In the article “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack” and “Some notes for Facilitators”, McIntosh precisely defines Racism and White Privilege as “an invisible package of unearned assets that I can count on cashing in each day, but about which I was “meant” to remain oblivious. White privilege is like an invisible weightless knapsack of special provisions, maps, passports, codebooks, visas, clothes, tools and blank checks.” She also mentions that “whites are carefully taught not to recognize white privilege, as males are taught not to recognize male privilege“ This is something people fail to recognize as they find comfort in their ignorance or simply because they actually are not aware of the many privileges they have to their advantage. For the purpose of this assignment, I will be incorporating stories of my classmates and me in relation to the topic of Race and White Privilege and using them to discuss the normative narrative and to disrupt it as well.
i) Normative Narratives
In Kiel’s story, he talks about excitedly meeting his cubby neighbor, Shawn in his kindergarten class. He notices how different both he and Shawn are but does not think too much of it. Looking back to this story now, Kiel realizes that the color of Shawn’s skin did not bring much attention to him because Kiel was simply focused on meeting his new friend and rather than being put with Shawn’s differences, he was more attentive on “who he was as a person, and our similarities” in other words, he was “blind to the differences”. Both Kiel and Shawn’s mother speaking together also shows how Kiel was not too curious about their differences because his mother gives a great example of speaking to “different” people and treating them as equal if it were a white person. At a young age he is familiarized with people of color.
In Taylor’s story, she recognizes diversity in her classroom through posters and magazines that included people of different races, culture, languages, and skin tones. She is familiar with her own skin color and acknowledges that she has met and talked to people with different skin colors. When she met her new classmate Lily, she became great friends with her and was fascinated from where she was from. As she got home she started to draw a picture of her and Lily. She notices that there is only one marker in the tone of her skin color but not one that matches Lily. With curiosity she asks her mother and she explains that “it was probably because sometimes people with different skin colors get left out which is not very nice.” Taylor realizes one of the many privileges she has with being white: a marker with her skin color.
These two stories somewhat relate to each other because Kiel and Taylor recognize the differences in some people but do not bother to ask questions as to why they look or sound a certain way. They accepted their classmate as the way they are and became great friends. They are aware of their privilege and though they may have advantages in situations and such, they did not use it against their classmates or to poke fun because just like what Kiel said, they both were focused on “who they were as a person, and our similarities.”
In relation to my story, I have a similarity for the classmate that is a person of color. Some of my classmates are aware of the skin color differences we have between each other and gladly that did not bring any problems in our friendship. I do relate with Taylor’s story with her recognizing a marker of her skin color and how the rest of skin tones are left out. Every time I drew myself and would need a color to match my skin tone, I would just use the brown even though it was a much darker complexion because it was the closest color I could use. What brings me comfort is that children are recognizing the differences with others like skin tone, cultures, and language at a young age. The majority are untroubled by it and live their school lives normally because they were taught from an elder which is important for when they happen to be curious and to avoid bringing discomfort to the person of color like Brooke’s story in which will be explained.
ii) Creating counter-stories: Disrupting Normative Narratives
In Brooke’s story, she and her classmates are introduced with a new classmate, Odeon. The classroom welcomes her by saying hello but Brooke noticed a big difference of treatment from when Ryder was a new student. When Ryder was introduced, he was “welcomed with open arms” where for Odeon, a group of students started to ridicule her because of her appearance and accent. During recess, Brooke witnessed a bunch of her classmates encircling Odeon, who was already at an agonizing state. Students were questioning as to why “is your skin black” and brought a lot of curiosity when they noticed beads in her hair. In avoidance of trouble, they ran away when they noticed the school supervisor walking towards them. Although Brooke was raised that there are other children with different colors, that moment was her first encounter with a classmate with a different skin tone and she thought nothing was wrong. She noticed differences but that did not give her the mentality to treat her any different because as she was told by her mother, “that some kids have different skin colors and at the end of the day- everyone bleeds the same.”
Brooke’s story differs from the first two because it shows a glimpse of reality in the life of a person of color. The unfair treatment of others due to the person’s skin color is just the beginning. I may have not been surrounded by students questioning the differences between us, but I and many others surely experience the comments and prejudice through not only in person, but through social media and the many things we go through, witness and live in our day to day lives. These stories are written by the people who experienced this as a child, they made friends who differ from them and saw no issue with their skin color. Why is it different for a mature adult? People recognizing the advantage they have and seeing the issues to those destitute brings a little ease for myself. But what can you do with that privilege? Use that advantage you have and acknowledge the different cultures and language, use that to help and educate others especially those who are stuck in their hole of ignorance that they keep digging deeper.
References
Blind to differences. (2021, February 6). Welcome to Edusites! – ePortfolio Hosting at the University of Regina. https://edusites.uregina.ca/kielschmidt/2021/02/06/blind-to-differences/
Rudolph, D. (1989). ‘White privilege: Unpacking the invisible knapsack’ and ‘Some notes for facilitators. National SEED Project. https://nationalseedproject.org/Key-SEED-Texts/white-privilege-unpacking-the-invisible-knapsack
Self story #2 | ECS 1O2. (2021, February 8). Welcome to Edusites! – ePortfolio Hosting at the University of Regina. https://edusites.uregina.ca/brookeecs102/2021/02/08/self-story-2/
Self story #2 – The one who stood out – Lovelee Cabrera. (2021, February 6). Welcome to Edusites! – ePortfolio Hosting at the University of Regina. https://edusites.uregina.ca/loveleecabrera/2021/02/06/self-story-2/
Writing the self 2: Drawing my new friend. (2021, February 9). Welcome to Edusites! – ePortfolio Hosting at the University of Regina. https://edusites.uregina.ca/taylorblake/2021/02/09/writing-the-self-2-drawing-my-new-friend/