Beneath the Surface of White Supremacy

Description

Racism has never been simple. It wasn't more obvious in the past, and it isn't less potent now. From the birth of the United States to the contemporary police shooting death of an unarmed Black youth, Beneath the Surface of White Supremacy investigates ingrained practices of racism, as well as unquestioned assumptions in the study of racism, to upend and deepen our understanding. In Moon-Kie Jung's unsettling book, Dred Scott v. Sandford, the notorious 1857 Supreme Court case, casts a shadow over current immigration debates and the "war on terror." The story of a 1924 massacre of Filipino sugar workers in Hawai'i pairs with statistical relentlessness of Black economic suffering to shed light on hidden dimensions of mass ignorance and indifference. The histories of Asians, Blacks, Latina/os, and Natives relate in knotty ways. State violence and colonialism come to the fore in taking measure of the United States, past and present, while the undue importance of assimilation and colorblindness recedes. Ultimately, Jung challenges the dominant racial common sense and develops new concepts and theory for radically rethinking and resisting racisms. Contents......Page 8 Acknowledgments......Page 10 Part I: Denaturalizing Common Sense......Page 14 1. Introduction: Reconsidering Racism and Theory......Page 16 2. Restructuring a Theory of Racism......Page 34 Part II: Denaturalizing the Nation-State......Page 66 3. The Racial Constitution of the U.S. Empire-State......Page 68 4. The Racial Unconscious of Assimilation Theories......Page 96 Part III: Denaturalizing Ignorance......Page 124 5. Symbolic Coercion and a Massacre of Filipinos......Page 126 6. Symbolic Perversity and the Mass Suffering of Blacks......Page 154 Conclusion: Denaturalizing Racisms Present and Future......Page 182 Notes......Page 196 References......Page 230 Index......Page 252