RACISM 101: understanding race and racism
Racism is a word that is widely used and yet often carries many different meanings depending on who is using it. If we want to work together effectively for racial justice, and we do, we need to be clear about what racism is, how it operates, and what we can do to end it.
We define racism, also referred to as white supremacy, as the pervasive, deep-rooted, and longstanding exploitation, control and violence directed at People of Color, Native Americans, and Immigrants of Color that produce the benefits and entitlements that accrue to white people, particularly to a white male dominated ruling class.
We define racism, also referred to as white supremacy, as the pervasive, deep-rooted, and longstanding exploitation, control and violence directed at People of Color, Native Americans, and Immigrants of Color that produce the benefits and entitlements that accrue to white people, particularly to a white male dominated ruling class.
Often white people think of racism as prejudice, ignorance, or negative stereotypes about People of Color. This definition often leads to the assumption that the solution to racism is to challenge misinformation about People of Color or other marginalized groups or to convince white people to be more tolerant or accepting.
In fact, prejudice, ignorance, and stereotypes are the result of racism, not the cause. Every one of us in this society, growing up with the lies, misinformation, and stereotypes found in our media, textbooks, and cultural images and messages, carries deep-seated and harmful attitudes towards many other groups.
It is our responsibility, as people with integrity, to unlearn the lies and misinformation we have learned and to replace them with more truthful and complex understandings of the peoples and cultures around us.
Racism operates on three different levels and it is important to understand each of them and their interconnections:
In fact, prejudice, ignorance, and stereotypes are the result of racism, not the cause. Every one of us in this society, growing up with the lies, misinformation, and stereotypes found in our media, textbooks, and cultural images and messages, carries deep-seated and harmful attitudes towards many other groups.
It is our responsibility, as people with integrity, to unlearn the lies and misinformation we have learned and to replace them with more truthful and complex understandings of the peoples and cultures around us.
Racism operates on three different levels and it is important to understand each of them and their interconnections:
Interpersonal Racism
When a white person can take their misinformation and stereotypes towards another group and perform an act of harassment, exclusion, marginalization, discrimination, hate or violence they are committing an act of interpersonal racism towards an individual or group.
When we move beyond talking about prejudice and stereotypes in our society we generally focus on acts of interpersonal racism. These are the kinds of acts that we hear about in the media—a hate crime, an act of job or housing discrimination, negative racial comments about People of Color, racial profiling or violence by a police officer towards a Person of Color.
These acts are definitely damaging. But the system of racism is much larger than these personal acts. And racism would not be eliminated by ending these individual acts. If we limit our discussion to these interpersonal acts, we end up focusing on the impact of individual “rotten apples.” All we need to do is punish/censor/screen out these particularly racist individuals and things would be pretty good.
In fact, our culture is much more comfortable encouraging us to focus on an individual "rotten apple" than it is on helping us to see the ways in which racism is deeply embedded in the policies and practices of our institution and the beliefs and values of our culture.
One of the ways our culture keeps racism in place is by continuing to focus only on individual acts of racism.
What are a couple of examples of interpersonal racism that you have seen personally or heard about from the media recently?
What harm do they do?
When we move beyond talking about prejudice and stereotypes in our society we generally focus on acts of interpersonal racism. These are the kinds of acts that we hear about in the media—a hate crime, an act of job or housing discrimination, negative racial comments about People of Color, racial profiling or violence by a police officer towards a Person of Color.
These acts are definitely damaging. But the system of racism is much larger than these personal acts. And racism would not be eliminated by ending these individual acts. If we limit our discussion to these interpersonal acts, we end up focusing on the impact of individual “rotten apples.” All we need to do is punish/censor/screen out these particularly racist individuals and things would be pretty good.
In fact, our culture is much more comfortable encouraging us to focus on an individual "rotten apple" than it is on helping us to see the ways in which racism is deeply embedded in the policies and practices of our institution and the beliefs and values of our culture.
One of the ways our culture keeps racism in place is by continuing to focus only on individual acts of racism.
What are a couple of examples of interpersonal racism that you have seen personally or heard about from the media recently?
What harm do they do?
Institutional Racism
Racism also operates through the policies, procedures, and practices of the institutions in our society. Racism is built into the policies, procedures, and everyday practices of the health care system, the education system, the job market, the housing market, the media, and the criminal "justice" system to name a few. That means that it operates both systematically and without the need for individual racist acts. People can simply be following the rules and produce outcomes that benefit white people and harm People of Color because the rules are set up to reproduce racism.
For example, during most of the history of this country it was illegal for white and Black people to marry across racial lines, eat together in public, travel together, or shop together on an equal basis. Therefore shopkeepers, bus and train conductors, public officials and others weren’t unusually racist to enforce segregation—they were just following the law, acting as law-abiding white citizens.
Similarly a white school teacher can be teaching her students equally, addressing the needs of each individual student and helping every single one advance to the next grade level. But if she is teaching in a school or school system where there are no Teachers of Color, where white students are tracked into higher level courses than Black students, where Students of Color are disciplined more harshly than white students and/or the curriculum does not reflect the contributions of People of Color to our society, then the school is racially discriminatory despite the efforts of the “color-blind” teacher.
What are a couple of examples of institutional racism in our society?
What harm does institutional racism do to People of Color?
How does it benefit white people?
For example, during most of the history of this country it was illegal for white and Black people to marry across racial lines, eat together in public, travel together, or shop together on an equal basis. Therefore shopkeepers, bus and train conductors, public officials and others weren’t unusually racist to enforce segregation—they were just following the law, acting as law-abiding white citizens.
Similarly a white school teacher can be teaching her students equally, addressing the needs of each individual student and helping every single one advance to the next grade level. But if she is teaching in a school or school system where there are no Teachers of Color, where white students are tracked into higher level courses than Black students, where Students of Color are disciplined more harshly than white students and/or the curriculum does not reflect the contributions of People of Color to our society, then the school is racially discriminatory despite the efforts of the “color-blind” teacher.
What are a couple of examples of institutional racism in our society?
What harm does institutional racism do to People of Color?
How does it benefit white people?
Structural Racism
The cumulative impact of interpersonal and institutional racism within our society creates a system of structural racism. The racism of different institutions overlap, reinforce, and amplify the different treatment that People of Color receive compared to that which white people receive, ensuring different life outcomes.
One example is the school-to-prison pipeline in which Children of Color are pushed out of our schools and into the criminal legal system. Racism within the school system, the welfare system, child protective services, the foster care system and at all levels of the criminal legal system interact to produce a system which disproportionately limits the educational opportunities of young People of Color and disproportionately disciplines and locks them up.
Another example is how lack of affordable health care and access to affordable healthy food options, coupled with higher exposure to toxic chemicals and other forms of pollution, coupled with job discrimination and housing segregation produces greater health problems, shorter life spans, lower wages, and greater levels of poverty for Communities of Color.
Structural racism is reinforced by the many layers of cultural racism in our society—the systemic and pervasive images, pictures, comments, literature, movies, advertisements, and on-line media which consistently portray People of Color, Native Americans, and Immigrants of Color as inferior, lazy, dangerous, sexually manipulative, infantile, and less smart than white people, while holding up white people in general as capable, honest, hard working, patriotic, safe—the heroes, leaders, and builders of our country.
Cultural appropriation is the logical consequence of cultural racism. Cultural appropriation occurs when those of us in the white group take a piece or pieces of a people's culture without having authentic relationships with the people or the culture and/or without their permission, often (not always) in order to financially profit.
So for example, we assume the traditional dress of a people for a Halloween party and call it a "costume," while remaining unaware of and unconcerned about the roots of such dress and the history of oppression that the people producing that dress have faced and fought.
What are examples of structural racism—the interplay between different forms of institutional and interpersonal racism?
What are examples of cultural racism that you have seen recently?
What do you imagine is their cumulative impact on People of Color, Native Americans, and Immigrants of Color?
What do you see as their cumulative impact on white people—what attitudes and expectations do they produce in us?
What do you think needs to be addressed to stop these and other acts of violence against People of Color, Native Americans, and Immigrants of Color?
One example is the school-to-prison pipeline in which Children of Color are pushed out of our schools and into the criminal legal system. Racism within the school system, the welfare system, child protective services, the foster care system and at all levels of the criminal legal system interact to produce a system which disproportionately limits the educational opportunities of young People of Color and disproportionately disciplines and locks them up.
Another example is how lack of affordable health care and access to affordable healthy food options, coupled with higher exposure to toxic chemicals and other forms of pollution, coupled with job discrimination and housing segregation produces greater health problems, shorter life spans, lower wages, and greater levels of poverty for Communities of Color.
Structural racism is reinforced by the many layers of cultural racism in our society—the systemic and pervasive images, pictures, comments, literature, movies, advertisements, and on-line media which consistently portray People of Color, Native Americans, and Immigrants of Color as inferior, lazy, dangerous, sexually manipulative, infantile, and less smart than white people, while holding up white people in general as capable, honest, hard working, patriotic, safe—the heroes, leaders, and builders of our country.
Cultural appropriation is the logical consequence of cultural racism. Cultural appropriation occurs when those of us in the white group take a piece or pieces of a people's culture without having authentic relationships with the people or the culture and/or without their permission, often (not always) in order to financially profit.
So for example, we assume the traditional dress of a people for a Halloween party and call it a "costume," while remaining unaware of and unconcerned about the roots of such dress and the history of oppression that the people producing that dress have faced and fought.
What are examples of structural racism—the interplay between different forms of institutional and interpersonal racism?
What are examples of cultural racism that you have seen recently?
What do you imagine is their cumulative impact on People of Color, Native Americans, and Immigrants of Color?
What do you see as their cumulative impact on white people—what attitudes and expectations do they produce in us?
What do you think needs to be addressed to stop these and other acts of violence against People of Color, Native Americans, and Immigrants of Color?
Questions for discussion:
- What are a couple of examples of interpersonal racism that you have seen personally or heard about from the media recently? What harm do they do?
- What are a couple of examples of institutional racism in our society? What harm does institutional racism do to people of color? How does it benefit white people?
- What are examples of structural racism—the interplay between different forms of institutional and interpersonal racism?
- What are examples of cultural racism that you have seen recently? What do you imagine is their cumulative impact on people of color, Native Americans, and immigrants of color? What do you see as their cumulative impact on white people—what attitudes and expectations do they produce in us?
- What do you think needs to be addressed to stop these and other acts of violence against people of color, Native Americans, and immigrants of color?
From dRworks workbook - www.dismantlingracism.org.
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The 3 Expressions of Racism: Another way to think about racism as more than personal is to understand that personal racism (individual acts of meanness) occurs within institutions. The policies and practices of those institutions in their turn are disproportionately serving and resourcing white people while underserving and exploiting People of Color. This institutional racism reproduces itself within a culture that tells us that white people are smarter and more qualified while People of Color are undeserving. |
More About Race and RAcism...
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Race was constructed for the social and political purposes of white supremacy. read more... |
The origins of racism in western societies is deep and complex. read more... |
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Resources that go deeper into the history of race, racism, and the fight for racial justice:
- Click here for a short article on the history of race-based slavery in Virginia.
- Click here for a longer article on how colonial Virginia created slavery and race.
- Click here for an informative review of Theodore Allen's book "The Invention of the White Race."
- Click here for an even longer article on "The Birth of Race Based Slavery."
- Click here for interactive timeline on The History of Racial Injustice.
- Click here for a civil rights chronology.
- Click here for the article "1667: The year America was divided by race."
- Click here for a video on "The west was built on racism. It's time we faced that."