Date of Graduation

8-2024

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts in Philosophy (MA)

Degree Level

Graduate

Department

Philosophy

Advisor/Mentor

McMullen, Amanda

Committee Member

Donohue, Jenna

Second Committee Member

Ward, Barry

Keywords

Ameliorative; Social justice; White guilt; Whiteness

Abstract

Common in the philosophy of race literature – notably those centered on critiques of whiteness and the oppressive structures therein – we find that guilt is looked upon rather divisively. On one hand, representative of what I call the “abolitionist” position, we find that such states serve no function but to stifle progress towards social justice. Feeling such emotions in relation to one's race seems to lead necessarily to a retreat from the social endeavor of racial justice, resulting in selfish requests for absolution. On the other hand, representative of what I call the “proponent” position, we find prescriptions to lean into these emotions and feel them with all of their force. In doing so, white persons are said to be engaging in a fruitful, self-reflective project that, in a variety of ways, makes them more capable agents of antiracist change. While both positions illuminate important truths about white guilt, I argue that they both implicitly subscribe to a certain conception of white guilt – what I call “the commonplace conception of white guilt.” In so conceiving, I argue that we are met with a justifiable, but regrettable, conclusion in which we are led to avoid the affective state of white guilt and, consequently, its potential as a space for the interrogation of whiteness. This is due to the fact that the argument proffered by the proponent camp implicitly entails a refocus on white sentiments, effectively ignoring the woes of Black persons who undergo extended emotional labor for white persons affected by white guilt. Additionally, as a Black-centered theoretical lens is a virtue of the commonplace conception, we have good reason to follow prescriptions for white guilt that come from the embodied knowledge of Black scholars in the abolitionist camp. With this considered, I construe the abolitionists as giving a prescription of avoidance when white guilt rears its head. While I believe that we are unable to rectify these issues given the commonplace conception of white guilt, I argue that there is conceptual space to redefine white guilt in such a way to capture the theoretical needs of the commonplace conception while prescribing a response to white guilt other than avoidance – i.e., introspection that interrogates one’s place in a racist system and the norms of whiteness therein. So redefined, I argue that white guilt can be rescued – or more appropriately, reappropriated – as a reaction that sets white persons’ focus on systems of oppression rather than their own absolution as good moral persons. This reappropriation, I suggest, allows us to avoid prescribing the non-feeling of white guilt, and literature that invokes or implies its affect, which opens a visceral route for investigating the racist structure of our society and white persons’ part in it.

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