The Social Constructs of Power

It is almost impossible not to think of Foucault when thinking about power. In The Subject and Power (1982), Foucault argues “It is legitimate to analyse (sic) power by looking at institutions, but relationships of power are based in the depths of society, in the “systems of social networks”: There can be no society without some form of power relations.” With this in mind, we look at this week's readings, which consider systems of power and the frameworks constructed to support them.

In My Class Didn't Trump My Race: Using Oppression to Face Privilege, Robin J DiAngelo addresses her experiences growing up poor using two questions to lead her analysis: "how does internalized dominance function collectively for Whites, regardless of our other social locations, and how did I learn racism specifically through my class (or other) oppression?" (DiAngelo, 2006). DiAngelo shares an experience from her past in she learns that her family is truly poor and the shame that arose from such knowledge, but even as a child DiAngelo recognized that while she was poor, at least she wasn’t Black. DiAngelo thus utilizes her recognition of how class influenced her (racial) identity to examine how she had internalized the social construct of white superiority. 

Dr. DiAngelo speaks about deconstructing white privilege at General Commission on Religion and Race of The UMC (2017)

And her analysis shows that such superiority is, indeed, a social construct: living segregated lives at school, work, and often church; being catered to as the “norm” for humanity-deviations are thus “others”; and allowed to be thought of as individuals rather than representative of an entire race or ethnicity. These constructions allow White people to be secure in their dominance, even when taking class difference into account, as DiAngelo herself recognized as a child. Finally, DiAngelo importantly understand the value of using racism as a lens to view her analysis, providing recognition into the intersecting hierarchies built on a social construct.

 Dissatisfied with the disconnect between Critical Race Theory and Critical Disability Studies, Zeus Leonardo and Alicia Broderick critique each to offer a deeper understanding of the intersection of race and ability, as they delve into theories of social construction in their article Smartness as a Property: A Critical Exploration of Intersections Between Whiteness and Disability Studies. Here again we can see that like race and class, ability is relational to power. Using Harris’s example of how Whiteness functions as a form of property, it is possible to see how the construct of White/smart is relies on the dehumanization of those perceived as less than, (Black/disabled), reinforced by the dominant hegemonic culture (White/abled), thus creating a delineation (discrimination) that keeps out “others.” White cannot be constructed without Black, abled cannot be constructed without disabled. 

These terms act as signifiers of stratification, conveying meaning within our society, and allow the construction of the ideology of Whiteness. Using Althusser’s concept of ideology (Leonardo, p2213), the authors agree with the idea that realization of race makes bodies subjective to race. Applying this concept to society at large, we understand at one that the institutions founded by a White dominated culture are imbued with the power to engage in that same realization of bodies subject to race/ability. By engaging in these actions, the educational system reinforces the relationships of race/ability as a policy supporting, and supported by, society as a whole. 

Works Cited

1.     DiAngelo, R. J. (2006). My class didn’t trump my race: Using oppression to face  privilege.    Multicultural Perspectives, 8(1), 52-56.

2.     DiAngelo, R.J. (2017) Deconstructing White Privilege. General Commission on Religion and Race of The UMChttps://youtu.be/DwIx3KQer54

3.     Foucault, Michel (1982). The Subject and Power. Critical Inquiry Vol. 8, No. 4 (Summer, 1982), 777-795.

4.     Leonardo, Z. & Broderick, A. A. (2011). Smartness as property: A critical exploration of intersections between whiteness and disability studies. Teachers College Record, 113(10), 2206-2232.