Maintaining White Supremacy Through White Femininity

• In Event: Marriott Roundtable Session 28
  In Roundtable Session: Leadership, Privilege, and Women of Color

Abstract

White women have played an important but neglected role in the perpetuation of racism in this country. Characteristics associated with traditional white femininity (e.g. politeness, likeability) secure the status of whiteness by covering racism with a cloak of female niceties. This critical discourse analysis of preservice teachers’ understandings of diversity found that white women were enveloped in discourses of comfortability and likeability that prohibited deep engagement with discussions of white supremacy. Further, students of color faced the dilemma of challenging their white peers or maintaining their peers’ comfort. Constructing more complex portraits of white women’s racism provides teacher educators with insights into dismantling the white supremacy implicit in teacher education programs and suggests new possibilities for public education.

Authors

• Pamela Jean Bettis, Washington State University

• Courtney Brooke Benjamin, Broome-Tioga Board of Cooperative Educational Services

• Nicole Ferry, Washington State University

• Jeremiah C Sataraka, Washington State University - Pullman

• Jenne Schmidt, Colorado State University

• Paula Groves Price, Washington State University