Pyrrhic Victory: Whiteness and Perceived Racial Justice

• In Event: Research and the Politics of Division: Re/Building Coalitions for Racial Justice Leadership and Advocacy in Education Across Communities of Color

Abstract

No doubt that racial justice is a clear admirable, noble, and desired movement. However, just how one engages in racial justice may not be so clearcut. Patel & Price (2016), for example, draw upon W.E.B. DuBois to cogently assert “there is little question about the existence of the color line; less clear is how to dismantle this line” (p. 61). As such, racial justice becomes a desired commitment with an elusive contract. So what is racial justice? That racial justice should in some form improve race relations is of no contest, but beyond what or just how do we improve race relations becomes a viable quandary to consider, especially when Bell (1980) warns us that the dilemma of interest convergence is inextricably tied to civil rights. Meaning, in acknowledging that headway in civil rights was wrought with interest convergence--that is, still benefitting whites--one may question as to what headway are we making or engaging in with respect to racial justice if the dilemma of interest convergence still exist? Is racial justice for people of color? Or, does racial justice only make strides when benefitting whites? Furthermore, the existence of whiteness in a white supremacist society inadvertently, or at times, deliberately, incoulates everything from education (Leonardo, 2009) to housing (Oliver & Shapiro, 1995). In fact, even multicultural approaches to education like culturally responsive teaching can be watered down and filter by the ocular of whiteness so much so that education can become complicit in recycling hegemonic whiteness (see Matias, 2013). Suffice it to say, racial justice is no easy task especially when it “entails a hard acknowledgement of ways in which racial groups harm one another, along with affirmative efforts to redress grievances with present day effects” (Yamamoto, 1999, p. 172). When complexifying racial justice with the dilemma of interest convergence and the ever presence of whiteness, to what extent can whiteness infiltrate racial justice in ways that never truly allows whites to see the harm they enact on others and thus, by not seeing, never really redress the grievances of people of color? This theoretical paper will draw from critical race theory, particularly its analytical tool used to investigate issues of race in legal studies, and critical whiteness studies to investigate the ways in which whiteness and interest convergence may still impact modern day racial justice efforts. Using a methodology of hermeneutics of whiteness (Leonardo, 2013, 2016) and racial psychoanalytics per Yancy (2008) and Cheng (2001), this paper will analyze racial justice movements and unveil aspects of where whiteness and interest convergence still are at play. Audience members will come away from this paper critically reflecting on the ways in which they engage in racial justice and reconsider how racial justice can remain true to the liberation of people of color.

Author

• Cheryl E. Matias, University of Kentucky