{"id":2706,"date":"2013-03-06T06:44:53","date_gmt":"2013-03-06T11:44:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/engage\/?p=2706"},"modified":"2013-03-07T12:15:37","modified_gmt":"2013-03-07T17:15:37","slug":"the-white-racial-frame","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/engage\/2013\/03\/the-white-racial-frame\/","title":{"rendered":"The White Racial Frame"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/em>[Guest post\u2013second on this topic\u2013by Roberto Bedoya, Executive Director of the Tucson Pima Arts Council. Mr. Bedoya reflects on the need to consider the impact of unconscious racial perspectives before we address diversity policies in the sector.<\/em>]<\/p>\n

Before I offer my commentary, I want to give thanks to my peers for responding to my prompt<\/a>. This inquiry into the perplexities and complexities of whiteness that we see working in the cultural sector from our various perches has triggered much thought and feeling within me and I suspect with the others as well. I deeply appreciate Barry<\/a>, Clayton<\/a>, Diane<\/a>, Doug<\/a>, Ian<\/a> and Nina<\/a>\u2019s efforts to walk down this path of investigations and a special thanks to Doug for his invitation to me to participate in this field reflection.<\/p>\n

My prompt was \u201c to share with us some of your good thinking and deep reflection on your understanding of how the White Racial Frame intersects with cultural polices and cultural practices.\u201d \u00a0And to that end, the thrust of my commentary will be on US cultural policy.<\/p>\n

So let\u2019s me begin with a definition:<\/p>\n

The scholar Joe Feagin defines the white racial frame as \u201can overarching worldview, one that encompasses important racial ideas, terms, images, emotion and interpretation. For centuries now, it has been a basic and foundational frame from which a substantial majority of white Americans \u2013 as well as others seeking to conform to white norms \u2013 view our highly racialized society. \u201d<\/p>\n

And what are the characteristics of whiteness \u2013 its good, bad and ugly, I ask myself. There are many writers who have written eloquently and with great rigor about whiteness: Toni Morrison, James Baldwin, Tim Wise, George Lipsitz, Linda Tuhiwai Smith, Renato Rosaldo, David Roediger, Peggy McIntosh to name a few authors in my library that inform my thinking.\u00a0 And at the core of their writings is an examination of identity, bias and privilege.<\/p>\n

The examination of whiteness in other sectors of our society, e.g. law, health care, education, has been animated and substantial. Yet, in the cultural sector it has been anemic. And I wonder why – are we lazy, fearful? Are we too comfortable with the status quo that believes whiteness as stated in my previous blog \u201c\u2026is the default frame that defines cultural value and worth; it is used (mostly unconsciously) to analyze, classify and quantify both what is understood as the norm and the notions of \u201cother\u201d \u2013 of diversity\u201d and so be it.<\/p>\n

I take no pleasure in examining deficiencies when there\u2019s no analysis of the causes behind it.\u00a0 So a study of the racial composition of audiences for dance, theater or the visual arts that folks find alarming because of its lack of racial diversity demands an examination of the racialized hierarchies that shape audience participation and in turn cultural polices.\u00a0 This is not a tidy examination but it is necessary.\u00a0 Coupled with this examination is an analysis of privilege – who has it or doesn\u2019t have it; who has access, legitimacy, power or doesn\u2019t have it, adds to the complexities of this undertaking.<\/p>\n

A starting off point for me is this examination of the white racial frame is \u201cpossessiveness\u201d. One of the scholars on whiteness that I admire is George Lipsitz who writes about the possessive nature of whiteness and it relationship to racialized hierarchies. He states \u201cI use the adjective possessiv<\/i>e to stress the relationship between whiteness and asset accumulation in our society, to connect attitudes to interest, to demonstrate that white supremacy is usually less a matter of direct, referential and snarling contempt and more a system for protecting the privilege of whites by denying communities of color opportunities for asset accumulation and upward mobility. Whiteness is invested in, like property, but it also a means of accumulating property and keep it from others.\u201d<\/p>\n

What is asset accumulation in the cultural sector\u2026 the new wing of a museum, the positive reviews of a performance season, the new donors, the poems the third graders wrote about their neighborhood, the award letter from a foundation?\u00a0 Are cultural investments a continual investment in whiteness? What are the cultural policies in place that enable or deny asset accumulation?\u00a0 How do we understand the assets one has or an asset one has that is managed by another? \u00a0Beginning in the 70\u2019s the articulation of \u00a0\u201cfirst voice\u201d by communities of color as part of a cultural agenda of self-determination fed the development of artists and arts organization that understood their assets and began to build upon them\u2026 yet the support system today for these artists and arts organization is weak. Is this weak condition a by-product of a tension related to the possessing of assets or asserting one\u2019s assets? In addition to this point about assets, today\u2019s conversations about social capital and its relationship to authenticity and asset building must take a look at the possessive nature of whiteness and ask if the articulation of social capital is complicit with whiteness or a counter-frame to it.<\/p>\n

In regards to the racial diversity conversation, I ask myself whether \u201cdiversity\u201d policies that began during the civil rights movement morphed into a possessive investment in whiteness that promotes a blindness to racialized privilege systems that impact and define audience and cultural validation methods.<\/p>\n

For many of my peers the diversity conversation today is about equity. \u00a0The equity mandate is interwoven with social justice practices that are addressing racialized hierarchies within the cultural sector. Additionally, within communities of colors there is a strong feeling that we are beyond the politics of recognition (which has produce Black History Month\u2026 etc.) and must now engage in the politics of distribution, with fairness and equity at the center of policy-making and cultural decision making practices.<\/p>\n

As I was gathering my thoughts for this blog, last week Justice Antonin Scalia called the Voting Rights Act \u201cthe perpetuation of racial entitlement\u201d \u2013 a comment that shocked me and illuminates a line of thinking of white racial resentment at play in our society\u2026when did the right to vote become a racial entitlement? \u00a0Let\u2019s push out this line of thinking \u2026 are our cultural policies that support the expressive life of our multi-racial nation being characterized as racial entitlement? I feel that is the case in the \u201cpost-racial\u201d conversations I encounter in our sector. I was recently reading about the work of the Native American visual artist Tom Jones and I came across this quote of his \u201cI question if a denial of one\u2019s cultural background is generated by mainstream Western art norms or if it is a form of identity genocide.\u201d Are the post-racial conversations occurring in our sector a form of \u201cidentity genocide\u201d and who has the privilege to carry on this conversation? I live and work in the politically toxic state of Arizona where racial profiling of Latinos by police officers is sanctioned by the State and Mexican-American studies has been eradicated from the Tucson schools. Even prior to the programs\u2019 dismantling the works of Sandra Cisneros, Leslie Marmon Silko, Rodolfo Acu\u00f1a and Shakespeare\u2019s Tempest (cuz that Caliban dude\u2026he\u2019s trouble!) were banned in those classes. This is a story of identity genocide and the ideology of whiteness at play through governmental, education and cultural policies.<\/p>\n

I define U.S. cultural policy as a system of arrangement that affects the allocation of resources and the articulation of value. I am mindful of these arrangements and ask where the ideology of whiteness is in this system? I know that there are many folks asking this question when they advocate for a healthy and robust support system for the arts that is equitable and just. Given the thinking of Judge Scalia and the policies of the state of Arizona as an example of the possessive nature of whiteness as it relates to one\u2019s civil and cultural rights, it also reveals how our society is not immune from racial biases that embrace and support a politics of dis-belonging.<\/p>\n

I feel that it also enters into the social imagery of the nation, of the phrase \u201cWe the People\u201d and who belongs or dis-belongs to this \u201cWe\u201d. So often in US public and cultural polices, regrettably, the meaning of\u00a0 \u201cWe\u201d is reduced to a privatized \u201cme and my friends\u201d meaning of the word. Does \u201cWe the people\u201d operate to reinforce whiteness as a privilege system that works to keep power in the hands that already have it, based on racial hierarchies? The democratic ideal of \u201cWe the People\u201d as a secular \u201cWe\u201d that includes people one doesn\u2019t know is often lost in cultural policy discussions and actions. I am aware that I am asserting my democratic ideal of \u201cWe the People\u201d and one thing I know about this \u201cWe\u201d is that it is multiracial as well as the inclusive gender, sexual, and class formations of\u00a0 \u201cWe\u201d.<\/p>\n

I have asked a lot of questions in this blog and probably troubled the water for some, in the spirit of critical witnessing to the ways of whiteness. To end with a suggested course of action, a counter-frame to the white racial frame, let me suggest that artists and arts leaders support the ethical imagining of the meaning of \u201cWe\u201d that includes people you don\u2019t know. This can be done to support the development of one\u2019s ethical identity that is anti-racist, that is grounded in an ethos of belonging, that understands systems of support as the equivalences we make among us that is fair and equitable. It can also be done so that we as policy actors and as individuals embrace and support the multi worldviews among us, that animate our pluralities as we move forward in our passions to advance humanity. Onward.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[Guest post\u2013second on this topic\u2013by Roberto Bedoya, Executive Director of the Tucson Pima Arts Council. Mr. Bedoya reflects on the need to consider the impact of unconscious racial perspectives before we address diversity policies in the sector.] Before I offer my commentary, I want to give thanks to my peers for responding to my prompt. 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Mr. Bedoya reflects on the need to consider the impact of unconscious racial perspectives before we address diversity policies in the sector.] My friend Doug asked me to respond to the recent blogs about diversity by Clayton\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Principles"","block_context":{"text":"Principles","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/engage\/category\/principles\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.artsusa.org\/artsblog\/wp-content\/profile-pics\/404.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":4627,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/engage\/2016\/08\/fifth-anniversary-highlights-considering-whiteness\/","url_meta":{"origin":2706,"position":1},"title":"Fifth Anniversary Highlights: Considering Whiteness","author":"Doug Borwick","date":"August 17, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"Fifth anniversary highlight: Roberto Bedoya on diversity and equity.","rel":"","context":"In "Principles"","block_context":{"text":"Principles","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/engage\/category\/principles\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/engage\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/FiveCandles.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2720,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/engage\/2013\/03\/equitydiversitychange\/","url_meta":{"origin":2706,"position":2},"title":"Equity\/Diversity\/Change","author":"Doug Borwick","date":"March 16, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"[Guest post by John L. 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