Sunday, September 25, 2005
The Past Week
Well, technically I was supposed to journal about the following questions over a week ago, but then I had a big weekend trip out of town and then I got distracted by schoolwork during the week, so I'm only getting around to these now.
How do "white people" balance issues of ethnic pride with historical perspectives of social justice?
Well, some don't. But most do, and I think they do it through domestic traditions such as family recipes and traditions. In my case, my German and Scottish ancestry directly links me to some fairly nasty episodes in European and North American history. My great-great grandparents were German immigrants who settled on land once inhabited by Native people. Is that my personal fault? No, of course not. But I am a direct beneficiary of the farm and the prosperity that followed.
The thing is, I don't particularly feel German or Scottish. I feel white, yes, but my ethnicity is really less and less important to me as the years go by. I used to really enjoy reading about Scottish history (and my mom even made me a kilt once), but these days I just don't really care anymore - mostly because the more I thought about this infatuation I had with my Scottishness, the more I realized the claim was in name only. I have a Scottish surname. Big whoop. That doesn't make me Scottish any more than painting the word "turbo" on the side of a '78 Gremlin makes it go faster.
What does it mean to be "white?"
It means being not categorized as something else. Just like being rich means not having to worry about money, being white means not having to worry about race. I'm growing more and more convinced of this.
What is the role of social class?
To separate and categorize. I have yet to figure out why people need to classify other people, but I think it has something to do with how easy it is to deal with someone when you can categorize them first, especially if that categorization is "Other."
Does "whiteness" justify/explain cultural exclusion - i.e., "I'm American, everyone else should be!"
Nope. The whole discourse around Otherness is not, in fact, about "liking" differences in culture; it's about recognizing that the differences exist and are not a basis for making value judgments. ¶ 9:46 AM
How do "white people" balance issues of ethnic pride with historical perspectives of social justice?
Well, some don't. But most do, and I think they do it through domestic traditions such as family recipes and traditions. In my case, my German and Scottish ancestry directly links me to some fairly nasty episodes in European and North American history. My great-great grandparents were German immigrants who settled on land once inhabited by Native people. Is that my personal fault? No, of course not. But I am a direct beneficiary of the farm and the prosperity that followed.
The thing is, I don't particularly feel German or Scottish. I feel white, yes, but my ethnicity is really less and less important to me as the years go by. I used to really enjoy reading about Scottish history (and my mom even made me a kilt once), but these days I just don't really care anymore - mostly because the more I thought about this infatuation I had with my Scottishness, the more I realized the claim was in name only. I have a Scottish surname. Big whoop. That doesn't make me Scottish any more than painting the word "turbo" on the side of a '78 Gremlin makes it go faster.
What does it mean to be "white?"
It means being not categorized as something else. Just like being rich means not having to worry about money, being white means not having to worry about race. I'm growing more and more convinced of this.
What is the role of social class?
To separate and categorize. I have yet to figure out why people need to classify other people, but I think it has something to do with how easy it is to deal with someone when you can categorize them first, especially if that categorization is "Other."
Does "whiteness" justify/explain cultural exclusion - i.e., "I'm American, everyone else should be!"
Nope. The whole discourse around Otherness is not, in fact, about "liking" differences in culture; it's about recognizing that the differences exist and are not a basis for making value judgments. ¶ 9:46 AM
