Whiteness Flashcards
Being white vs Caucasian
- outdated term for when we believed there were only 3 racial groups
- refers to an actual geographical area
- Khabib Nurmagomedov is Caucasion
term Caucasian usually indicates a desire to create distance from discussions about race
you have to be born in a certain geographical location to call yourself caucasian
* from Georgia
what is Whiteness
White people/ white culture are reproduced as race-less
* it is universal
Issues of racism become positioned as “special interests”
seen athletically as the perfect mixture of “brain and brawn”
there is an internal hierarchy to whiteness in addiction to the broader racial hierarchy
white history is the history
* Hockey’s history has been told through a white lens
country music
* every facet of country music comes from black tradition
* active erasure of Blakc people from country music
whiteness
a location of structural advantage; directly linked to a societal position of power that affords those perceived as white with invisible privilege unavailable to othered bodies
white supremacy
belief that the white race is inherently superior and/or a structure of power designed for the benefit of white people in political, economic, and social terms
Broad racist ideology
* foundation of eugenics
* systems of oppression
* colonization
white supremacists: the individual
* KKK
White Separatism
form of white supremacy that believes white people should exist seperately from all other non-white races either through the creation of a separate state or through eradication of non-whites
form of white supremacy
white nationalism
believe in a country built by and for white people, do not necessarily believe in 100% white society but that white people should dominate and be the majority
- version of white supremacy but the enacting part/the doing part rhetoric around defending the nation (make America great again)
- stricter immigration laws and building the wall
white privilege
socio-political system that distributes power, privilege and benefits unequally among groups; it is rooted in the history of European colonial domination and settlement
- racism is the one thing that you don’t have to think about
The hierarchy of whiteness
- European nations closest to African perceived as “less white”
- Those furthest away perceived as most “pure”
- as we move further East it also raises questions about White purity
the Whiteness of Kinesiology
- Kin programs tend to reproduce colonial, ableist, racist, versions of science
- Pool of physical education teachers are 83% white
- 81% of National Athletic Trainer’s Association are white
- 90% + of Physical Therapy professionals are white
- KIN curricula provide a narrow understanding of science and people’s experiences
- think about the images shown in class, authors of readings, faculty/student composition, types of sport activities taught/covered
- Queen’s historically is White
the Wellness-to-Fascism Pipeline
- the imagery of wellness: slender, white, middle-class/upper-class women
- wellness is the neoliberal interpretation of health
- Individualism has evolved into anti-vaccine messaging
- merging of Qanon and anti-vaxxers has taken place through wellness communities
- con spirituality: confluence of yoga, wellness, and spirituality
- skepticism of vaccines (part of wellness discussion)
Most pernicious fallacies promoted by anti-vaxx rhetoric is that good health is an individual responsibility and achievement, when it is more often the result of privilege
Ayahuasca: Shaman takes the drug
* now people go to drink it because of failures of the medical sysem or from curiosity
* owners feed into cultural appropriation in order to survive
the Alt-Right and Barstool
Richard Spencer (white nationalist) created it
promotes
* racial seperatism
* scientific racism
* gender essentialism
* anti-diversity
seeks the restoration of white male fraternal bonds
Portnoy voted for Trump
* Barstool created homosocial spaces
Alt-Right
- Born via internet
- appealing to college age white men
- tend to have been promised the world
- lie that if you work hard enough you can achieve anything
What does it teach
* that women and immigrants are the problems
* Rebranding of white supremacists
* should be no consequences to masculinity
* freedom equated to no consequences
Alt-Right Recruitment
- Look for lonely young men online via video games, chat rooms
- be-friend them
- drop a questionable static or meme
- slowly the rhetoric becomes more racist, xenophobic etc.
- create a fun and social environment with a culture based in music, jokes etc.
- Do not need consistent ideologies
- Alt-right has found a way to create identity, community, and purpose
White Fragility
- White North Americans operate in “insulated environment of racial protection”
- enabling them to move through space and life without hvaing to acknowledge whiteness as a privilege structure of racial hierarchy
- creates an inability to deal with “racial stress”, a lack of racial stamina = white fragility
- white interests are often positioned as universal interests
- common white fragility responses: anger, withdrawal, guilt, argumentation
