This research toolkit, co-published with the MacKenzie Art Gallery, was originally released in 2020 to prepare audiences for the 2023 exhibition Conceptions of White. The exhibition is currently on view at the Art Museum from January 11 to March 25, 2023.
This toolkit remains available for those interested in learning more about the concept of White identity.
In the midst of global and local uprisings against the systemic violence perpetrated upon Black, Indigenous and racialized communities, John G. Hampton and Lillian O’Brien Davis are sharing some resources from their active research for the exhibition Conceptions of White. The exhibition looks at the origins, travel, and present reality of “Whiteness” as a concept and racial invention for classifying degrees of humanity and justifying discrimination throughout all our social structures.
The subjugation of Black, Indigenous, and other racialized bodies is a foundational tenet in how the concept and institution of the “White Race” was created. And whilst there has never been any scientific or genetic basis for the category, and where there are no essential characteristics that can be prescribed to White people, one thing has remained constant since its invention. In the North American context, state power (as represented in all its infrastructures and institutions, from the police to healthcare, design of cities and education, art and cultural history) has been—since colonization—consolidated under White leadership and ideologies. If the brutal murder of George Floyd and the ongoing acts of police violence closer to home have newly opened many more eyes to the structural devaluing and vilification of Black lives, there continues to be a profound and more insidious violence in systemic racism—blindness, active denial, and blaming the victims.
The exhibition seeks to make visible the nature of White identity as the norm within North American legal, political, social, and economic models. We are undertaking this project to more fully understand our institutional foundation, and to be able to better recognize the normalized forms and invisibility of White identity in our society. It is also part of a larger project of examining the existential, experiential, and ethical dimensions of our institutional presence and activities, including how we can resist and undo the racist frameworks embedded within our own histories and context in order to help create a more just and inclusive community and culture. It is active, evolving, and ongoing, and we welcome your input and participation.
Links to Resources
Podcasts/Websites
- John Biewen and Dr. Chenjerai Kumanyika, “Seeing White.”
Podcast by Scene on Radio, February (August 2017).
- Whitney Dow, “Whiteness Project” (2014).
Ongoing, interactive video installation and website.
- Aruna D’Souza, Justin Stanwix, Whitney Dow, and Rich Benjamin, “‘White Male’ Panel Discussion.” MoMA (25 March 2019).
- Nell Irvin Painter, Why White People are Called Caucasian (Illustrated), University of California Television (2014).
- Jennifer L. Eberhardt, “How Racial Bias Works – and How to Disrupt It,” TED Talk (2020).
- Gene Demby & Shereen Marisol Meraji. “Why Now, White People?” Audio Podcast by Code Switch, NPR (June 2020).
Collections
Books
- Theodore W. Allen, The Invention of the White Race, Vol. 1 (London / New York: Penguin Random House, 1994).
- Constance Backhouse, Colour-Coded: A Legal History of Racism in Canada (Toronto: Osgoode Society for Canadian Legal History by University of Toronto Press, 1999).
- Bruce Baum, The Rise and Fall of the Caucasian Race: A Political History of Racial Identity (New York: New York University Press, 2008).
- Daniel Coleman, White Civility: The Literary Project of English Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2006).
- Denise Ferreira Da Silva, Toward a Global Idea of Race (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2007).
- Robin DiAngelo, White Fragility: Why it’s so hard for White People to talk about Racism (Boston: Beacon Press, 2018).
- Aruna D’Souza, Whitewalling: Art, Race & Protest in 3 Acts (New York: Badlands Unlimited, 2018).
- Richard Dyer, White: Essays on Race and Culture (London: Routledge, 1997).
- Ken Gonzales-Day, Lynchings in the West: 1850-1935 (Durham: Duke University Press, 2006).
- Elisa Hategan, Race Traitor: The True Story of Canadian Intelligence Service’s Greatest Cover-Up (Toronto: Incognito Press, 2014).
- Katherine Ellinghaus, Jane Carey, and Leigh Boucher (eds). Re-Orienting Whiteness (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009).
- Ibrahim X. Kendi, How to Be an Antiracist. (New York: One World, 2019).
- Nell Irvin Painter, The History of White People (New York: Norton, 2010).
- Claudia Rankine, Citizen: An American Lyric (Minneapolis: Graywolf Press, 2014).
- Vivek Shraya, even this page is white (Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp Press, 2016).
- George Yancey, Who Is White?: Latinos, Asians, and the New Black/Nonblack Divide (Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2003).
Articles
- Sara Ahmed, “A Phenomenology of Whiteness.” Feminist Theory 8, no. 2 (August 2007).
- Elijah Anderson, “The White Space.” Sociology of Race and Ethnicity Vol. 1 no. 1 (2015).
- James Baldwin, “On Being White… And Other Lies.” Anti-Racism Digital Library. (Originally published in Essence, April 1984).
- Homi Bhabha, “The White Stuff.” ArtForum (May 1998).
- Eula Biss, “White Debt.” New York Times (December 2015).
- Shawna Carroll, “The Construction and Perpetuation of Whiteness [in Canada].” Journal of Unschooling and Alternative Learning Vol. 8 Issue 15 (1 July 2014).
- Adam Coombs, “The Ever-Changing Nature of White Canada.” Active History (3 August 2017).
- Tilman C. Cothran, “Negro Conceptions of White People.” American Journal of Sociology (March 1951).
- Andrew R. Chow, “‘We Have No Practice Talking About Race in This Country.’ Claudia Rankine on White Privilege and Her New Play Help.” TIME (6 March 2020).
- iLiana Fokianaki, “Redistribution via Appropriation: White(washing) Marbles.” e-flux Journal # 91 (May 2018).
- Lauren Michele Jackson, “What’s Missing From ‘White Fragility.‘” Slate (4 September 2019).
- Genevieve Fuji Johnson and Robert Howsam, “Whiteness, Power and the Politics of Demographics in the Governance of the Canadian Academy.” Canadian Journal of Political Science 53 (2020).
- Hiro Kanagawa, “The Unbearable Whiteness of Being.” Medium (7 June 2020).
- Peggy McIntosh, “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack.” Peace and Freedom Magazine (July/August, 1989).
- Quinn Norton, “How White People Got Made.” Medium (17 October 2014).
- Xaviera Simmons, “Whiteness must undo itself to make way for the truly radical turn in contemporary culture,” The Art Newspaper (2 July 2019).
- Judith Taylor, “Murdering white men and the work of white women” Toronto Star (June 2020).
- Ryan Wong, A Syllabus for Making Work About Race as a White Artist in America, Hyperallergic (6 April 2017).
- Jenna Wortham, “White Filmmakers Addressing (or Avoiding) Whiteness Onscreen.” New York Times (29 August 2019).
- George Yancey, Dear White America, New York Times (December 2015).
Scholarly articles for download
Other reading lists
Credits
Banner Image: Ken Gonzales-Day. The Wonder Gaze (St. James Park, CA. 1935), from the Erased Lynchings series, 2006–2022. Print and vinyl wall installation. Courtesy of Luis De Jesus Los Angeles.
Images 1-4: Howardena Pindell, Free, White and 21, 1980, video (colour, sound), 12:15 min. Courtesy of the artist and Garth Greenan Gallery, New York.
