A thread about whiteness: Whiteness, as one of the primary conduits through which hegemony asserts (and reasserts) itself, relies on an inability to see the interconnectedness of things. 1/7

So, for instance, whiteness can see "racism" as a new phenomenon and name it as endemic of "the age of Trump" rather than to see its long tail and reckon with the idea that the Civil Rights Act of 1965 nor Obama's election as president "solved" race. 2/7

Whiteness also, as I "got into it" on another post, can see a University's actions as separate, so that, say, the release of a new logo, an effective hiring freeze (although heaven forbid we call it that)... 3/7

And the seeming endless trek of BIPOC faculty and administration away from it are imagined as disconnected events-- or as universities would like us to understand it, as different pots of money, and as such, one thing has no bearing on the other. 4/7

And whiteness and its separation of these things is always seen as innocuous. These projects had a longer tail and the results are just being released. That money was spent long ago. Black people should "get over" slavery because it was "so long ago." 5/7

Dismantling racism involves dismantling whiteness, dismantling hegemony and I'd also add, dismantling the two-party political system in the US (and the electoral college). 6/7

It's hard work. But we'd be better off in the long run if we actually engaged in that work versus making what my friend Kristen Warner might call "plastic" overtures. 7/7