Politicizing Whiteness:
Recognition of Race Privilege and Prejudice among Rural, Southern Whites
Whiteness is a particular material, cultural, and subjective location that “signals the production and
reproduction of dominance rather than subordination, normativity rather than marginality, and privilege rather than
disadvantage” (Frankenberg 1993: 236-237). White studies acknowledge that for the most part, “whiteness” has
been invisible since it has gone unmarked, assumed, and considered normative. This invisibility of whiteness and
lack of race consciousness among whites are key aspects of the privilege of being white. Whites are able to treat race
and race relations as apolitical and still navigate society successfully. However, due to the history of the South as a
region with pronounced racial conflict and integration between “opposing groups” (blacks and whites), Southern
whites may have more “race consciousness” about being white than whites in other regions of the United States.
When they do mark whiteness, they politicize it by addressing and acknowledging more white privilege and white
prejudice than other whites.
People’s social locations, contexts, and interactions shape their experiences, their ideas about what is
normative and what is deviant, and their beliefs about themselves and others. These concepts are socially
constructed and re-constructed through comparisons and interactions with others. Making comparisons is key to
boundary work, which is establishing and distinguishing oneself in relation to others. Whether unmarked or marked,
whiteness and white identity are constructed and relational. To delimit and analyze whiteness, we must understand
that “race is not a natural category, but rather a complex and often unstable social construct”(McMillen 1995: A23).
Indeed, while some Southern whites treat whiteness as non-political by taking it as a given and taking it for granted,
other Southern whites treat it as political by addressing whether they and other whites are privileged and prejudiced,
and some do both.
Methods and Sample
The data comes from forty-two audio-taped, face-to-face, semi-structured, in-depth interviews with rural,
Southern whites in Morrisons county,
Mississippi. I chose to do in-depth interviews in order to get at the complex
levels of meaning and understanding behind people’s race identities and experiences. The interview process enabled
me to have a dialogue in which I could directly and immediately respond to the respondents and ask follow up
questions myself. I chose to study rural, Southern whites for two reasons. One, due to the history of the South as a
region with pronounced racial conflict and integration, I was interested in whether Southern whites have more “race
consciousness” about being white than whites in other regions of the United States. In particular, Mississippi is the
1
The name of this county is a pseudonym.
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Convention