The Gratifications of Whiteness: W. E. B. Du Bois and the Enduring Rewards of Anti-Blackness

Ella Myers (Associate Professor of Political Science and Gender Studies, Associate Professor of Political Science and Gender Studies, University of Utah)

The Gratifications of Whiteness: W. E. B. Du Bois and the Enduring Rewards of Anti-Blackness
Format
Paperback
Publisher
Oxford University Press Inc
Country
United States
Published
11 January 2022
Pages
248
ISBN
9780197556771

The Gratifications of Whiteness: W. E. B. Du Bois and the Enduring Rewards of Anti-Blackness

Ella Myers (Associate Professor of Political Science and Gender Studies, Associate Professor of Political Science and Gender Studies, University of Utah)

The first book-length study of W. E. B. Du Bois’s conceptualization of American whiteness.

W. E. B. Du Bois famously argued that whiteness in the US in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries functioned as a public and psychological wage, offering valuable social standing to even the poorest of whites. Such compensation, dependent on the devaluation of Black existence, helped secure the US capitalist regime and prevent interracial class solidarity. This book argues that Du Bois’s influential account of compensatory whiteness is crucially important, but also incomplete. For Du Bois, whiteness was never one thing, but many. Focusing on Du Bois’s middle-period work (about 1920-1940), Ella Myers uncovers an overlooked, complex analysis that theorizes whiteness as a source of varied gratifications. These gratifications include not only the status rewards of racial capitalism, but also the enjoyment of gratuitous Black suffering and the conviction that the planet belongs to those marked as white. The book shows that Du Bois’s analysis, developed in response to the pressing political problems of his own day, also offers insight into 21st century struggles for racial justice. Myers argues that it is important to recognize the extent to which anti-Blackness continues to underwrite plural -and deeply disturbing-forms of white gratification here and now. Doing so helps explain the tenacity of America’s unequal racial order and also reveals why creative, multifaceted strategies of resistance are necessary to end it.

This item is not currently in-stock. It can be ordered online and is expected to ship in approx 4 weeks

Our stock data is updated periodically, and availability may change throughout the day for in-demand items. Please call the relevant shop for the most current stock information. Prices are subject to change without notice.

Sign in or become a Readings Member to add this title to a wishlist.