Using phenomenology and critical whiteness to understand the experiences of white college-student social-justice allies and their interactions and relationships with anti-inclusive family and friends
Date
2020
Authors
Cleveland, Jon, author
Anderson, Sharon K., advisor
Kim, Joon, committee member
Munin, Art, committee member
Muñoz, Susana, committee member
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Abstract
This qualitative dissertation explored the research question, "How do white college-student social-justice allies describe their interactions and relationships with anti-inclusive family and friends?" The data were collected from 12 white college-student social-justice allies at a predominantly white institution in the western part of the United States with a student population over 30,000. The study exposed several important findings, organized under four themes, including: More Concern than Promise (the participants regularly experienced anti-inclusive interactions), Identities Beyond Being White are Significant (the unique role marginalized identities played in interactions and relationships), Voices and Silence (the participants regularly using and not using their voices in the face of anti-inclusion), and Strained, Changed, and Governed (the changes in relationships the participants experienced). Through this study, we are reminded about the complex phenomenon of whiteness and the many ways that white supremacy happens, even among well-intentioned white allies. Using critical whiteness as a theoretical framework, the findings exposed several tenets of white supremacy (minimization of racism, invisibility of whiteness, white action and complacency, white privilege, and rules of whiteness) manifested through the participants' interactions and relationships.
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Subject
college student
social-justice ally
anti-inclusive
white supremacy
critical whiteness