Whites Challenging Racism Syllabus
Week 1: Historical Understanding
Readings:
- Understanding
Racism: An Historical Introduction by Sharon Martinas, a
white
anti-racist organizer with the Challenging
White Supremacy Workshop.
- What
is
White Supremacy? by Elizabeth Martínez who has taught Ethnic
Studies and Women's Studies in the California State
University system part-time since 1989 and lectures around the country.
She is the author of six books, including two on Chicano/a
history. She has been an anti-racist activist since
1960.
Her best-known work is the bilingual book 500 Years of Chicano History in
Pictures,
used by teachers, community groups, and youth since 1976.
- Optional,
supplemental:
the first two chapters of Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United
States.
Discussion on defining terms such as racism and white supremacy
Week 2: Privilege,
Barriers & Fears
Readings on white privilege and barriers to anti-racist
organizing
Week 3: Continuing to
Implicate
Ourselves
- Chapter 1, The
Possessive
Investment in Whiteness: How White People Profit from Identity Politics
by George Lipsitz
- The
Meritocracy Myth: A Dollars & Sense interview with
Lani Guinier
Week 4: Intersections
between racism,
classism, colonialism, and patriarchy
Week 5: Family histories
- Sharing & discussing our family
histories
- The Color of Supremacy: Beyond the discourse of "white
privilege"
by Zeus Leonardo, Educational
Philosophy and Theory, 36(2), 137-152 (2004).
Week 6:
Backlash & Cultural
Appropriation
Week 7: Experiencing and
Responding to
Racism
- "La
Guera," by Cherrie Moraga in This
Bridge Called My
Back (1979).
- "Killing Rage," Killing
Rage:
Ending Racism by bell hooks (1995).
- "Where Are You From?" by Geeta Kothari in Under Western Eyes: Personal
Essays from
Asian America (1995).
- Optional,
supplemental: "The
Uses of Anger: Women Responding to Racism," Sister Outsider by
Audre Lorde
(1984).
Week 8: Gentrification,
Casinos &
More
Week 9: Prison Industrial
Complex
Guest speaker: Dr. Barbara Johnson, Associate Dean and Director of
Diversity Initiatives at Carlow
University
speaks on racism in Pittsburgh
Week 10: Being an
effective
anti-racist ally