Readers in African American history as well as American business history will find this study interesting; informative; and useful for the insights provided on the makings of a northern black business enterprise. - Juliet E. K. Walker. Examining the evolution of a prominent Chicago insurance company; the author provides a rare glimpse into the origins and operations of an African American business. The Chicago Metropolitan Assurance Company was founded in 1925 to provide burial insurance to working-class black Chicagoans. Over the next 60 years; however; the company expanded to serve African-Americans throughout Illinois; Indiana; and Missouri. Discriminatory lending practices by white-controlled banks often inspired pioneering black businesses such as Chicago Met to raise operating and investment capital through creative meansNsuch as gambling. These companies were crucial to economic development within black communities. They provided white-collar jobs to men and women otherwise denied access to such opportunities and helped create a black bourgeois class and culture. They exemplified black self-help ideology and nationalist inclinations in black working-class communities of the urban North.
#711912 in Books Shannon Sullivan 2006-03-28 2006-03-28Original language:EnglishPDF # 1 9.25 x .67 x 6.12l; .86 #File Name: 0253218489264 pagesRevealing Whiteness The Unconscious Habits of Racial Privilege
Review
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful. Highly Perceptive; Highly RecommendedBy British5Another excellent piece of work by Shannon Sullivan. Its depth is admirable; and she is able to offer new insights into the subtle behaviors and gestures that inform white privilege; and that simultaneously damage others. Mixed-race people; who grapple with an experience similar to that of Fanon; can glean a lot from this book. The fractured experience of being perceived as white in some settings and black in others cleaves the experience of that person into a conflicted blend of good/evil; this book gives the unconscious habit which is so obvious to the "other" a detailed dissection. I especially liked the discussion of Fanon's Black Skin; White Mask and the sharp perception into his character as one damaged by his experience of race. Also excellent is the discussion on Morrison's Beloved; which offers truly thoughtful and philosophical new insights into the character and the way our histories haunt us.Like Good White People; this book emphatically states that all white people can contribute to active deconstruction of these habits. Again; the mixed-race person can find a place to be the privileged one (especially if he/she is frequently though not always perceived as white) and make his/her own contribution.Please keep this work coming!I plan to keep buying from this highly perceptive author...4 of 6 people found the following review helpful. Not for average reader interested in white privilegeBy William R. DrakeI am not sure how to rate this book. It is too much like a text book for the average reader. After going through 1/3 of it I gave up on it due to its nature. I do anti-prejudice work and was assessing it for inclusion on a resource list for a Unitarian group that wanted to learn more about white privilege. Sullivan's book may be great for students of psychoanalysis or students who want assessments of Freud's or DuBois' theories. Maybe I gave up too soon. Maybe it is a great book for a philosophy course (Sullivan is a philosophy professor.). But for people who just want a better understanding of white privilege and systemic racism; they would be much better served with Frances Kendall's Understanding White Privilege; Paula Rothenberg's White Privilege: Essential Readings on the Other Side of Racism; Tim Wise's White Like Me; or Robert Jensen's The Heart of Whiteness: Confronting Race; Racism; and White Privilege.11 of 13 people found the following review helpful. A powerful argument for the existence of white privilegeBy Augustus CarmichaelIn "Revealing Whiteness;" Shannon Sullivan takes a philosophical-phenomenological approach to assessing the means by which white privilege survives in modern society. Although this may sound like an overly theoretical approach to a concrete problem; Sullivan uses elements of American pragmatism and continental phenomenology to clarify and defend her observations on white privilege in both European and American society. These observations can be summarized as follows:1. White privilege lives on; even after the era of de jur white supremacy.2. White privilege exists in the unconscious- the associations and value judgments we make in day-to-day life that we do not necessarily consciously direct. In other words; the habits of white privilege live on in our bodily reactions to our experiences.3. White privilege is propagated in spite of (and sometimes because of) our naïve attempts to treat white privilege as if it is a conscious ideology.4. Despite the subterranean nature of the habits of white privilege; white people are perfectly capable of fighting racism as long as they have a proper understanding of its phenomenological nature.The book itself is divided into two parts. The first part primarily serves as Sullivan's explanation and defense of her model for Critical Race Theory. She demonstrates that all individuals' selves contain unconscious habits. We associate images of daily actions; urban spaces; and certain lifestyles with values that we instinctually respond to. This is why a white person working behind a counter at a convenience store is likely to become more nervous when a black person walks through the door than if another white person does; even if the white clerk doesn't harbor conscious racist beliefs. This is just one paltry example I cam up with; Sullivan better supports this claim via various examples within the book.These habits usually are of a collective nature. White individuals distinctly identify as part of a dominant culture; and thus express their behavior towards other groups of people in ways that bespeak of their own cultural dominance; while minorities often internalize these negative associations within their own habits. Sullivan draws on Dewey; Fannon; various continental phenomenologists; and DuBois (especially DuBois) throughout this section.The second section is mostly dedicated to using her model to pinpoint evidence for the damage white privilege does to minority groups. She continues to discuss the African-American experience in these chapters; but also conducts in-depth analyses of the Native American and Romany ("Gypsy") struggles with white privilege in the U.S. and Europe; respectively. She then develops her points into a new ethic of anti-racism- what she thinks her observations should mean for white folks who want to help fight the evils of racism. This is perhaps the most interesting part of the study; because she actually attacks many aspects of politically-correct culture for its obsession with superficial aims towards promoting "diversity;" which often is just a way that white-dominated institutions use the literal presence of minorities for public relations purposes without really confronting the habits of white privilege. However; her thoughts on the possibilities of combating racism are nuanced; and even though I don't agree with everything she said; she presented plenty of strong arguments for her positions.Sullivan leaves us with a challenging view of white privilege: White privilege is neither leftover statistical inequalities from the segregation era nor the lingering presence of white supremacist ideologies. It has a dire socio-economic impact on the lives of culturally disempowered minorities; but at the same time exists in the region of the human experience that we rarely have conscious access to (at least in our daily lives). Naturally; this book will mainly appeal to left-leaning people who are already convinced that racism is a serious issue in the modern world. If you see yourself as unconvinced as to the continual prevalence of white privilege; I would recommend two other books to read alongside this one: The Hidden Cost of Being African American: How Wealth Perpetuates Inequality; a fantastic sociological study of how white privilege moves from peoples' habits to actual socio-economic effects; and Machines as the Measure of Men: Science; Technology; and Ideologies of Western Dominance (Studies in Comparative History); a comprehensive study of how Westerners came to hold the notion that they were superior to other peoples.
