I first encountered discussion of "whiteness" circa 2016 when I was teaching at a liberal arts college near NYC. The 2015 book was called "The Future of Whiteness," by Linda Alcoff. I was shocked by the book because even though it was a superficially "social constructivist" argument, it was using essentialist language to talk about race in ways that I thought we had all agreed was wrong. That was when I woke up to the fact that a very new way of thinking about race, a way that I blithely assumed was retrograde, had entered the scene. Of course I subsequently realized that I was completely naive, and that this way of thinking about race had been around for a while, and was even influential in certain corners of the field I had received my Ph.D. in, sociology. The discussion of the book was encouraged and led by several deans, although to be fair they did allow me to express my criticism of the book's arguments. In retrospect, that book and that discussion marked a point at which I realized I could no longer continue teaching at that school. Not surprisingly, the job ad for my replacement required a DEI statement from all applicants....
Wow, thanks for sharing. My first awareness wasn't regarding race but gender. As an undergrad, I pursued a minor in feminism, though the name was later changed to "gender studies." And I noticed some of the same issues. I remember one student making the claim that all heterosexual sex is rape because women are too psychologically captured by patriarchal society to give authentic consent. This was the precursor to "all white people are racist." I also studied human behavior as a grad student and encountered a lot of other wokeisms such as the concepts of safe spaces and trigger warnings, all of which are incredibly useful in a therapeutic environment, but they get wildly misapplied outside that field.
Yes, I am also very troubled about uses of the concept of "patriarchy," which seem to typically consist of wild generalizations that receive zero empirical push-back....It is deeply disturbing that so much wild, accusatory rhetoric is allowed to fly under the radar of "empirical social science."
The rhetoric is chilling, of course, and also nothing is being achieved in terms of making people's (any people, of any background), lives better. Even if that trainer had been 100% correct about every assertion, what purpose did the session serve? It's a grift.
The sad part is, Bilkszto seemed like a deeply good faith person who would have welcomed a lively discussion and a more decent, less racist diversity trainer could have easily turned the class into an enriching conversation. Everyone might have left having learned something powerful. And Bilkszto would be alive today.
I first encountered discussion of "whiteness" circa 2016 when I was teaching at a liberal arts college near NYC. The 2015 book was called "The Future of Whiteness," by Linda Alcoff. I was shocked by the book because even though it was a superficially "social constructivist" argument, it was using essentialist language to talk about race in ways that I thought we had all agreed was wrong. That was when I woke up to the fact that a very new way of thinking about race, a way that I blithely assumed was retrograde, had entered the scene. Of course I subsequently realized that I was completely naive, and that this way of thinking about race had been around for a while, and was even influential in certain corners of the field I had received my Ph.D. in, sociology. The discussion of the book was encouraged and led by several deans, although to be fair they did allow me to express my criticism of the book's arguments. In retrospect, that book and that discussion marked a point at which I realized I could no longer continue teaching at that school. Not surprisingly, the job ad for my replacement required a DEI statement from all applicants....
Wow, thanks for sharing. My first awareness wasn't regarding race but gender. As an undergrad, I pursued a minor in feminism, though the name was later changed to "gender studies." And I noticed some of the same issues. I remember one student making the claim that all heterosexual sex is rape because women are too psychologically captured by patriarchal society to give authentic consent. This was the precursor to "all white people are racist." I also studied human behavior as a grad student and encountered a lot of other wokeisms such as the concepts of safe spaces and trigger warnings, all of which are incredibly useful in a therapeutic environment, but they get wildly misapplied outside that field.
Yes, I am also very troubled about uses of the concept of "patriarchy," which seem to typically consist of wild generalizations that receive zero empirical push-back....It is deeply disturbing that so much wild, accusatory rhetoric is allowed to fly under the radar of "empirical social science."
The rhetoric is chilling, of course, and also nothing is being achieved in terms of making people's (any people, of any background), lives better. Even if that trainer had been 100% correct about every assertion, what purpose did the session serve? It's a grift.
The sad part is, Bilkszto seemed like a deeply good faith person who would have welcomed a lively discussion and a more decent, less racist diversity trainer could have easily turned the class into an enriching conversation. Everyone might have left having learned something powerful. And Bilkszto would be alive today.