James Baldwin & the Illusion of Whiteness
I’ve been reading James Baldwin lately and I’ve been turning over certain parts of his essay called “On Being White… And Other Lies” in my mind, struck by how apropos it remains all these years later.
Actually pretty much everything he wrote is/was germane both then and now.
On Being White is short — you can read the full piece here — but he packs in a lot to ponder.
No Such Thing as Whiteness
I read Ta-Nahesi Coates‘ book Between the World & Me when it came out a few years ago and he uses the term “people who believe themselves to be white” throughout the book. He borrowed the term from Baldwin and here’s a brief glimpse (from the aforementioned essay) into what they are talking about when they refer to us “white” folks as “people who think they are white.”
America became white –
the people who, as they claim, “settled” the country became white –
because of the necessity of denying the black presence, and justifying the black subjugation. No community can be based on such a principle–
or, in other words, no community can be established on so genocidal a lie.
