Smashing White Supremacy

White Supremacy

What It Is - The Invention of the White Race

"The Invention of the White Race" by Theodore W. Allen. Presentation by Jeffrey B Perry

"The Invention of the White Race" (Verso Books) by Theodore W. Allen, especially Vol. II: "The Origin of Racial Oppression in Anglo-America."

This Slide Presentation/Talk by Jeffrey B. Perry, which draws on insights from Hubert Harrison, was hosted by The Hubert Harrison and Theodore W. Allen Society on January 31, 2013, at the Brecht Forum, when it was still located in lower Manhattan.

"When the first Africans arrived in Virginia in 1619, there were no 'white' people there; nor, according to the colonial records, would there be for another sixty years."

- Theodore W. Allen (Written after searching through 885 county-years of Virginia's colonial records)

Theodore W. Allen's "The Invention of the White Race," with its focus on racial oppression and social control, is one of the twentieth-century's major contributions to historical understanding. This two-volume classic (Vol. 1: "Racial Oppression and Social Control" and Vol. 2: "The Origin of Racial Oppression in Anglo-America") details how the "white race" was invented as a ruling-class social control formation and a system of racial oppression was imposed in response to labor solidarity in the wake of Bacon's Rebellion (1676-77), how the "white race" was created and maintained through "white race" privileges conferred on laboring class European-Americans relative to African-Americans, how these privileges were not in the interest of African-Americans or laboring class European-Americans, and how the "white race" has been the principal historic guarantor of ruling-class domination in America. (See http://www.jeffreybperry.net/_center_... )

"The Invention of the White Race" presents a full-scale challenge to what Allen refers to as "The Great White Assumption" -- "the unquestioning, indeed unthinking acceptance of the 'white' identity of European-Americans of all classes as a natural attribute rather than a social construct." Its thesis on the origin and nature of the "white race" contains the root of a new and radical approach to United States history, one that challenges master narratives taught in the media and in schools, colleges, and universities. With its equalitarian motif and emphasis on class struggle it speaks to people today who strive for change worldwide.

Jeffrey B. Perry contributed new introductions, back matter, internal study guides, and expanded indexes to Verso Books' new expanded edition of "The Invention of the White Race."

Theoretical Foundations

The Question of Fascism in the US by Steve Martinot

Americanism Personified: Why Fascism Has Always Been an Inevitable Outcome of the American Project, Colin Jenkins, The Hampton Institute

White Blindspot by Noel Ignatin and Ted Allen

History of and Varities of Whiteness

One or Two Things I Know About Us: Rethinking the Image and Role of the "Okies", Roxanne Dubar-Ortiz

'Whiteness' and Trump voters, Richard Seymour

What’s the Matter with the ‘White Working Class’?, Richard Seymour

Hubert Harrison

Hubert Harrison Father of Harlem Radicalism Founder of New Negro Movement by Jeffrey B. Perry

The Life of Hubert Harrison - A Discussion with Jeffrey B Perry

Hubert Henry Harrison: The Father of Harlem Radicalism w Dr. Jeffrey Perry : Dr. Perry will join iMixWhatiLike! to discuss his work on Hubert Henry Harrison. Dr. Jeffrey B. Perry (Jeff Perry) is an independent, working-class scholar formally educated at Princeton, Harvard, Rutgers, and Columbia. Volume 2 of his Hubert Harrison biography entitled "Hubert Harrison: The Struggle for Equality, 1918-1927" (Columbia University Press) was published in November 2020.

Theodore Allen

Can White ̶W̶o̶r̶k̶e̶r̶s̶ Radicals Be Radicalized? : Lost Writings of SDS by Ted Allen, Brooklyn, NY 1967

PDF: The Invention of the White Race, Volume 1: Racial Oppression and Social Control

PDF: The Invention of the White Race, Volume 2: The Original of Racial Oppression in Anglo-America

Theodore Allen on Race and Privilege, Socialist Worker

The Centrality of Theodore W. Allen’s Work in the Struggle Against White Supremacy by Jeffrey B. Perry, Black Agenda Report, August 23, 2017.

Critiques of "White Privilege"

‘White Privilege’ Defanged: From Class War Analysis to Electoral Cynicism, Abolition Journal

Approaches to Ending White Supremacy

Du Bois and the “Wages of Whiteness”: What He Meant, What He Didn’t, and, Besides, It Shouldn’t Matter for Our Politics Anyway, Adolph Reed, Jr.

Reclaim the Discourse on White Privilege by Richard Moser, April 5, 2017.

Organizations - White Workers Against White Supremacy

Young Patriots

The Panthers and the Patriots, Jacobin

Young Patriots at the United Front Against Fascism Conference, 1969

Video: Hillbilly Nationalists: The Young Patriots & the Rainbow Coalition : Join Young Patriots co-founder Hy Thurman and Amy Sonnie and James Tracy for a book launch discussion of 'Hillbilly Nationalists'. In 1969, the Young Patriots Organization (YPO) emerged out of Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood to organize poor white people against capitalism and white supremacy. They worked alongside the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense and the Puerto Rican Young Lords in the Original Rainbow Coalitions. The YPO embodied the politics that sought to build multiracial working-class unity while respecting the self-determination and autonomy of their comrades of color.

Redneck Revolt

Redneck Revolt Builds Anti-Racist, Anti-Capitalist Movement With Working Class Whites, Shadowproof