The gratifications of whiteness : W.E.B. Du Bois and the enduring rewards of anti-blackness / Ella Myers.
"W.E.B. Du Bois famously argued that whiteness in the U.S. in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries functioned as a 'public and psychological wage,' offering valuable social standing to even the poorest of whites. Such 'compensation,' dependent on the devaluation...
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| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Ebook |
| Language: | English |
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New York, NY :
Oxford University Press,
[2022]
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | Oxford Scholarship Online |
| Summary: | "W.E.B. Du Bois famously argued that whiteness in the U.S. in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries functioned as a 'public and psychological wage,' offering valuable social standing to even the poorest of whites. Such 'compensation,' dependent on the devaluation of Black existence, helped secure the U.S. capitalist regime and prevent interracial class solidarity. This book argues that Du Bois's influential account of compensatory whiteness is crucially important, but also incomplete. For Du Bois, whiteness was never one thing, but many. Focusing on Du Bois's middle-period work (about 1920-1940), Ella Myers uncovers an overlooked, complex analysis that theorizes whiteness as a source of varied gratifications. These gratifications include not only the status rewards of racial capitalism, but also the enjoyment of gratuitous Black suffering and the conviction that the planet belongs to those marked as 'white.' The book shows that Du Bois's analysis, developed in response to the pressing political problems of his own day, also offers insight into 21st century struggles for racial justice. Myers argues that it is important to recognize the extent to which anti-Blackness continues to underwrite plural -- and deeply disturbing -- forms of white gratification here and now. Doing so helps explain the tenacity of America's unequal racial order and also reveals why creative, multifaceted strategies of resistance are necessary to end it."--Back cover of paperback edition. |
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| Physical Description: | 1 online resource (xi, 243 pages) |
| Bibliography: | Includes bibliographical references and index. |
| ISBN: | 0197556760 9780197556764 0197556779 9780197556771 0197556787 9780197556788 0197556795 9780197556795 0197556809 9780197556801 |