If I had to describe myself in one sentence I would say I am a straight, white, female with a modest upbringing, who was raised in the country by a conservative widow. The town I grew up in was a small, rural town in central Arizona. My high school graduating class had only 23 students and when I was young, the roads around town were still dirt. I remember how exciting it was when the roads were paved. My dad died when I was two and a half years old and my Mom never remarried. My brother and sister are 17 and 18 years older than me, respectively. For the most part, it was just me and my Mom. I most definitely came from humble beginnings, although quite honestly, I didn 't know it at the time.
What follows is a reflection of the various influences …show more content…
I remember only one boy from a Mexican family in elementary school, and twin Black girls who moved to the area in high school. Growing up, I definitely did not have exposure to racial diversity and it did not occur to me that my race provided privileges not available to others. I am not sure I fully realized what is meant by white privilege until this course. Per McDermott and Sampson (2005) in the "White Racial and Ethnic Identity" article, "many whites themselves fail to see the connection between their opportunities in life and their racial identity, much as their race is generally invisible to them" (p. 248). I most certainly feel this is the case with myself and most of the people I know. For me in particular, my race has mostly been invisible to me and I don 't know that I have ever considered myself privileged. I most certainly understand now that I am, and that there are those even more privileged than me (i.e. white …show more content…
While I believe that I have been through the stages of Helms ' white identity development before, I feel as if I revisited some of the stages during this course. For example, I definitely experienced the disintegration state and felt discomfort, shame, guilt and anger about the events that whites were responsible for throughout history. I am not as certain about the reintegration, pseudo-independent, or immersion/emersion stages. I may have experience them earlier in life, but I do not know that I experienced them during the course. Overall, I think I have settled into the autonomy stage and I try to confront racism and oppression in daily life (Tatum,
What follows is a reflection of the various influences …show more content…
I remember only one boy from a Mexican family in elementary school, and twin Black girls who moved to the area in high school. Growing up, I definitely did not have exposure to racial diversity and it did not occur to me that my race provided privileges not available to others. I am not sure I fully realized what is meant by white privilege until this course. Per McDermott and Sampson (2005) in the "White Racial and Ethnic Identity" article, "many whites themselves fail to see the connection between their opportunities in life and their racial identity, much as their race is generally invisible to them" (p. 248). I most certainly feel this is the case with myself and most of the people I know. For me in particular, my race has mostly been invisible to me and I don 't know that I have ever considered myself privileged. I most certainly understand now that I am, and that there are those even more privileged than me (i.e. white …show more content…
While I believe that I have been through the stages of Helms ' white identity development before, I feel as if I revisited some of the stages during this course. For example, I definitely experienced the disintegration state and felt discomfort, shame, guilt and anger about the events that whites were responsible for throughout history. I am not as certain about the reintegration, pseudo-independent, or immersion/emersion stages. I may have experience them earlier in life, but I do not know that I experienced them during the course. Overall, I think I have settled into the autonomy stage and I try to confront racism and oppression in daily life (Tatum,