1. Chapter Six: White Privilege and the Changing U.S. Racial Hierarchy
By Tanya Maria Golash-Boza

2. White Privilege
“It is important to think about white privilege for several reasons. First of all, if we want to understand racial oppression, it is crucial to understand how it looks from the other side. Second, white privilege often remains invisible, and by bringing it to light we can develop a better understanding of how racism works in our society. Nevertheless, it is important to keep in mind that all whites do not experience white privilege in the same way.” (p. 152)

3. Some Examples of White Privilege from “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack” by Peggy McIntosh
“I can go shopping alone most of the time, pretty well assured that I will not be followed or harassed.”
“Whether I use checks, credit cards, or cash, I can count on my skin color not to work against the appearance of financial reliability.”
“I can swear, or dress in secondhand clothes, or not answer letters, without having people attribute these choices to the bad morals, the poverty, or the illiteracy of my race.” (p. 151)

4. White Privilege as Unearned Privilege
An image that presents this idea has been developed by an artist who portrayed what looks like an American Express card, that includes a certain message: “White Privilege Rewards” and the name on the card is “B. E. Aware.”(The Wejr Board, 2011, April 4)
The idea behind the card is that there is already a resource-loaded and pre-loaded card that a white person simply has to use.

5. Rewards are Not Equal Across the Board
“Does white privilege benefit all whites equally? White privilege certainly benefits some whites, yet these benefits are not spread equally among them. When an employer gives a white applicant the benefit of the doubt because he is white, the applicant experiences white privilege, whether or not he is aware of it. However, whiteness is not experienced in the same ways by all whites. A poor lesbian white woman in rural South Carolina, for example, will experience her whiteness— her white privilege—in different ways than a wealthy white heterosexual male stockbroker in New York.” (pp )

6. Differential Privilege
Social class—Poverty versus Middle Class privilege
Sexual Orientation—Lesbian or gay oppression versus straight privilege
Gender—Women experience patriarchy and differential societal expectations exist for women classified in different racial groups
Place of Residence—Segregated neighborhoods contain unequal resources.

7. Definitions of White
U.S. Census categories may define who is white and have shifted over time as representative of “social constructions of difference.” (p. 167)

8. Whiteness in Contemporary Times
“Some groups have moved closer to whiteness, whereas others have moved further away.” (p. 156)
Racial hierarchies shift. Examples:
Latinos
Arab Americans, North Africans, Middle Easterners

9. Multiracial Identity
Much variability in how different people identify themselves
Does a child who has one white parent identify as white? Or biracial? Or Multiracial? Or favor the non-white parent?
Does the identity shift with the situation and people one is around?
Physical appearance, socioeconomic status, and social networks influence this self-identification. (p. 161)

10. Three Models Explaining Future of White Majority
The White/Nonwhite Divide—Whiteness will continue to be an exclusive category in which Asians and Latinos will be excluded through socioeconomic exclusions.
The Black/Nonblack Divide—Whites will expand to include everyone but Blacks.
The Tri-racial Order: Latin-Americanization—This creates a system of whites at the pinnacle, those considered “honorary whites” in the middle, and blacks at the bottom.

11. Ending Thought
White privilege is an important dynamic to understand and identify
Groups may change in racial identification or be simultaneously an ethnic and a racial group
Multiracial identity helps both challenge and reinforce current racial hierarchies
The racial hierarchy could flex in different ways with population change according to scholars.

12. Racial Categories: Is Latino a Racial or Ethnic Group?
Latino can both be considered a race, as some Latinos answer with this label when asked what their race is. This is an example of racial assimilation.
Latino can also be an ethnicity in that specific practices although with much in-group diversity characterize the groups included in the label.

13. Conclusion
“…[I]t is far from obvious who is white and who is not. We have also seen there are benefits related to being classified as white, yet that these benefits are not spread evenly across the white population.” (p. 172)

14. Reference
The Wejr Board. (2011, April 4). What is in YOUR invisible knapsack. Retrieved from invisible-knapsack/