Learning to be White: Money, Race and God in America

By Thandeka

Book Overview

Thandeka explores the politics of the white experience in America. Tracing the links between religion, class, and race, she reveals the child abuse, ethnic conflicts, class exploitation, poor... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0826410545
• ISBN13: 9780826410542
• Release Date: January 2000
• Publisher: Continuum Intl Pub Group
• Length: 169 Pages
• Weight: 0.98 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.8" x 0.5" x 6.3"

Customer Reviews

So much we don't know

I have only recently started looking at White Priveledge and racism in a very new light. Most white people, including myself, have a true blind spot about our assumptions about people of color as well as about being white. This book Learning to Be White: Money, Race, and God in America, which I am still reading, opened my eyes to how we, at a very young age, start learning to recognize difference between races from our caretakers. Thandeka writes about childhood incidents which are only too common, such as, parents making it clear that a new friend of color is not a welcome friend and not welcome in the home, a new boyfriend of color, also not approved of or welcome. As children we accept thi s, as we depend on our caretakers (parents) for love and a place of belonging. There is much that white people take for granted that is ours simply because we are white. As Thandeka states it, we, as white people are "in the driver's seat." Thandeka also writes about the difficult assimilation of immigrants to the United States and how these people have been taught to become racist by the white people with power. A very difficult read at times, not a "fun book," but very eye-opening. A book I recommend reading to illuminate those blind spots about race.

THIS WAS GOOD

This was a great, hard hitting book. It is about time America started discussing "WHITE" people and how they become white. The issues that are raised in this book apply to the majority of the white people in the USA. I would have to disagree with one reader who claims that other racial and ethnic minorites experience the same amount of shame and rejection as whites when it comes to interacial friendships because that is not true. I wonder what was the color of those who wrote negative reviews of this book? Did they go out and play the race game? This book is a break through for white identity! This book will be around for decades to come because it is already making its mark within the university.

You've Got To Be Carefully Taught

There is a line from a song in Rogers & Hammerstein's "South Pacific" that goes: "To hate all the people your relatives hate, you've got to be carefully taught." Thandeka's book is about how children are taught racism. It begins with a series of anecdotes about how various children were taught racism; for example, one little boy invited his friends to his birthday party, to the evident consternation of his parents, who let him know in no uncertain terms that inviting black friends into his home was NOT acceptable behavior. He was made to feel that he had done something very wrong. Young children, dependent on their parents for their very survival, are in no position to question the rightness of their parents' teachings, even when they may feel something is wrong. Survival requires them to conclude that the fault is theirs, and they must accept what they are taught and adjust their feelings accordingly. As I read this book, I recognized my parents' failed attempts to teach me to be white. They started too late; I had already decided I did not want to be a racist. I grew up in a town where there were no black families, so it wasn't until I was 16 that I was subjected to an attack from my mother because I had been greatly impressed (and told her parents so) with the intelligence of a girl I had met who, unbeknownst to me, had a slight admixture of "Negro" ancestry. When the reason behind her attack finally came out, my instant response was to tell my mother that she ought to be ashamed of herself, and that I was ashamed of her for demanding that I act in a dishonorable (i. e. racist) manner, a demand that I would never consider obeying. Read this book. It will help many of you to understand your own life experience, and perhaps to overcome some conditioning you should never have had, and to avoid doing the same harm to your children. For those of you fortunate enough never to have been taught "to be white" it will help you understand and perhaps help those of your friends and acquaintences who were. This is a book that should be in every school library. watziznaym@gmail.com

an insightful parting of the veil

Thandeka releases a part of the "white man's (real) burden" by allowing Euro Americans to see what they have lost in subordinating essential humanity to the American dream. Her copiously footnoted text requires the reader suspend judgement so that she can present her case. When she has finished, she has rewarded the reader with a revealing look at him or herself and the social matrix that encompasses. This is not a long book. But is an important work. She is both concise and eloquent.

Essential and clearly written recipe for anti-racism work.

Dr. Thandeka, a Unitarian Universalist scholar, has written the essential recipe for those of us working collectively and individually on becoming more fully human.Clearly and compassionately written, Dr. Thandeka has the capacity to articulate the soul-destroying wounds many "white" people experience during formative years and frequently feel as unidentified losses(our ethnicities and working class values). Everyone, especially in this so-called era of prosperity, will take away not only a deeper historical understanding of race and class intersections,but hopefully the opportunity to redeem important human values we hold in our hearts but, sadly, are not supported in a world where market values dominate. Read it. Share the stories you thought you'd forgotten, and most importantly, share them with your children.