Difference, Power and PrivilegeDiversity Literacy Week 1 / Lecture 1

Prepared by Claire Kelly

The Diversity Wheel

Work Background

Income

Parental Status

Geographic Location

Religious Beliefs

African Traditions

Education

Marital Status

Age

RaceSexual /

affectional orientation

Gender

EthnicityPhysical abilities / qualities

Adapted from Loden & Rosener’s Diversity Wheel cited in Johnson, A. G. (2001). Privilege, power and difference (Chapters 3 & 8).Boston: McGraw-Hill. (p. 15-41 & 96-116) Prepared by Claire Kelly

The Diversity Wheel

Doesn’t say much about you as an individual but says volumes about social reality i.e. your positioning.

Not all difference is created equal: inner and outer circle.

What is the difference between the inner and outer circle?

Prepared by Claire Kelly

Difference & PowerThe problem is not difference, the problem is

that our world is organized to use difference to exclude, oppress, devalue, discredit

Different positioning confers different opportunities i.e. difference access to resources

Why and how such patterns come about, why are they maintained?

Prepared by Claire Kelly

Difference as Social Construct Social structuring is a social process: what we

experience as real is a cultural creation Differences only become significant if we live in a

culture that recognizes them as such Differences change over time but are generally long

lasting

Rarely, if ever, experienced as such - just the way things are

“Difference maintained by a normative order that supports those who accept the division and constrains those who seek to alter it.” (Payne, p. 242)

Prepared by Claire Kelly

Unsettling the normative order….Insert: Picture of Piet Dlamini who is an

African man (black) and also an Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB)supporter , which is awhite supremacist organization.

http://roganward.blogspot.com/2010/04/awb-man.html

http://www.google.co.za/search?q=Piet+Dlamini+&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-ZA:official&client=firefox-a

Prepared by Claire Kelly

Unsettling the normative order….Insert: Picture of Thomas Beatie, who is the

“man who fell pregnant.” Beatie is a transgender male.

http://www.thomasbeatie.com/

www.youtube.com/watch?v=jho1UCPDqXg

Prepared by Claire Kelly

PrivilegeInsert: Picture of a cartoon demonstrating

white privilege. You can choose any “white privilege” image that you think your audience will understand.

http://thefreshxpress.com/2011/03/white-aint-right-or-is-it/

http://cosmologyofwhiteness.blogspot.com/2011/04/whiteness-and-white-privilege-paradigm.html

Prepared by Claire Kelly

Privilege“When one group has something of value that

is denied to others simply because of the groups they belong to” (McIntosh)

You don’t have to do anything for it

Privilege is structural: “The path of least resistance”

Social position versus subjective experience: The power of privilege is that it rarely experienced as such.

Prepared by Claire Kelly

Privilege / NormativityInsert: Thembinkosi Goniwe, “Untitled” .

Picture of a black man and a white man, both with white plasters on their faces. The plaster appears very obvious that it was made for white skin.

http://www.artthrob.co.za/01nov/images/goniwe01a.jpg

Prepared by Claire Kelly

Privilege / NormativityInsert: A picture normalizing and privileging

maleness. The picture used for the class is an image of stick figures, and the one says to the other “women suck at maths.”

http://restructure.wordpress.com/2009/06/09/gender-difference-in-math-ability-variability-driven-by-social-inequality-study/

Prepared by Claire Kelly

How Privilege Works

Three characteristics of systems of privilege: dominated by: positions of power, power looks

“natural”, entitlement identified with: standard, the norm centred: path of least resistance is to focus on

them

Prepared by Claire Kelly

Divisions, privilege and us

Individuals positioned and constrained but we are not wholly given… “path of least resistance” not the only path

Thomas Beattie & Piet Dlamini

To follow the “path of least resistance”, however, is to sanction the power relations that plots the route of the path – it’s like standing still on a moving train (Howard Zinn)

Prepared by Claire Kelly

Extra References Zinn, H. (1995) You can't be neutral on a moving train: A personal history of our

times. Boston: Beacon Press

Prepared by Claire Kelly