Sunday, September 09, 2007

Quote of the (Sun)day

"I contend that we have not integrated privilege in the racializing process. We have explored and documented the effects of oppression on its victims and they have, in turn, borne powerful testimony to their injuries and resilience. We have yet to chronicle how those who oppress make sense of their power in relationship to those they have injured. We are all potentially oppressors given that having power over others varies from context to context and is primarily determined by race, class, gender, and sexuality. Yet, we lack an elaborate language to speak about those who oppress -- how they feel about, think about, react to, make sense of, come to terms with, maintain privilege over, and ultimately renounce the power to oppress. Missing in the puzzle of domination is a reflexive mechanism for understanding how we are all involved in the dirty process of racializing and gendering others, limiting who they are and who they can become."

Aida Hurtado, "The Trickster's Play: Whiteness in the Subordination and Liberation Process," in Race, Identity, and Citizenship: A Reader, Rodolfo D. Torres, Louis F. Miron, & Jonathan Xavier Inda, eds. (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000), pp.225-243, 244.

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