A dense book filled with topic related jargon, White Privilege is not to be taken lightly. The heavy language can be off-putting to those not familiar with the terms but can be eye-opening to those willing to take the effort. In a world that consistently denies racism and white privilege alike, Kalwant Bhopal uses her voice to educate the masses with evidence and rationale.

White Privilege : un terme vu de nombreuses fois, décrié par certains, avec autant de définitions (évidemment contradictoires) que d'intervenants. J'ai donc choisi ce livre pour y voir plus clair. Le Brexit et l'élection de l'autre prouvent que, comme l'indique le sous-titre, la société post-raciale est un mythe. Kalwant Bhopal examine ici le fait que la race (le fait de ne pas être blanc ou, dans certains cas, pas d'un blanc acceptable) est une forme de désavantage dans la société moderne. Malgré les tentatives de la politique néo-libérale (c'est vraiment spécifique apparemment) de présenter une image d'inclusion, il existe toujours de grandes disparités entre les communautés blanche et noire (et autres minorités). Les inégalités ont été exacerbées plutôt que corrigées par le néo-libéralisme qui privilégie les identités blanches.

L'auteure traite de ces disparités dans différents domaines : éducation, enseignement supérieur, marché du travail, pauvreté, au Royaume-Uni (surtout) mais aussi aux États-Unis, qui malgré leurs grandes différences historiques, culturelles et sociales, sont des pays où les minorités restent marginalisées à des niveaux divers de la société où les identités blanches sont prédominantes.

J'ai trouvé ce livre intéressant dans l'ensemble, même si je ne suis pas sûre qu'il a répondu à toutes mes questions concernant le white privilege. Il ressemblait plus à une thèse universitaire mais comme je ne lis pas souvent des livres de ce type, je ne peux pas comparer. Le fait que l'auteure soit du Royaume-Uni explique peut-être aussi la structure déconcertante pour moi (moins conviviale, si je puis dire, qu'un livre américain). J'ai bien aimé les interviews même si j'ai trouvé les réponses un peu décalées (peut-être les personnes interrogées étaient-elles méfiantes). Elles donnent en tout cas des exemples concrets et flagrants de white privilege. Je dois avouer que ce livre m'a donné un sentiment de frustration et de pessimisme quant à l'avenir des minorités dans nos sociétés. Et une fois de plus, je me suis rendu compte à quel point j'ignorais la situation des minorités au Royaume-Uni.

The author of this book does a really great job of exploring the intersectionality of race, ethnicity, and gender in relation to racism and white supremacy. Even though this is a relatively short but dense book, the role of neoliberalism in perpetuating the capitalist system which privileges white society and oppresses black and ethnic communities throughout the world is laid out clearly. I definitely recommend this book.

So let’s say you acknowledge white privilege exists. (If you don’t, you should back up and maybe read something like So You Want to Talk about Race.) But maybe now you’re wondering how much white privilege actually affects people, particularly when it comes to issues of education and the workplace. That’s what White Privilege: The Myth of a Post-Racial Society tackles. Kalwant Bhopal carefully and in great detail pieces together a picture of how American and British schools, universities, and places of business continue to discriminate in favour of white people. Thanks, NetGalley and Policy Press, for letting me read this eARC.

White Privilege is very much an academic research book, so know that going in. Unlike Ijeoma Oluo’s aforementioned book, this is not really a mainstream publication. That doesn’t mean I think only academics should read it—there’s a lot of interest in here for people outside the academy, particularly teachers and those interested in public policy. However, it is definitely very dry in tone, and Bhopal writes with the considered cadence of someone who really wants to define every term clearly and leave little to doubt. Each chapter is meticulously cited and has extensive endnote references (a good thing, of course). But an evocative read this is not.

Bhopal splits each chapter down the middle and addresses data from both the UK and the US. This is an interesting, informative approach. As a Canadian who has taught in the UK, I found the chapters focusing on UK secondary school education the most interesting. Much of what Bhopal describes dovetails and resonates with my own experience, which I’ll discuss presently. Other facets illuminate parts of my time there or only occurred after I left. In any event, it is clear that both the US and the UK (and Canada, but that’s outside of the scope of this book) have a long way to go in addressing racial inequity in education.

After graduating from my education degree in Canada, I taught in the UK for two years at an academy that primarily served students from a working class socioeconomic background. There was a mixture of white families and families predominantly of an Eastern European background, though there were definitely some Black families as well. While class was a large factor, I think, in the students’ attitudes towards school and their success, racial and ethnic background definitely contributed too. In particular, Bhopal hits the nail on the head when she examines the call to teach “British values” and other, similar movements, and how these replicate patterns of (white) cultural supremacy within the education system.

She’s also accurate when she points out that so many teachers in these systems are white and themselves under-prepared to teach racialized pupils. That was definitely me (I’m white, btw, if my avatar’s terrible fashion sense didn’t give that away). This is an oversight in our teacher education programs, but it’s also an artifact of my white privilege within a larger, white supremacist society. I’m aware of my privilege on an intellectual level, yet I’m also painfully aware I lack tools necessarily to relate to and understand the needs of some of my racialized students. This was the case when I was in the UK, and it is still sometimes the case now that I’m back in Canada and teaching adults, many of whom are First Nations. My toolkit has gotten better (thanks, For White Folks Who Teach in the Hood and Indigenous Writes ). Still, thinking bigger picture, we need a seismic shift in the ways we prepare and train teachers at a system level.

White Privilege occasionally hints at or navigates around the periphery of the wider issue that the US and UK are still, in many ways, white-supremacist states. It would have been nice to see the book engage with this issue more directly—but perhaps that would verge too far into the polemical; Bhopal appears more interested in making concrete arguments backed up by data. As such, there is little I can disagree with in this book, but there are times when I feel it doesn’t quite go far enough—but maybe that’s just my revolutionary idealism speaking.

I can’t fault this book’s information, organization, or content. This is a strong work of academic writing with excellent details and an ironclad, logical presentation. I wish the writing were less dry. If you can handle this style, you’ll find lots in here about the topic of privilege and its practical consequences for education, among other things. However, this is also a good example of how it takes more than a solid understanding of data and a good thesis to write a great book. White Privilege is illuminating, but it lacks that final touch to really make a book shine.

Undeniable is the fact we need to have honest harsh dialogues about race and white privilege. Unfortunately the very people who are benefiting the most from white privilege are the ones most resistant to acknowledging it exists, to say nothing of dismantling or reforming the rigged system.

This book is touted to be "rooted in dispassionate analysis" with its approach in tackling this complex issue. Divided into chapters, starting with a discussion of neoliberalism and the fallout from Brexit and election of Trump then education, bullying in schools, gypsies and travelers, labor and employment issues with regard to white privilege.

There were some significant issues that, in my opinion, marred this book.
1) The discussion was limited to situations and institutions in the US and Britain. Surely white privilege is a problem in Europe, Canada, New Zealand, Australia etc etc.? Take the overwhelming percentage of white people in top political leadership positions, managerial CEO positions, judicial and army posts - these would be relevant in the other countries mentioned as well.

2) The phrase "blacks and other minority groups" was used repeatedly to denote non-whites. While this is understandable for the United States where likely the largest non-white group are blacks, it makes less sense to use this for Britain where brown people and Muslims would form the majority of non-whites. With the ubiquitous use of this phrase, there was an over-emphasis on specific challenges that black people face while ignoring the same for other groups such as native americans, latinos and asians.

3) A whole chapter with its own subgroup of education, health, labor issues etc was devoted to gypsies and travelers. The author explained that they were chosen to illustrate that there is a type of whiteness that is considered "other" and therefore not a recipient of white privilege. However, this group is specific to Britain and not even able to be generalized to the Roma European group. So again, puzzling overemphasis on a group that did not progress the discussion much.

Some other minor issues. This is written in an academic manner but there were some citations from newspapers such as Huffington Post, The Telegraph and The Guardian, which would not have been admissible in an academic work. In my Kindle version, the graphs and tables that accompanied the text were garbled. The chapter format was also untidy. The author mentions cases of police brutality of black people in US in conjunction with Trump's election but there were other more connected cases of racism and violence directly after his election (like the racially motivated shooting of a Sikh on his driveway) that were more illustrative. Lastly, the author mentions vaguely that there was some hostility to this topic but there is a body of literature on fragility of the white ego that could have been included and relevant. I would also have appreciated a discussion on media and literary representation of whites and non-whites (including the white saviour complex).

The book's strength lies in its extensive documentation and figures. The logical and analytical approach provides irrefutable evidence not only of the existence of white privilege but the mechanisms in place to maintain the status quo.

Thanks to Policy Press and Netgalley for providing a copy of this book for review.

This was an interesting book. As someone who has read a lot of racial theory and anti-racist works ,this was a little basic for me but it is a great encapsulation of the things that so really need to be considered and looked at by white people about their privilege.

This book explores the different aspects of whiteness and white privilege, race, education, poverty in the US and UK and policies that affect the society.
I had a rough idea of neoliberalism because over the years in Kenya public services like education can do health have been privatized. In regards to education there are at least five private schools within a five mile radius of a public school.
I was quite taken by the author's insight on neoliberalism that it's the "drive to privatize public services like education and Healthcare and the disposal of assets owned by the state to private investors. It fails to acknowledge racism by reinforcing the notion that it is for the good of the whole society rather than a select few, yet the evidence presented in this book suggests this is not the case."

The author concludes by saying that policy making within a neoliberalism context has not led to the inclusion it aspires to, but rather has reinforced inequalities between black and minority ethnic groups and white people in the society and this is because the structures and racist practices still exist.

I also thought that it'd make a good reference book but in paperback version because the digital copy I received did not show figures which would be a great enhancement to the data and research studies referenced.

"I have come to see white privilege as an invisible package of unearned assets that I can count on cashing in each day, but about which I was 'meant' to remain oblivious
- Peggy Macintosh

This is a critical analysis of white privilege in the UK in the context of the government's neoliberal policies, with reference to Brexit, the labour market and a particular focus on education. It's a sobering examination of how pervasive and self-perpetuating this systemic privilege is and the catastrophic impact it has on the lives of British BAME people across the country.

What I liked:
- It was very well researched and referenced, providing a goldmine of evidence that a post-racial society is indeed a myth.
- A lot of current nonfiction on the topic of racial inequality is often from the perspective of American society, and while the US perspective is included here, it is as a comparison rather than the core focus. This was a welcome bank of evidence on the UK, particularly in the wake of Brexit, the subsequent rise in racial hate crimes and the public sector cuts that are disproportionately affecting black and ethnic minorities.
- It quite rightly exposed the hypocrisy of institutions who operate under the illusion that they do not have an issue with racial inequality because they have a diversity and inclusion policy in place, but who will then take every action they can to dispute or ignore evidence that is presented to the contrary.

What I didn't like:
- This is very much aimed at an academic audience. It was structured in the same way that a university essay is - particularly the "tell them what you're going to say, say it, and then summarise what you just said" kind of format. This meant that it was quite repetitive in places; and heavy on statistics and 'jargon'.
- I didn't think it was clear enough what Bhopal was getting at with the section on "non-acceptable whiteness". To differentiate between groups within white people undermines the idea of white privilege as being afforded to anyone with white skin. This may be completely true and I found it to be a very compelling argument in the section about Gypsies and Travellers, but it should have been an argument running throughout, rather than in just one chapter. The rest of the analysis reverted to data on whites as a homogenous group, compared to black and ethnic minority people, which gave a confusing picture - is it just "acceptable" white people who are privileged, or is it all white people? If it is not just "white" as skin colour (and is in fact an even narrower group of "acceptable" white people) - then there is the risk that critics could use that to say that 'white privilege' doesn't exist, because there's a group of white people (i.e. Gypsies and Travellers) who don't have that privilege. Bhopal's argument had the potential to be an even more damning indictment of British society where privilege is afforded to an even narrower group than previously discussed, but it needed to be strengthened, and consistent across the whole analysis.

"What seems remarkable is less the breadth of inequality, over very long periods of time, across the socio-political landscapes of two globally significant, liberal democratic nations, and more the feeling that such inequalities will persist in the future without any clear indication of change."

Overall, this is an incredibly important piece of work from someone who clearly has extensive knowledge on the subject. However, the reading experience is a challenging one if you do not have an academic background in politics or social sciences. I hope that this analysis, and others like it, will encourage policy makers to enact new approaches that will challenge this persistent inequality; but I would be lying if I didn't agree with Bhopal's feeling that change is not on the horizon.

Am I the only one that thinks Chick-fil-A is addicting?

One of my New Year resolutions was to read more books that stimulate my mind. Thanks #netgalley in helping me achieve this goal with an ARC of
#whiteprivilegethemythofapostracialsociety by #kalwantbhopal.

This book contends that racism is systemic and in our society whiteness is privileged (as evidenced by social contexts in the US and UK). The author posits different levels of privilege within whiteness both in terms of intersectionality and particular kinds of whiteness that are favored in society. She goes on to explain how racism is manifested in education by policies that are presented under the guise of inclusion but are inherently exclusive and marginalizing. Bhopal also discusses racism in the labor market and the cyclical nature of “wealth, poverty and inequality”.

In all honestly this book was dense. It’s been a while since I’ve been in school and read academic texts and I find I enjoy them. I agree with the authors argument and think it’s a much needed discussion in light of all that’s happening in our society. We say we live in a post racial society but then we see the state of our nation. No bueno. Most of the arguments the author I’ve read in some form or another but appreciate the context the author discusses and makes sense of these ideas.

Check out this book on its 4/6/18 publication date.

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This should be required reading for every white person alive so they can understand why their responsibility for dismantling these widespread systems of inequality that plague the rest of us!