Understanding White Supremacy Culture Anti-Blackness: A particular form of racism that is targeted towards Black people, not specific to the US and/or Turtle Island. BIPOC: Black, Indigenous, People of Color BIWOC: Black, Indigenous, Women of Color Colorblindness: A white, liberal approach to race that frames acknowledging race as impolite and socially unacceptable. While this approach to racial difference is intended to minimize racism, it uses an assimilationist framework that does not allow for BIPOC people to be seen, witnessed, and celebrated in their full embodied expressions. Colorblindness is a response to explicit racism that devalues these lived differences but is still stuck in a fear-based paradigm which replicates ideologies through denial of difference. Dominant Groups/Marginalized Groups: In society there are dominant groups who hold more social power and who are afforded more cultural space and other social groups who are denied social power and are not granted much cultural space. This can be reflected in language, cultural norms, visual representation, political representation, and cultural influence. Intersectionality: A term coined by Kimberlé Crenshaw and written about by Barbara Smith and the Combahee River Collective for how our multiple social identities inform and overlap with each other, particularly as experienced by Black women. These identities include race, gender, sexuality, class, citizenship, ability, religious affiliation, political affiliation, and education level. We can never be “just” our race, or “just” our gender. They are grafted on to each other and interconnected. Microaggressions: These are comments, assumptions, and gestures in social situations that are rooted in stereotypes of a social group. These are often enacted due to unconscious bias and downplayed or explained away due to their seemingly “micro” nature without considering their cumulative effects or harmful logics and impacts. People of the Global Majority: This phrase is an intentional interruption of logics that place whiteness at the center and understand BIPOC peoples as “minorities.” This intentional reframing places the lives of Black, Asian, Brown, Indigenous people, and those from the Global South at the center within a global framework to disrupt white supremacist, Eurocentric narratives and unequal power relations. Racism vs. Prejudice: While any person can display prejudice against another person attitudinally, racism is backed up by societal ideas, institutions, and structures (i.e. structural and institutional
racism), which translates to social power. Hence “reverse racism” cannot exist when there are structural barriers in place for BIPOC that do not exist for white-bodied people. Structural and Institutional Racism: Discriminatory policies and institutions that deny equal access to BIPOC. Institutional racism includes unfair housing policies, unequal education, unequal job opportunities, unequal pay, low quality healthcare, the school to prison pipeline, and unfair treatment by law enforcement. Implicit/Unconscious Bias: This relates to ways in which a person is unaware of how their belief systems and worldview inform their thoughts and actions in society. Whiteness: A cultural logic that places the experiences, cultural norms, and knowledge of people of European at the center maintained through historical amnesia to avoid grappling with culpability of histories of oppression and domination. White Supremacist Culture: A cultural landscape in which white bodied people are granted unearned privileges due to the bodies that they occupy, and anyone living in bodies that are coded “not-white” are denied opportunities because of the bodies they occupy. This can relate to housing, education, employment, and healthcare. White supremacist culture is premised on the idea that white bodied people are superior, and thus are granted more social power. White Privilege: A term coined by Peggy MacIntosh to denote the unearned social privileges granted upon white bodied people which provide extra social capital, safety, comfort, and options in everyday life. Further Resources: (Divorcing) White Supremacy Culture: Coming Home to Who We Really Are: https://www.whitesupremacyculture.info/ Tema Okun, Tenets of White Supremacy Culture: https://www.whitesupremacyculture.info/uploads/4/3/5/7/43579015/okun__white_sup_culture_2020.pdf Dismantling Racism: https://www.dismantlingracism.org/ The Racial Healing Handbook: Practical Activities to Help you Challenge Privilege, Confront Systemic Racism, and Engage in Collective Healing, Anneliese A. Singh, Ph.D., LPC