Research: Critical Whiteness Interest Group

The Critical Whiteness Study Group (CWSG) brings a middle-sized group of scholars and townspeople together once a month for seminars usually featuring discussion of unpublished writing by faculty members or graduate students, but sometimes centering on readings of published works, or on films and other works of art. Participants include those specializing in architecture, urban planning,ethnic studies, psychology, counseling psychology, law, U.S. history, art, communications research, English, cultural studies, cinema studies, European history, education, library science and theology. The intellectual project under which the group convenes is the attempt to challenge cultural and academic habits that make white racial identity and privilege seem natural, unremarkable, timeless, and unproblematic. Indeed the work of the seminar brings together those making a problem out of how white identity and privilege arise and of how they are reproduced historically, economically, culturally, socially and psychologically.

For more information on the "Critical Whiteness Interest Group," please contact Sharon Irish slirish@uiuc.edu or Carmen Thompson cthomps5@uiuc.edu

Publications:

TOWARDS A BIBLIOGRAPHY OF CRITICAL WHITENESS STUDIES (PDF)

TOWARDS A BIBLIOGRAPHY OF CRITICAL WHITENESS STUDIES (online version)

Articles:

"Saying goodbye to my 'Fargo' accent" by Robert Jensen

CRT/CWS Handout (PDF)

The Meaning of White (PDF)