Contested Whiteness: Useful Heuristic or Reinscribing Dominance?

Abstract

This paper takes a relatively new concept in discussions of race and racial identity – that of contested whiteness – and expands upon it substantially. I first review literature on racial incongruence and mismatch and then provide a theoretical amplification of contested whiteness by situating it in theories of racial formation and whiteness as property. I identify a diverse subset of undergraduate and graduate students who can be described as contested whites. These are groups of postsecondary learners who grapple with racial contestation along the borders of whiteness on a daily basis, either from social forces, institutional logics, fellow students, or faculty and staff. In conceptualizing this population and the attendant dynamic of racial contestation, I elucidate the power formations of white supremacy and the policing of its borders as a potent, but covert dynamic that maintains contemporary U.S. race relations. I share stories of contested whiteness from data gathered using this heuristic and argue that it allows for a more complete revelation of the operations of white supremacy. Implications for higher education policy, practice, and research are considered.