White Episode 2: How Race Was Made
What is the significance of the date, 1619?
When Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and author Nikole Hannah Jones states that “Our democracy’s founding ideals were false when they were written. Black Americans have fought to make them true.” What specifically does she mean?
Click through and read the 1619 Introduction. (Links to an external site.) There are many images and essays discussing the impact of slavery on many aspects of our modern world: from landscape to healthcare to pop music. Reflect on what you see here. Describe which of these categories holds your interest: explain why.
Why is it important that we study the intersection between race and capitalism in our country’s origins?
What is the Saving American History Act of 2020? Explain why it exists.
In Seeing White, How Race Was Made, who is Nell Irving Painter? What book did she write? How does she explain the existence of the so-called “three races?”
In Seeing White, How Race Was Made, who is Ibram X Kendi? What book did he write? Summarize his explanation for how racism was imported to the colonies from Britain. What does he mean when he says: “And of course, Blackness cannot really operate without whiteness.”
In Seeing White, How Race Was Made, who is Chenjerai Kumanyika? What does he mean when he says: “…. race isn’t real biologically but it is very real as a way that society has been structured. The effects of race as a social construct are real. The reason we can’t stop talking about it is because we can predict wealth distribution, police killing, all kinds of other sort of life expectancy factors, health issues, based on race, access to schools, because society has been organized around a concept that is not biologically real.” Explain and give examples from the 1619 Introduction to support your point.