Privilege, Oppression, and Difference

1. Privilege, Oppression, and Difference

2. Friday the 13th…. There is nothing inherently frightening about what we don’t know. If we feel afraid, it isn’t what we don’t know that frightens us, it’s what we think we do know. --Dr. Allan Johnson

3. Systems • A system’s culture defines a persons differences: • Race • Gender • Sexuality • (Dis) Ability • Language • Ethnic-Cultural values • Religion • Food tastes • Apparel/fashion • Etc.

4. So, if a system’s culture defines a persons differences, and differences are historically-socially constructed for political-economic interests, then we can conclude that social categories such as race, gender, sexuality have no significance outside systems of privilege and oppression in which they were first created.

5. Social Construction of Difference • In a society, like the United States of America, that has had a loooooooooong history of systematic oppression, difference has/is/continues to be politically constructed in order to produce hierarchies and maintain the invisible knapsack. • Refer to Peggy McIntosh “White Privilege Male Privilege”

6. Mapping Difference: Who Are You?

7. Privilege • Privilege operates always in relation to someone else’s oppression (either individually or collectively). • It remains invisible because it has been made the dominant narrative, therefore it is rarely questioned. • What happens when it is questioned? • What kicks in? Why?

8. 2 Kinds of Privilege • 1) Unearned Entitlements (Unearned Advantage) • All people should have access and guarantee of this regardless of social constructs of inequity. • 2) Conferred Dominance • Cultural assumption that justifies the dominance of one category of people vs. another.

9. Key Connections • The granting of privilege has nothing to do with who those individuals are as people. • E.G. Male privilege is more about MALE people than it is about male PEOPLE. (Johnson, 34). • Fixed Privileges V. Not—fixed Privileges • E.G. Heterosexuality is not fixed. That is to say that it is not publicly acknowledged. • “I am gay” or coming out is necessary only because US society protects hetero-normativity.

10. Hetero-normativity • The ideology, structures, and norms that maintains heterosexuality to be the “norm” for sexual orientation; ‘Traditional’ gender roles between man and woman.

11. What is Difference? • To talk about difference means to bring discussion about privilege and power. • Difference becomes an issue when it is used to justify political-economic interests. • Inclusionary V. Exclusionary citizenship • Access to wealth V. denial to wealth • Value of culture V. not recognizing of culture • Ex: Men = A. Women = Not A. • Ex: Straight = A. Gay = Not A. • Ex: White = A. Color = Not A.

12. Why?

13. Because hierarchies don’t allow for a critical examination of ones own privileges or advantages since identity is intersectional (privilege and oppression operate simultaneously).

14. Oppression • Oppression results from social relationships between privileged and oppressed categories. • In order to have the experience of oppression, one must first belong to an oppressed group. • Women • People of color • LGBTQ • Disabled

15. Dimensions of Oppression • Systematic – • US institutions discriminate against racialized bodies, whether by design or accident. • Interpersonal • Socially sanctioned ideologies maintain systems of domination and subordination. • Personal • Institutional treatment and interpersonal realities shape your lived experiences.

16. Class Wrap-Up Understanding systems of Superordinate and subordinate, privilege and oppression, normativity and ‘otherness’, white and non-white, ‘bias’ and bias is one of the major foci to this class and the field of critical ethnic studies. Can you handle it? Last day to drop classes without penalty is Sept. 17th.

17. Dope quotes • “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” – William Faulkner • “The paradox of education is precisely this—that as one begins to become conscious one begins to examine the society in which he is being educated.” – James A. Baldwin • “To be a student and not a revolutionary is a contradiction.” Salvador Allende • “There isn’t any Negro problem; there is only a white problem.” – Richard Wright