More Work Is Needed

• In Event: What Can White People Do? Whiteness and Education in the Current Moment

Abstract

In this talk, I rely on Johnson’s (2017) methods of racial storytelling to tell and theorize two stories about whiteness to consider why its continued study is important for white people. This talk is intended as a provocation for researchers and educators to consider the potential pedagogical work white people might engage to contribute to better understandings of whiteness and anti-racism.

I place Thandeka’s (1999) work concerning how white people grow into our whiteness in relation to Lensmire’s (2017) exploration of how white people mediate their race through real and imagined people of color to problematize how white people engage in teaching and learning about race. Further, I worry that white people exacerbate logics of white supremacy when we imagine that race is always and only about people of color. Yes, people of color have and continue to suffer due to logics of white supremacy. Still, white people are ill-equipped to work against white supremacy in solidarity with people of color until we better understand the ways white supremacy has dehumanized us. Indeed, Ralph Ellison (1953/1995) finished an essay about twentieth century fiction by assuring his white reader that it was “meant as no plea for white writers to define Negro humanity, but to recognize the broader aspects of their own” (pp. 98-99). For Ellison, white people need to understand that white supremacy strips us of our humanity. Ultimately, I tell and interpret two brief stories to illustrate that it remains urgent for white people to better understand their whiteness in order to inspire more thoughtful engagement with race, racism, and anti-racism in education.

Participants will leave this talk having considered the following questions:

How can white people better contribute to the pedagogical work of anti-racism in education?

What is afforded when we imagine that race is a problem that white people need to actively address in our living, our teaching, and our research?

References

Ellison, R. (1953/1995). Shadow and act. New York, NY: Vintage International.

Lensmire, T. J., (2017). White folks: Race and identity in rural America. New York, NY:
Routledge.

Thandeka. (1999). Learning to be white: Money, race, and God in America. New York, NY: Continuun.

Author

• Samuel Jaye Tanner, University of Iowa
  Presenting Author