An African-Centered Perspective on White Supremacy

Abstract

This article engages the idea of White supremacy and its ideological companion, racism, from the standpoint of critical analysis. What this article seeks to do is to reveal the nature of White supremacy as it has operated in the United States and in the United Kingdom. Using an African-centered paradigm, the article demonstrates that the existence of White supremacy marginalizes African people within both societies. Only by utilizing an agency analysis where Africans see themselves as subjects can White supremacy be overcome.White nationalism was the basis of [European] slavery, and eventually, when slavery reached a saturation point, white nationalism invented another form of slavery called colonialism. And after colonialism they computerized colonialism with a form of racism.- Clarke (1991, p. 268) Throughout the last four and a half centuries, racism and white supremacy have continually threatened the existence of African people before, during, and after enslavement. These threats have forced Africans to modify their beliefs, thoughts, and behavior in order to survive on a planet where they are regarded as "Third World" people. Those who now claim to be members of "First World" are actually late comers to the human family.

White Institutional Presence: The Impact of Whiteness on Campus Climate

“…According to Schiele (1994), the philosophical base of higher education in the United States is ethnocentric and exclusive. While White ascendancy reflects social behavior, monoculturalism reflects organizational behavior that cuts across all facets of institutional practices and policies (e.g., conducting research and teaching) and has profound ramifications for the perceptions of the world and knowledge dissemination (Christian, 2002).…”

The Fletcher Report 1930: A Historical Case Study of Contested Black Mixed Heritage Britishness

“…The fact that the City of Liverpool in 1999 formally apologised to its Black communities for the role it played in the enslavement trade era and subsequent decades of institutionalised racism is an important landmark, but much more has to be done to improve the socioeconomic condition relating to Blacks of mixed heritage in Liverpool (see Christian 2002b: 184–186).…”

Public Sociology or Partisan Sociology? The Curious Case of Whiteness Studies

“…It took for granted a set of processes that established the legitimacy of, then normalized, white values and expectations as superior to nonwhite values and expectations-made possible because whites control the "gateway to knowledge" (Sue 2004). 13 In the absence of sustained critique, Eurocentrism will continue to reproduce dominance as a virtue (Christian 2002;Jeffery 2005;Perry 2001). …”

“…Whiteness studies appropriated the postmodern critique of Western epistemologythat is, whiteness constitutes a pseudo-universal category that hides its racial project behind various guises (Baez 2000;Blanchett 2006;Bowers 1996;Christian 2002;Gillman 2007;Green and Sonn 2006;Hays and Chang 2003;Johnson et al 2000;Keating 1995;Lynn and Parker 2006;Marable 2002;Perry 2001;Reitman 2006;Scheurich and Young 1997;Sleeter 1993). This project imposed a Eurocentric version of the world upon nonwhites-especially the precepts, assumptions, and values of the Enlightenment.…”