Acting white

Acting white, in the United States, is a pejorative term applied to persons of minority group when they are perceived to have betrayed their supposed cultural patterns and norms by incorporating the social expectations of the dominant white non-Hispanic group. Traditionally, population groups in the United States have been differentiated by racial and/or ethnic differences, each group then attributed distinct cultural patterns, real or percieved, that distinguish them a separate. In most cases, these distinction are stereotypically negative for the minorities, and stereotypically positive for the dominant group.

"Acting white", in its racial usage, has been historically applied to African-Americans, but also to other racial groups. More recently, in an ethnic usage, the term has be applied on Hispanics/Latinos of all races, including white Hispanics, in which case the term carries a meaning of "acting Anglo". This meaning is also often carried when used on other groups bound by culture and language (i.e. ethnicity), but not necessarily by race, such as Arab Americans. In the latter case, however, additional complexities arise, since Arab Americans are categorized officially as White only. See Race and ethnicity in the United States Census.

Educational attainment in particular is seen as a form of selling out by being disloyal to one's culture. The term "Acting white" is controversial, and its precise meaning is hard to precisely define. Nevertheless, the idea that minority students suffer from the negative prejudices of their ethnic peers is currently conventional wisdom in much of the American news media—as expressed in articles in The New York Times, Time Magazine, and The Wall Street Journal- and in American society.

History of usage

The phrase was coined by Signithia Fordham and first popularized in her groundbreaking 1986 study, Black Students' School Success: Coping with the "Burden of 'Acting White.'" The question of whether or not acting white attitudes really exist has been debated back and forth in academic literature. The term rose to further media prominence when Bill Cosby used it in a famous May 2004 speech. Black people that are accused of acting white are sometimes referred to as Black Anglo-Saxons, a term coined by comedian Paul Mooney. The 2008 election of Barack Obama as President of the United States created a public discussion that the acting white attitude may be waning.

Case studies and research

The difference among races, both native and foreign born, in regard to those who have earned a Bachelor's degree or higher (data from U.S. Census Bureau).

Not all scholars define acting white in precisely the same way. However, most definitions include a reference to situations where some minority adolescents ridicule their minority peers for engaging in behaviors perceived to be characteristic of whites. "White behavior" as such is highly correlated with high grades in school, which is the effect that researchers focus on, but the two attributes are distinct.

In 1986, Signithia Fordham co-authored with Nigerian sociologist John Ogbu a study that concluded that high-performing African American students in a Washington, D.C. high school borrowed from hegemonic white culture as part of a strategy for achievement, while struggling to maintain a black identity. Ogbu made a related claim in his 2003 book, Black American Students in an Affluent Suburb: A Study of Academic Disengagement, concluding that black students' own cultural attitudes hindered academic achievement and that these attitudes are too often neglected. However, as Ogbu made clear in his seminal work Minority Education and Caste (1978), school disengagement among caste-like minorities occurs because of the glass ceiling placed by white society on the job-success of their parents and others in their communities. He reasoned that non-whites "failed to observe the link between educational achievement and access to jobs."

Though the study's conclusion gained a popular foothold and has been exposed by figures such as Bill Cosby in his famous May 2004 speech, a later study challenged its validity. In 2003, Karolyn Tyson, a sociologist, and William Darity, Jr., an economist, both at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, directed an 18 month study at eleven North Carolinian schools. The study concluded that white and black students have essentially the same attitudes about scholastic achievement; students in both groups want to succeed in school and show higher levels of self-esteem when they do better in school. They compared attitudes identified as acting white to the normal adolescent pains experienced in John Hughes' movies.

Academics Philip J. Cook and Jens Ludwig published a report in 1997 finding that blacks do not face any stronger social pressures for succeeding in school than whites, and that they have no greater feelings of alienation towards education in general either. They noted anecdotal and ethnographic research confirming that minority students hold these views, but they concluded that these are not inherently generalizable and do not substantially affect student behavior in the classroom. They labeled the issue "something of a distraction" from what they saw as more important educational reforms.

A 2006 study titled An Empirical Analysis of "Acting White" by Roland G. Fryer, Jr. at Harvard University and Paul Torelli suggested that the phenomenon probably had little to no effect on students achieving at average levels, but might explain a significant role in the disparities between black and white students at high achievement levels. Fryer has also written that, in contrast to Fordham and Ogbu's theory, "acting white" prejudices are actually more common the more integrated the school, with historically black schools free of any effects. He found that groups such as Italian immigrants in Boston’s West End and the Maori of New Zealand display similar behaviors. He concluded, "[t]here is necessarily a trade-off between doing well and rejection by your peers when you come from a traditionally low-achieving group, especially when that group comes into contact with more outsiders."

A fundamental drawback of much of the research so far is that the people studied have been asked to rate their own popularity in the eyes of others, which naturally brings those scores into question. Roland G. Fryer, Jr. has remarked, "[a]sking teenagers whether they’re popular is like asking them if they’re having sex."

Commentary

Media personality Bill Cosby brought the term to greater prominence in 2004.

Dana White, an African-American associate of the Heritage Foundation, wrote in 2003 that "[o]nly within the black community is academic or entrepreneurial success openly chastised." She compared that with what she saw as more positive attitudes among Korean-Americans, Chinese-Americans, and Jewish-Americans, which have also faced widespread discrimination in society. She also stated that "[n]o longer do white racists tell black children books are for white people. Today, black people do this". Political observer John McWhorter has commented, "[t]eenagers have a variety of identities open to them for trying on anti-Establishment postures. White kids can be stoners or goths. Black kids can be 'nonwhite'." He interpreted those kids as black "nerds". He stated that the acting white attitude developed as the creation of an "other" among newly integrated African-American kids.

In their aforementioned study, Karolyn Tyson and William Darity, Jr. stated that school staff and faculty who hold racist attitudes about the ability of black students use the attitude as a cover for disparities in student performance. Shelby Steele wrote in The Content of Our Character that what he identified as middle class black values are falsely viewed by the majority of blacks as "white" while they are actually colorblind. He argued that this attitude is separate from the natural reaction of young blacks in poverty.

New York University School of Law professor Kenji Yoshino wrote in his 2006 book Covering: The Hidden Assault on Our Civil Rights criticizing what he sees as social pressures to conform to mainstream white culture. He stated that this constitutes a violation of African-Americans' civil rights and that they should be able to uphold their own social distinctions. He also stated that they should be able to freely choose to identify with white culture if they wish. Anne Arnett Ferguson, Assistant Professor of Afro-American Studies and Women's Studies at Smith College, has written that white culture "ruthlessly excludes African American cultural modes as relevant and meaningful". She highlighted the insistence in schools of standard English over Black Vernacular English as an example.

Clarence Page remarked on The News Hour with Jim Lehrer in 2004:

In African American folklore, the sea crab ranks among the dumbest of creatures who also offers a valuable lesson. When you catch a bucket or a basketful, you never have to put a lid on because when one of the creatures tries to get out, the others will just pull it back in. Some of our fellow human beings aren't much smarter than that. When they see you working hard to achieve your dreams, they'll make fun of you just for trying.

Behaviors

According to economist Roland G. Fryer, Jr., some of the behaviors commonly viewed as acting white are:

• Getting high grades in classes.
• Speaking standard American English.
• Using strict diction in one's words.
• Answering questions asked by the teacher in class.
• Enrolling in Advanced Placement or Honors classes.
• Shopping at The Gap or Abercrombie & Fitch for clothes.
• Avoiding wearing clothes from FUBU and Tommy Hilfiger.
• Wearing shorts in Winter.

Accusations of "acting white"

Barack Obama

President Barack Obama, who is biracial, has been labeled as "acting white" by Jesse Jackson, Ralph Nader, and other public figures.

Obama's presidential victory in the 2008 election and public image have started a public debate about whether or not the stigma of 'acting white' will go away in the future. Commentator John McWhorter and economist Stephen J. Dubner have stated that it might.

Obama himself vehemently criticized the concept in his keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, arguing that "children can’t achieve unless we raise their expectations and turn off the television sets and eradicate the slander that says a black youth with a book is acting white.”

See also

• Educational attainment in the United States#Race
• Stereotypes of African Americans
• Stereotype threat
• Uncle Tom
• Black shame
• "Blackness" as a self-identity
• Oppositional culture
• List of ethnic slurs
• 'Acting Straight'

External links

• "The Price of Acting White". By Richard Morin. The Washington Post. June 5, 2005.
• "Study: ‘Acting White’ Accusation". By David Pluviose. Diverse. April 5, 2006.
• "Collective Identity and the Burden of “Acting White” in Black History, Community, and Education ". By John U. Ogbu. Urban Review. Volume 36 Issue 1, pages 1–35. March 2004.