Inventing Whiteness a podcast exploring the social constructions of race and its connections to colonialism, ableism and capitalism Episode 1 14 June 2024 Hosts Robert Hawkins Krisanna Scheiter Carmen Soliz Sean Zdenek Abstract What does it mean to live in a racially constructed America? How has race been invented, constructed, and reinvented in our society since colonialism arrived on American soil? When we consider race, we often think about it in the context of People of Color. But what about whiteness? How did white people become white? And why and how does it matter? In this podcast, we discuss racial hierarchies and examine how and why whiteness was constructed and who benefits. We take a look at Latin America and the history of racial categorization and how whiteness was for sale. Within the United States, we explore the history of how certain groups became white while others did not and discuss the social and legal context in which this happened. We also examine the contemporary ramifications of whiteness, how it intersects with ableism, and how it shows up in computer algorithms and artificial intelligence. Contents Introduction The social construction of race Buying whiteness in colonial Latin America Defining whiteness in the legal system Algorithmic racism and ableism Conclusion Keywords social construction, quace, gracias al sacar, mestizo, Takao Ozawa, Bhagat Singh Thind, algorithmic racism, algorithmic ableism Introduction Carmen Soliz 0:00 Coming from Latin America, it's kind of shocking when the first form that you have to fill out is, "What is your race?" Robert Hawkins 0:06 In the US, I mean, we are racially constructed. White people didn't exist prior to the Atlantic slave trade. And what I mean by that is that white people didn't define themselves as white. They were Europeans. They were Christians. They were Italians. They were many things, but they were not white. And whiteness was created as a juxtaposition against blackness. Krisanna Scheiter 0:33 The fact that it's socially constructed doesn't mean it's not real. Sean Zdenek 0:46 (Intro music: “Drive Breakbeat” by Rockot) Welcome! This is Inventing Whiteness, a podcast to explore the social constructions of race, and its connections to colonialism, ableism and capitalism. Why is it problematic to say that race is self-evident? How has race and whiteness in particular been constructed throughout history, in both the US and in Latin America? How do constructions of race intersect with gender and disability? Do the law courts play a role in defining whiteness? What about new technologies, especially generative AI, and algorithms? There's a lot to explore, so we invited a multidisciplinary panel to talk about moments in which race and whiteness were invented or constructed. The social construction of race First up is Dr. Krisanna Scheiter, a philosopher and Gender, Sexuality and Women's Studies Professor at Union College. Dr. Scheiter, thank you for joining us today. What does it mean to say that race is socially constructed? Krisanna Scheiter 1:41 Basically, it means that race is not natural. Historically, people thought that race is something we discovered. They thought we could divide up the human race based on biological and essential features. You couldn't change which race you belong to. Moreover, the supposed biological differences were also considered to have certain advantages and disadvantages, such that there was thought to be a hierarchy of races, with the white race, Caucasians, being on top. There are many variations on the idea that race is a social construct. But in general, the idea is that race is not something that is determined by essential biological features. But it's something we as a society invented. Sean Zdenek 2:20 That's a really interesting word to use in this context: invented. What does it mean to invent race? Krisanna Scheiter 2:26 So, the idea that race is socially constructed is often hard for people to grasp. I mean, how can race be a social construct if it's based on physical and biological differences? We can literally see what race someone belongs to. The thing is that these physical characteristics are not all there is to race. So Charles Mills, a philosopher and Critical Race theorist, explains in a well-known article, "But What Are You Really?," that race is not just about our physical differences, but about the value in the hierarchy we place on those physical differences. It is the imposed hierarchy he thinks that helps construct race. To illustrate what he means Mills proposes a thought experiment: he asked us to imagine a society in which every citizen either natural born or naturalized is assigned a quace, a play on race. Each citizen is assigned a code: Q1, Q2, or Q3. Whatever code they're assigned is on all of their official documents, their birth certificates, their driver's license, their passports, but the codes are distributed totally at random, and they don't align with any physical traits. You couldn't look at someone and just know what quace they belong to. What's more, parents may not have the same quace as their children. And there's no history of oppression or exploitation attached to any given quace. No economical disparities based on quace. No prohibitions on interquacial marriages. No generational trauma correlated to quace. No calls to quacial purity. The quace system is a long forgotten tradition. It's just a cultural quirk, and it plays no part in the quality of any individual person's life. Asking someone what quace they are is like asking them for their driver's license number or their passport number. If they were to say, Q1, no one would question it. No one would ask, "But what are you really?" It'd be an absurd question, because there's no reason to doubt the person. Even if they misremember their code, there's nothing at stake. Mills’ point is that in this hypothetical system of quace, there's differences between individuals, and there's different groups, but these differences just don't carry any weight. They're meaningless. Sean Zdenek 4:34 That's really interesting. The concept of quace is new to me. But I understand it as a hypothetical thought experiment, in which people are divided into different groups. They're labeled Q1, Q2, Q3, and yet that label has no significant impact on an individual's life, whereas in a racial system such as the one in the United States, racial categories have a very clear and profound impact on people's lives. But still, how does that prove that race is a social construction? Krisanna Scheiter 5:08 The quacial society is what mills would call a horizontal system of race, where there are different groups, but being part of a group doesn't affect anything. In the US., on the other hand, we have a vertical system of race in which there are very clear hierarchies. And the goal of this system is to privilege one race over another. In the US, our system of race privileges white people. The key point is that we created these hierarchies. They're not based on anything. We created them in order to privilege a certain group of people. But because we created these hierarchies, it now matters a lot which racial category one belongs to, because in a vertical system of race, one's race affects the opportunities available to us, as well as the goods we think we're entitled to. Because there are advantages and disadvantages tied to our social categories, we're invested in knowing which racial category we and others fit into. And so we look to physical characteristics. We look at ancestry, culture, experience, all these different things in order to identify which race people belong to. And we pile on stereotypes and moral judgments to justify the oppression of races perceived as lower in the hierarchy. And it's in this way that we construct race. Buying whiteness in colonial Latin America Sean Zdenek 6:17 Let's build on this discussion by turning to an example of racial construction in colonial Latin America. We're joined now by Dr. Carmen Soliz, an Associate Professor of History of Latin America at UNC Charlotte. So, Dr. Soliz, is it true that you could buy whiteness in colonial Latin America? Carmen Soliz 6:37 You could, if you were wealthy in colonial Latin America. In the late 18th century, you start seeing everywhere in Latin America—and what today is Mexico, Venezuela, Peru, Argentina—we start seeing the emergence of a group of mixed race people—pardos, mulatos, mestizos—who managed to accumulate wealth as land owners, mine owners, or merchants. The problem was that despite their enormous wealth, they could not access positions of power at the highest levels of the political structure. Because of their mixed blood. They could not put their daughters into a convent, or they could not get their sons into the military. Because these institutions were only intended for white Spaniards. The good news for them was that the Spanish crown was always in debt, close to bankrupt. And they came up with a solution for this wealthy mixed-race class, which was selling them titles of whiteness. This process of purchasing whiteness for you and your descendants was called "gracias al sacar." This brought in a new source of income for the Spanish crown and significant gains for the affluent social class eager to access positions of power at the highest levels of the colonial society. Sean Zdenek 7:09 What a fascinating and remarkable example, an example of literally buying whiteness. Was this case unique in Latin America? Carmen Soliz 8:30 This was not the only case where racial categories were subject to negotiation in colonial Latin America. Since the beginning of the colonial period, thousands of indigenous people started declaring themselves mixed race. And they did this to escape the onerous obligation of working in the mines and paying taxes. Initially, these two onerous obligations were only imposed on Indians. This individual strategy—declaring oneself mestizo—put the indigenous community at risk, because the Spanish crown agreed to recognize indigenous communities' land if they were willing to pay tribute taxes and to work in the mines. So, what you find is this ongoing tension between the interests of the community in keeping all of their members and individual members of that community trying to look for alternatives. I think both cases show how race was not something fixed but negotiable. Both cases show how economic opportunities or taxes were shaping racial identities. Defining whiteness in the legal system Sean Zdenek 9:54 Let's turn now to constructions of race in our legal systems. We're joined by Dr. Robert Hawkins, a Professor of Social Work and Social Policy, whose research specializes in the intersection of race and poverty. Dr. Hawkins, can you give us an example of when the courts in the US constructed whiteness? Robert Hawkins 10:14 There are several examples throughout history of state and federal courts legally sanctioning racial identity in one way or another. But the first case that comes to mind is Ozawa v. United States. Takao Ozawa was a Japanese immigrant who had lived in the United States for more than 20 years when he filed for US citizenship in 1914. Under the Naturalization Act of 1906, law-abiding immigrants of good character could become US citizens if they were white. Ozawa's application was denied in the courts because he was classified as Japanese. His case eventually made its way to the Supreme Court, at which point he had lived in the United States for 28 years. Now, the reason that Ozawa wanted to become a US citizen was because he wanted to own property, and property can only be owned by US citizens. But his conundrum was that because he was Japanese, he was not considered a US citizen. But Ozawa was an educated married father of two, and he claimed to the court that he had fully assimilated into US culture. He argued that skin color is controlled by climate and should not be the basis for citizenship. He also claimed that his skin was as white as any Caucasians, and so he should be considered a free white person. Ozawa went on to argue that he was law abiding. His children went to American schools, both he and his wife held degrees from American universities, and that he was loyal to the US. He wrote in a brief: "I neither drink liquor of any kind, nor smoke, nor play cards, nor gamble, nor associate with any improper person...In name Benedict Arnold was an American, but at heart he was a traitor. In name I am not an American, but at heart I am a true American," Sean Zdenek 12:19 That's really interesting. And what was the government's argument? Robert Hawkins 12:22 The government argued that the term "white person" referred to individuals of Caucasian race, as understood by the common scientific and popular understanding at the time, which did not include Japanese individuals. Sean Zdenek 12:36 And the final verdict? How did the supreme court rule? Robert Hawkins 12:39 The Supreme Court in 1922 ruled unanimously against Ozawa. In the opinion, they noted that a white person was understood to be someone of the Caucasian race, which the Japanese were not. The Court declared that the word "white" was synonymous with what is popularly known as the Caucasian race. They concluded that the Japanese could not be white, since they were clearly of a race which is not Caucasian. The ruling also noted that Congress did not intend to grant citizenship rights to the Japanese or recognize them as free white people. Sean Zdenek 13:20 What a fascinating case, a case that went all the way to the Supreme Court to decide whether someone is white or not. What does this case say to you and is this case unique? Robert Hawkins 13:30 Now, this is not the only case of the court determining who is or is not white. It is not even the only time that the Supreme Court made a ruling on racial identity on that day. In the same ruling, they denied the citizenship of another Japanese man using an argument similar to Ozawa's. The following year, the court would go on to hear another case, Bhagat Singh Thind, who was a descendant of Aryans of India and belonged to the Caucasian race. To him, his claim was that disqualified him for citizenship. The court rejected Thind's claim, however, ruling that he did not meet a common sense understanding of whiteness. In other words, the court said he was not white because white people did not consider him to be white. What this all means to me is that race is a social construct, but it's also very much a legal one. It also reminds me that we cannot so easily pick our own race in the United States. It is often bestowed on us, sometimes through social interactions, and other times legally. Algorithmic racism and ableism Krisanna Scheiter 14:56 So far, our discussion has been focused on historical examples, but what about today? Let's consider digital technologies. From search engine algorithms to AI writing tools to image recognition technologies, our information and knowledge are filtered and shaped by the tools we use. Dr. Sean Zdenek is an Associate Professor of Technical and Professional Writing at the University of Delaware. He teaches and studies at the intersection of new media and disability studies. Dr. Zdenek: How much power and control do search engines have over us? Aren't they just neutral tools to help us live and work more efficiently? Sean Zdenek 15:35 You know, in a pretty important way, the search engine is a tool. But it's also a tool that filters and structures and functions, I think, as a gatekeeper to the world of information on the web. You know, we tend to assume the search engine is a mere window, a kind of transparent window onto the web, when in fact, the search engine is powered by an algorithm that chooses how we access that information, what kind of information we have access to. So let me give you one example: you know, let's say you have a small business website or a personal website, and you want to drive traffic to that website. In order to do so effectively, you need to address the search engine. You need to be thinking about the search engine as perhaps the most powerful reader. You know, before people can even find your website, the search engine needs to find it. It needs to index it. It needs to understand how to deliver that website address to people who are searching for information related to the website. So, the search engine, again, is perhaps our most powerful audience, reader, and user. When we write online, we aren't just writing for other people, but, importantly, we're writing for the search engine. While online resources are readily available to help businesses optimize their sites for search engines, precisely how Google's search algorithm works is a trade secret. So that's where I start: with this obvious fact that search engines are powerful gatekeepers. They aren't simply neutral tools. Krisanna Scheiter 17:17 The search engine is powerful. But can it also be racist, sexist, or ableist? Sean Zdenek 17:22 In her groundbreaking 2018 book, Algorithms of Oppression, Safiya Umoja Noble argues that search engines reinforce racism. In the opening pages of her book, Noble relays how a simple web search for a fun activity to do with her nieces led to a powerful lesson about the role of algorithms in perpetuating stereotypes. After googling "black girls," Noble was overwhelmed with results for pornographic websites. In another compelling example, Noble describes the case of an African American couple who were auto-tagged as "gorillas" by Google's facial recognition software. More than two years after the incident, as of 2018, Google still had not fixed the gorilla problem, choosing instead to purge the term "gorilla" from its image classifying system. Rather than concluding that these examples are mere "glitches" to be worked out of the system, Noble argues that algorithmic racism cuts deeper—that "Google could completely fail when it came to providing reliable or credible information" (p. 3). As Noble puts it: "Racism is a standard protocol for organizing behavior on the web" (p. 4). Krisanna Scheiter 18:28 Are we just talking about race and gender here? Or are there other intersections too? Sean Zdenek 18:33 Yeah, I'm particularly interested in the intersections between algorithms and disability, or algorithms and ableism. We might use the term "algorithmic ableism," which builds on the work of scholars in digital race studies to explore “the specific harms and disproportionate negative impacts that surveillance and algorithmic tools can have on disabled people” (Brown et al. 2022, 6). I'm quoting here from the Center for Democracy and Technology. One of their examples is facial recognition technologies. It's an example of how algorithmic tools are only going to be as good as the data they're trained on. When the data is biased, the results will be biased. Here's how the center puts it: "Because many facial recognition technologies are trained on biased data. They often do not represent people of color or disabled people sufficiently, which can lead to discrimination." Another example we could look at are so-called "resume screening algorithms." Lots of employers are using nonhumans—algorithms, machines—to weed out applicants who don't fit certain criteria. These algorithms can be trained to learn from a set of data. You know, when that data is partial or biased, the algorithm is going to be biased as a result. When a resume screening algorithm "treats underrepresented traits as undesired traits," members of underrepresented groups, including people with disabilities and women in male-dominated fields, can be excluded from employment opportunities (Givens 2020). A third example here would be generative AI systems—generative AI systems that may be drawing on stereotypes of people of color or people with disabilities. There's a recent study from earlier in 2024 of visual representations of disability using generative AI systems. These are systems in which you can enter phrases or key words or paragraphs of text, and the AI system will generate an image based on the criteria in that text input. So, what the authors of this study found was that these generative AI systems “perpetuat[ed] broader narratives in society around disabled people as primarily using wheelchairs, being sad and lonely, incapable, and inactive. Some of the images were strikingly dehumanizing as assistive technologies (AT) were more visible than the person” (Mack et al. 2024). The point of the article is really summarized in its title, which is: “‘They only care to show us the wheelchair’: Disability Representation in Text-to-Image AI Models.” Conclusion Sean Zdenek 21:17 (Outro music: “Drive Breakbeat” by Rockot) Thank you for checking out this inaugural episode of Inventing Whiteness. We hope to be back soon with new guests, new conversations, and new stories about the invention of race. [Auto-transcribed by https://otter.ai. Corrected and formatted by Sean Zdenek]