Sangha Is All
An embodied awareness community
Born in 1960 in a small Illinois town with a population of about 6,700 people, my earliest experiences of racialization were similar to the vast majority of racialized as white (RAW) people at that time; they were based upon life in a community made up almost exclusively of other RAW people.
In 1968, my parents carefully sought out an integrated neighborhood in Chicago to relocate our family to, and they succeeded. For about a year. Two school photos from my elementary years have survived. During my first year in Chicago, my 3rd grade class photo includes 18 RAW, 2 Hispanic heritage, 1 Asian heritage, and 12 African American students. Just three years later, my 6th grade class photo reflects 1 RAW student (me), 1 Asian heritage student, 1 Hispanic heritage student, and 25 African American students. Redlining and white flight had rapidly changed neighborhood racial diversity and by 1972 I was effectively a racial minority in my community. These circumstances were my first conscious and explicit experience with racialization.
While communities across the US are changing, most RAW people have not had the kind of experiences with race my circumstances created. In 1973, my Iowa cousin took me to a Donny Osmond concert at the Iowa State Fair. That same year back at home, we were listening to Eddie Kendrick and the Chi-Lights. And in practicing with these experiences, I’ve come to understand that we all have distinct experiences with racialization, regardless of the color of our skin.
I’ve come to understand that the structural racism we live with today evolved into being not because Black or any other people of color exist, but because laws were created in colonial America to enact privilege for a specific group of persons who were then, for the first time, described in law as “white.” At that time, “white” meant a person of English heritage but, over time, “white” has simply come to mean person to whom privilege is conferred upon. The US Census Bureau currently defines “white” as “A person having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa,” so “white” includes, for instance, Iraqi, Lebanese, Egyptian, and Sudanese people. This US Census Bureau definition of “white” flies in the face of the US Code definition of “racial group” as “a set of individuals whose identity as such is distinctive in terms of physical characteristics or biological descent.” When the facts don’t fit the frame, you’re being bullshitted.
RAW people are accustomed to examining questions of race and racism in terms of the inequities imposed upon people of color. While that is a worthwhile and necessary activity, without self-examination by racialized a white people, the ways in which today’s structural racism hurts all people will never be understood…and self-examination by RAW people is significantly absent. Self-examination is not the same as self-flagellation. Many supportive ways for exploring whiteness are available today. Sangha Is All offers several ways to explore whiteness in a safe yet rigorous container. Click here for more information.
Exploring the content of your personal racialization can be transformative.
To schedule a Personal Racialization Conversation with me, or to learn more, click here.