White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism

White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism

• Genre: Nonfiction; racial and social justice
• Originally Published: 2018
• Reading Level/Interest: College/Adult
• Structure/Length: 12 chapters with introduction and resources; approx. 192 pages; approx. 6 hours, 21 minutes on audio
• Central Concern: DiAngelo explores how white people should address racism, challenge its entrenched forms, and escape racist assumptions.
• Potential Sensitivity Issues: Racism and white supremacy; race relations; the role gender plays in racism and race relations

Robin DiAngelo, Author

• Bio: American academic, lecturer, author; consultant and trainer; former professor of multicultural education at Westfield State University; an Affiliate Associate Professor of Education at the University of Washington; coined the term “white fragility” in a 2011 academic essay in the International Journal of Critical Pedagogy
• Other Works: Is Everybody Really Equal? (with Özlem Sensoy; 2012); What Does it Mean to Be White? (2012); Nice Racism: How Progressive White People Perpetuate Racial Harm (2021)
• Awards: Starred review from Publishers Weekly (2018)

CENTRAL THEMES connected and noted throughout this Teaching Unit:

• How White Resistance to Thinking and Talking About Race Leads to Complicity in Systemic Racism
• Discomfort as a Trigger
• Children’s Socialization in a Racist Society

STUDY OBJECTIVES: In accomplishing the components of this Unit, students will:

• Gain an understanding of the social, cultural, and historical contexts regarding How White Resistance to Thinking and Talking About Race Leads to Complicity in Systemic Racism
• Discuss short paired texts and other resources to make connections via the text’s themes of Discomfort as a Trigger and Children’s Socialization in a Racist Society
• Design multi-media collages that connect the misconception of “post-racial America” described in Claudia Rankine’s Citizen to DiAngelo’s concept of “white fragility”
• Analyze and evaluate the epigraphs found at the beginning of each chapter in a structured essay response regarding how they further the book’s themes around Discomfort as a Trigger and How White Resistance to Thinking and Talking About Race Leads to Complicity in Systemic Racism, among other topics