Featured Books
White Fragility
The New York Times best-selling book exploring the counterproductive reactions white people have when their assumptions about race are challenged, and how these reactions maintain racial inequality. In this "vital, necessary, and beautiful book" (Michael Eric Dyson), antiracist educator Robin DiAngelo deftly illuminates the phenomenon of white fragility and "allows us to understand racism as a practice not restricted to 'bad people' (Claudia Rankine). Referring to the defensive moves that white people make when challenged racially, white fragility is characterized by emotions such as anger, fear, and guilt, and by behaviors including argumentation and silence. These behaviors, in turn, function to reinstate white racial equilibrium and prevent any meaningful cross-racial dialogue. In this in-depth exploration, DiAngelo examines how white fragility develops, how it protects racial inequality, and what we can do to engage more constructively. Download readers guides at www.beacon.org/whitefragility.
Articles, book chapters, etc.
- White Fragility (Reading/Discussion Guides)Links to pdfs the general reading guide, discussion guide for educators, and discussion guide for UU communities.
Smith, L. (2020). White Fragility. Critical Questions in Education, 11(1), 95–100. Link to full text
- A reflection on my (the author's) reactions to DiAngelo's White Fragility. In this piece, I select themes and discuss their function in their work to achieve DiAngelo's goal of uncovering her own White Fragility. The themes I speak about are DiAngelo's use of the tool of story and how it functions to uncover a White lens valuing objectivity; uncovering the White Lens as a critique of self; and barriers to understanding White complicity, namely the White lens itself, and valuing the myth of objectivity and individualization obscuring Whiteness. In honouring my own story and journey, I aim to be more upfront about my Whiteness and my lenses that have brought me to where I am, so that I may share my viewpoint with others who may be considering embarking on their own journey. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
Evans-Winters, V. E., & Hines, D. E. (2020). Unmasking white fragility: How whiteness and White student resistance impacts anti-racist education. Whiteness & Education, 5(1), 1–16. https://doi-org.sandiego.idm.oclc.org/10.1080/23793406.2019.1675182
- The authors analyse how white undergraduate pre-service teachers resist anti-racist teacher education courses, and how acts of white fragility and white student resistance are employed against Black female professors. In this discussion, we draw from our experiences as two Black women faculty at two predominately white institutions (PWI). Using Critical Race Feminism we discuss how white student resistance is manifested in social interactions with Black female faculty, and how the racialized and gendered spaces of higher education, specifically teacher education, impacts teaching and learning. We introduce a conceptual framework for elucidating white student resistance using psychological and sociological concepts including 1) passive-aggressive behaviours, 2) groupthink, 3) lynch mob, and 4) bystander's effect. This article advances scholarship on white student resistance to non-hegemonic curriculum in higher education, and how whiteness structures student's ability to develop anti-racist praxis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
Podcasts
Book reviews
- Book Review: White fragility: Why it's so hard for White people to talk about racismReviewed by: NiCole T. Buchanan, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI; Stephen A. Alexander, Alliance Revenue Management Solutions, East Lansing, MI
- White TearsDiAngelo's White Fragility reviewed by Haley Riemer for Women's Review of Books
