What Does It Mean to Be White?
Developing White Racial Literacy – Revised Edition
Series:
Robin DiAngelo
Chapter 14: Popular White Narratives That Deny Racism
Extract
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POPULAR WHITE NARRATIVES THAT DENY RACISM
In my neighborhoods it has only been white people. Ever since elementary school, I have always been taught to treat everybody equally and that just because you have a different skin color doesn’t mean that you are different or should look down on anyone. I always learned about slavery in history classes and how it was many years ago. Society has gotten much better now and society and schools are trying to teach everyone not to be prejudice. I am proud to treat everybody equal. (ASR)
My particular neighborhood was not very racially diverse but surrounding neighborhoods were. I have always been taught to treat everyone equally. Although my neighborhood was not racially diverse, my high school was. Even though it was, most of the people I hung around with are white. This is not saying I wouldn’t be friends with someone of a different race, it just happened like that. (ASR)
There are many common white narratives about racism that I have attempted to clarify throughout the previous chapters. However, given their tenacity, I want to explicitly address a few key ones here. These misconceptions limit rather than expand understanding of what racism is and how it works, and thus function to protect rather than to challenge racism. In this way they can be conceptualized as ideologies of white supremacy. ← 255 | 256 →
“Racism is in the past. I didn’t...
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