Whiteness: Feminist Philosophical Reflections

by Cuomo, Chris J.; Hall, Kim Q.

• ISBN13: 9780847692941
• ISBN10: 0847692949
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1999-12-01
• Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Pub Inc

Summary

Written in an engaging narrative style these philosophical investigations undermine racist hierarchies along with false natualistic conceptions of the meanings of race and universalistic understandings of gender, by considering whiteness as it shapes and is infused by gender, class, sexuality, and culture. Central to this project are questions about how it is that culture and the state create such a wide range of different people who understand themselves as white. The essays collected here discuss how one learns to be a good white Southern woman, what it means to pass as white, and whether there really is a dilemma that accompanies white privilege.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	vii
Introduction: Reflections on Whiteness	1	(14)
Chris J. Cuomo
Kim Q. Hall
Glancing Backward
My Grandmother's Passing	15	(14)
Linda Lopez McAlister
My Father's Flag	29	(8)
Kim Q. Hall
Growing Up in Little Rock	37	(8)
Amy Edgington
Pinay White Woman	45	(10)
Linda M. Pierce
Performing Whiteness
The American Celebration of Whiteness	55	(2)
Judy Scales-Trent
The King of Whiteness	57	(6)
Chris J. Cuomo
``Whitie'' and ``Dyke'': Constructions of Identities in the Classroom	63	(14)
Laurie Fuller
Identity and Privilege
White Ideas	77	(8)
Naomi Zack
Despising an Identity They Taught Me to Claim	85	(20)
Alison Bailey
The Other Colors of Whiteness: A Travelogue	105	(12)
Lisa Tessman
Bat-Ami Bar On
Epilogue	117	(2)
Related Reading	119	(10)
Index	129	(2)
About the Contributors	131