racism. Racism is a system that I inherited but did not create. I do not believe that most of us would choose to be socialized into racism and white supremacy. Unfortunately, we didn’t have that choice. So I must take responsibility now that I can see it. This means working to challenge racism both within and without me. (Concrete steps for how to do this will be discussed in Chapter 16.) ← 191 | 192 →

Discussion Questions

1. The author traces some of the specific ways that her life has been shaped by racism. Consider your own socialization. In what specific ways has your life has been shaped by racism?

2. What are the earliest racial messages you can recall? We receive many more implicit messages than explicit messages. If you are white, try to move beyond what you were openly told or your first interactions with people of color and work to identify implicit messages.

3. Consider your education, the media, health care, the military and other social institutions from the perspective of the white racial frame. What messages were conveyed specifically from these institutions?

4. How are the messages identified in questions 2 and 3 conveyed in your current life?

5. In what settings have you experienced the expectation of white solidarity/racial silence? How has that expectation been communicated to you? How have you responded? How might you respond differently in the future?

6. Consider the bulleted list following the author’s analysis of The Blind Side. Why is this story so appealing to white people? Whose vision of the world do these stories serve? What racial scripts get reinforced by these stories? Where else have you seen these racial scripts?

7. The author describes the power of segregation. She argues that segregation is “active.” What does she mean? Discuss how various patterns of segregation across your life span shape your racial frame.

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