White privilege (or white skin privilege) refers to advantages that white people enjoy in many societies beyond those commonly experienced by people of color in the same social, political, or economic spaces (nation, community, workplace, income, etc). It sometimes connotes unspoken advantages, which white people may not realize they have. These include cultural affirmations of one's own worth, greater presumed social status, and freedom to move, buy, work, play, and speak freely. White privilege also implies the right to assume the universality of one's own experiences, marking others as different or exceptional while perceiving one's self as normal. It can be compared and combined with male privilege.
Academic perspectives such as critical race theory and whiteness studies use the concept of "white privilege" to analyze how racism and racialized society affect the lives of whites. The term is often used in the United States and Europe but also applies in other places with histories of racial stratification after colonialism, such as South Africa and Australia.
Conservative critics of the "white privilege" concept such as Shelby Steele have argued that white people do not benefit from unfair advantages and may even be victims of institutionalized racism since minority groups benefit from race-based affirmative action programs and other special advantages. Some left-wing critics have argued that that white privilege is less significant than class privilege. In academic circles, the concept of white privilege has been critiqued on the grounds that whiteness is not a discrete identity with properties that apply to all white people.
Read more about White Privilege: History of The Concept, Global, In South Africa, In Australia
Famous quotes containing the words white and/or privilege:
“Where do whites fit in the New Africa? Nowhere, I’m inclined to say ... and I do believe that it is true that even the gentlest and most westernised Africans would like the emotional idea of the continent entirely without the complication of the presence of the white man for a generation or two. But nowhere, as an answer for us whites, is in the same category as remarks like What’s the use of living? in the face of the threat of atomic radiation. We are living; we are in Africa.”
—Nadine Gordimer (b. 1923)
“my
mother hoped that
i would die etcetera
bravely of course my father used
to become hoarse talking about how it was
a privilege and if only he
could”
—E.E. (Edward Estlin)