Me and White Supremacy by Layla F. Saad

Robin DiAngelo, author of White Fragility, will be speaking at a virtual Family Action Network event this evening, beginning at 7:00pm. 

DiAngelo also wrote the foreword for ME AND WHITE SUPREMACY by Layla F. Saad.  That book is based on an Instagram challenge and daily reflection practice which encourages people with white privilege to examine their own preconceptions and actions.  Saad writes, “This book is for people who are ready to do the work, people who want to create change in the world by activating change within themselves first.” As Saad explains, the work is indeed hard, but she “chunks” it into 28 days around topics like white privilege (“Were you ever told as a child that your whiteness would work against you?”); tone policing, white silence, and white exceptionalism.  Each section contains a definition, gives examples (“I can’t take in what you’re saying about your lived experience because you sound too angry”), explains why the concept is important and offers a series of journaling prompts. 

Saad advocates working thought the book sequentially and then to keep dipping in and out while continuing to ask questions.  It was especially meaningful to me to be listening to our school’s Board of Education respond to student requests about diversifying curriculum, expanding coverage of Black history and re-instating Seminar Day (with almost 5000 signatures on the petition) on the same day I had been reading Saad’s words: “you have been educated by institutions that have taught white superiority through curricula that favor a white-biased narrative, through the lack of representation of BIPOC [Black, Indigenous and People of Color], and through the way these institutions handled acts of racism.”    

ME AND WHITE SUPREMACY is a text that deserves attention from everyone, especially since each reader can work through the material at an individual pace. As teachers, we had read and discussed Peggy McIntosh’s work on white privilege earlier this year as part of our professional development work.  Saad references that scholarship and further notes: “Not looking at something does not mean it does not exist. And in fact, it is an expression of white privilege itself to choose not to look at it. …. Your desire to be seen as good can actually prevent you from doing good, because if you do not see yourself as part of the problem, you cannot be part of the solution.”

Both Booklist and Library Journal gave ME AND WHITE SUPREMACY starred reviews. In a recent interview on NPR, Robin DiAngelo called it one of two “really excellent resources. … a book you do rather than read.”  The other resource she recommended is Dr. Eddie Moore's 21-Day Racial Equity [Habit] Building Challenge, saying they “will start us on what is a process — not a moment or an instant.”