Skip to main content
Log in

Whiteness and Cultural Theory: Perspectives on Research and Education

  • Published:
The Urban Review Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

With the influx of whiteness literature into the cultural studies scene, this essay attempts to locate four major trends or lines of thought within a diverse body of work. Further, the impact of this research on education is considered in order to determine how whiteness studies might inform multicultural education initiatives. Ultimately, the essay is designed to provide a conceptual frame that organizes this research while arguing that whiteness is of premier concern to educators in the efforts to promote diversity, equality, and social justice in education.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Similar content being viewed by others

REFERENCES

  • Aanerud, Rebecca (1997). Fictions of whiteness: Speaking the names of whiteness in U.S. Literature. In Ruth Frankenberg (ed.), Displacing Whiteness: Essays in Social and Cultural Criticism, pp. 35–59. Durham: Duke University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Alcoff, Linda. (1991–1992). The problem of speaking for others. Cultural Critique (Winter 1991–92): 5–32.

  • Anzaldúa, Gloria (1987). Borderlands, la Frontera. San Francisco: Aunt Lute.

    Google Scholar 

  • Butler, Judith (1990a). Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Butler, Judith (1990b). Performative acts and gender constitution: An essay in phenomenology andfeminist theory. In Sue Ellen Case, ed., Performing Feminisms: Feminist Critical Theory and Theatre, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Butler, Judith (1993). Bodies That Matter: On the Discursive Limits of Sex. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chabram-Dernersesian, Angie (1997). On the social construction of whiteness within selected Chicana/o discourses.” In Ruth Frankenberg, ed., Displacing Whiteness: Essays in Social and Cultural Criticism. Durham: Duke University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cohen, Phil (1997). Laboring under whiteness. In Ruth Frankenberg, ed., Displacing Whiteness: Essays in Social and Cultural Criticism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Crenshaw, Carrie (1997). Resisting whiteness' rhetorical silence. Western Journal of Communication 61: 253–278.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dunbar, Roxanne A. (1997). Bloody footprints: Reflections on growing up poor white. In Matt Wray and Annalee Newtiz, eds., White Trash: Race and Class in America. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dyer, Richard (1988). White. Screen 29(4): 44–64.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ellsworth, Elizabeth (1997). Double binds of whiteness. In Michelle Fine, Lois Weis, Linda C Powell, and L. Mun Wong, eds., Off White: Readings on Race, Power, and Society. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fine, Michelle, Weis, Lois, Powell, Linda C., and Wong, L. Mun., eds. (1997). Off White: Readings on Race, Power, and Society. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Frankenberg, Ruth (1993). White Women, Race Matters: The Social Construction of Whiteness. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Frankenberg, Ruth, ed. (1997a). Displacing Whiteness: Essays in Social and Cultural Criticism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

  • Frankenberg, Ruth (1997b). Introduction: Local whiteness, localizing whiteness. In Ruth Frankenberg, ed., Displacing Whiteness: Essays in Social and Cultural Criticism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Giroux, Henry A. (1997a). Racial politics and the pedagogy of whiteness. In Mike Hill, ed., Whiteness: A Critical Reader. New York: New York University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Giroux, Henry A. (1997b). Rewriting the discourse of racial identity: Towards a pedagogy and politics of whiteness. Harvard Educational Review 67(2): 285–320.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hall, Stuart (1992). What is this “black” in black popular culture. In Gina Dent, ed., Black Popular Culture. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hartigan, John, Jr. (1997a). Locating white Detroit. In Ruth Frankenberg, ed., Displacing Whiteness: Essays in Social and Cultural Criticism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hartigan, John, Jr. (1997b). Objectifying “poor whites” and “white trash” in Detroit. In Matt Wray and Annalee Newtiz, eds., White Trash: Race and Class in America. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Henwood, Doug (1997). Trash-o-nomics. In Matt Wray and Annalee Newtiz, eds., White Trash: Race and Class in America. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hill, Mike (1997a). Can whiteness speak? Institutional anomies, ontological disasters, and three Hollywood films. In Matt Wray and Annalee Newtiz, eds., White Trash: Race and Class in America. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hill, Mike, ed. (1997b). Whiteness: A Critical Reader. New York: New York University Press.

  • hooks, bell (1997). Representing whiteness in the black imagination. In Ruth Frankenberg, ed., Displacing Whiteness: Essays in Social and Cultural Criticism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kipnis, Laura, with Reeder, Jennifer (1997). White trash girl: The interview. In Matt Wray and Annalee Newtiz, eds., White Trash: Race and Class in America. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lee, Enid. (1995). Taking multicultural, anti-racist education seriously: An interview with Enid Lee. In David Levine, Robert Lowe, Bob Peterson, and Rita Tenorio, eds., Rethinking Schools: An Agenda for Change. New York: New Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lorde, Audre (1984). Sister Outsider. Freedom, CA: The Crossing Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Maher, Frances A., and Tetreault, Mary Kay (1994). The Feminist Classroom: An Inside Look at How Professors and Students are Transforming Higher Education for a Diverse Society. New York: Basic Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Maher, Frances A., and Tetreault, Mary Kay Thompson (1997). Learning in the dark: How assumptions of whiteness shape classroom knowledge. Harvard Educational Review 67(2): 321–349.

    Google Scholar 

  • McIntosh, Peggy (1988). White Privilege and Male Privilege: A Personal Account of Coming to See Correspondences Through Work in Women's Studies. Working Paper No. 189. Wellesley College Center for Research on Women.

  • McIntyre, Alice (1997). Making Meaning of Whiteness: Exploring Racial Identity with White Teachers. New York: SUNY Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • McLaren, Peter (1997). Decentering whiteness. Multicultural Education 5(1): 4–11.

    Google Scholar 

  • Montag, Warren (1997). The universalization of whiteness: racism and enlightenment. In Mike Hill, ed., Whiteness: A Critical Reader. New York: New York University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Morrison, Toni (1970). The Bluest Eye. New York: Holt Rinehart & Winston.

    Google Scholar 

  • Morrison, Toni, ed. (1992). Race-ing Justice, En-gendering Power: Essays on Anita Hill, Clarence Thomas, and the Construction of Social Reality. New York: Pantheon Books.

  • Morrison, Toni (1993). Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination. New York: Vintage Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mull, Martin, and Rucker, Allen (1985). The History of White People in America. New York: Perigee Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Muraleedharan, T. (1997). Rereading Gandhi. In Ruth Frankenberg, ed., Displacing Whiteness: Essays in Social and Cultural Criticism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Nakayama, Thomas K., and Krizek, Robert L. (1995). Whiteness: A strategic rhetoric. Quarterly Journal of Speech 81: 291–309.

    Google Scholar 

  • Overall, Christine (1997). Feeling fraudulent: Some moral quandaries of a feminist instructor. Educational Theory 47(1): 1–13.

    Google Scholar 

  • Penley, Constance (1997). Crackers and whackers: The white trashing of porn. In Matt Wray and Annalee Newtiz, eds., White Trash: Race and Class in America. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pineau, Elyse Lamm (1994). Teaching is performance: Reconceptualizing a problematic metaphor. American Educational Research Journal 31(1): 3–25.

    Google Scholar 

  • Roediger, David R. (1997). White looks: Hairy apes, true stories, and Limbaugh's laughs. In Mike Hill, ed., Whiteness: A Critical Reader. New York: New York University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Roman, Leslie G. (1997). Denying (white) racial privilege: Redemption discourses and the uses of fantasy. In Michelle Fine, Lois Weis, Linda C Powell, and L. Mun Wong, eds., Off White: Readings on Race, Power, and Society. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sandoval, Chéla (1997). Theorizing white consciousness for a post-empire world: Barthes, Fannon, and the rhetoric of love. In Ruth Frankenberg, ed., Displacing Whiteness: Essays in Social and Cultural Criticism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shome, Raka (1996). Race and popular cinema: The rhetorical strategies of whiteness in City of Joy. Communication Quarterly 44: 502–518.

    Google Scholar 

  • Staub, Michael E. (1997). The whitest I: On reading the Hill-Thomas transcripts. In Mike Hill, ed., Whiteness: A Critical Reader. New York: New York University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sweeny, Gael (1997). The king of white trash culture: Elvis Presley as the aesthetics of excess. In Matt Wray and Annalee Newtiz, eds., White Trash: Race and Class in America. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Talbot, Margaret (November 30, 1997). Getting credit for being white. New York Times Magazine: 116–119.

  • Twine, France Winddance (1997). Brown-skinned white girls: Class, culture, and the construction of white identity in suburban communities.” In Ruth Frankenberg, ed., Displacing Whiteness: Essays in Social and Cultural Criticism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Vorlicky, Robert H. (1997). Performing men of color: Male autoperformance, highways performance space, the NEA, and the white right. In Mike Hill, ed., Whiteness: A Critical Reader. New York: New York University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ware, Vron (1997). Island racism: Gender, place, and white power. In Ruth Frankenberg, ed., Displacing Whiteness: Essays in Social and Cultural Criticism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wellman, David T. (1993). Portraits of White Racism, 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wellman, David (1997). Minstrel shows, affirmative action, and angry white men: Marking racial otherness in the 1990s. In Ruth Frankenberg, ed., Displacing Whiteness: Essays in Social and Cultural Criticism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • West, Candace, and Fenstermaker, Sarah (1995). Doing difference. Gender and Society 9(1): 8–37.

    Google Scholar 

  • West, Candace, and Zimmerman, Don H. (1987). Doing gender. Gender and Society 1(2): 125–151.

    Google Scholar 

  • West, Cornel (1993). Race Matters. New York: Vintage Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wray, Matt, and Newitz, Annalee, eds. (1997). White Trash: Race and Class in America. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Warren, J.T. Whiteness and Cultural Theory: Perspectives on Research and Education. The Urban Review 31, 185–203 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1023235624671

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1023235624671

Keywords

Navigation