15 Whiteness Quotes for You to Enjoy

The discovery of personal whiteness among the world's peoples is a very modern thing - a nineteenth and twentieth century matter, indeed. The ancient world would have laughed at such a distinction. W. E. B. Du Bois

People World Matter Nineteenth Indeed Distinction Ancient Laughed Would Discovery Very Personal Modern Century Whiteness Twentieth Twentieth Century Among Thing

I made my first white women friends in college; they loved me and were loyal to our friendship, but I understood, as they did, that they were white women and that whiteness mattered. Alice Walker

Friendship Me Women Made College First White Our Understood Were Friends Mattered Did Loved White Women Whiteness Loyal

To Trump, whiteness is neither notional nor symbolic but the very core of his power. In this, Trump is not singular. But whereas his forebears carried whiteness like an ancestral talisman, Trump cracked the glowing amulet open, releasing its eldritch energies. Ta-Nehisi Coates

Power Ancestral Releasing Carried Neither Open Like Glowing His Nor Singular Trump Very Cracked Whereas Energies Whiteness Symbolic Core

The symbolic power of Barack Obama's presidency - that whiteness was no longer strong enough to prevent peons taking up residence in the castle - assaulted the most deeply rooted notions of white supremacy and instilled fear in its adherents and beneficiaries. Ta-Nehisi Coates

Strong Fear Power White Enough Presidency Beneficiaries Obama Prevent Castle Taking Instilled Longer Most Supremacy Up Barack Rooted Notions Whiteness Assaulted Residence Deeply Symbolic

Whiteness is dynamic, relational, and operating at all times and on myriad levels. These processes and practices include basic rights, values, beliefs, perspectives and experiences purported to be commonly shared by all but which are actually only consistently afforded to white people. Robin DiAngelo

Rights People Values White Consistently Only Myriad Shared Operating Practices Times Afforded Experiences Dynamic Which Processes Commonly Perspectives Whiteness Include Beliefs Actually Basic Levels Basic Rights

I want all types of people to look at my work and see themselves, just like I watch a Reese Witherspoon movie as a black woman and can empathize with her because we have had to internalize whiteness in that way to survive. Amy Sherald

Work Woman People Black Types Way See Had Empathize Like Look Because Reese Witherspoon Survive Just Want Movie To Survive Themselves Whiteness Internalize Her Watch

Everything gleamed or glinted on TV in the '70s, from the 'flavor crystals' in Folgers coffee to the yellow dentures dipped in Polident and instantly restored to pristine, piano-key whiteness. Steve Rushin

Coffee Everything TV Restored Instantly Crystals Pristine Yellow Flavor Whiteness

Even pearls are dark before the whiteness of his teeth. William R. Alger

Dark Before Teeth His Whiteness Even Pearls

The interesting thing about white power and the desperate white knuckling grip on this thing call whiteness, which is a myth in itself, is that black folks... we're not asking you to invent new laws for us. We're asking you to include us in the laws that are already on the books. Jesse Williams

You Desperate Black Invent Myth Power White Books Folks About Laws New Call Itself Which Interesting Grip Interesting Thing Us Asking Whiteness Include Thing

In America, mixed-race identity tends to invite both curiosity and suspicion, largely because few have found a way to interrogate it without centering whiteness as the scale by which to evaluate blackness. Jenna Wortham

Few Way Scale Blackness Both Tends Invite Identity Because Without Curiosity America Suspicion Which Whiteness Evaluate Found Largely

Since I got to this country when I was 12, I've been obsessed with this idea of whiteness and blackness because I realized I was neither. For me, it was so important to me to make a film that focused on whiteness because you wouldn't have blackness if you didn't have whiteness. Jose Antonio Vargas

Me You Country Important Focused Neither Blackness Idea Obsessed Since Make Because Got Been Realized Whiteness Film

The white men of the South had better make up their minds that the blacks will remain in the South just as long as corn will tassel and cotton will bloom into whiteness. Timothy Thomas Fortune

Better Will Men Long White Corn Minds Blacks Cotton Remain Had Make Make Up South Up Bloom Just Whiteness

Well, I think that I have a complicated relationship with whiteness because oftentimes, I pass as white, and I recognize that. I would be disingenuous to pretend that I don't pass as white. Rostam Batmanglij

Relationship Complicated White Think I Think Recognize Pretend Would Would-Be Well Because Pass Oftentimes Disingenuous Whiteness

Blackness better defines who I am philosophically and socially than whiteness does. Rachel Dolezal

Better Philosophically Defines Blackness Does Am Than Whiteness Who Socially