Europeans began to see themselves as "white" primarily during the early modern period, especially from the 17th century onward, in the context of colonial expansion, Atlantic slavery, and the development of racial thinking.
Key Phases in the Construction of Whiteness:
1. Medieval Period (before 1500s):
Europeans did not have a unified concept of "race" as we understand it today.
Identity was based more on religion, ethnicity, language, and region (e.g., Christian vs. Muslim, English vs. French, noble vs. peasant).
The idea of being “white” did not function as a self-identifier or category of solidarity.
2. 16th–17th Centuries: Early Colonialism and Slavery
As Europeans colonized the Americas and encountered Indigenous peoples and African slaves, new hierarchies were constructed.
The transatlantic slave trade and European justifications for slavery helped formalize distinctions between Europeans (later “whites”) and Africans or Indigenous peoples as “non-white” and inferior.
“White” began to emerge as a legal and political category, particularly in English colonial law.
3. 18th Century: Enlightenment and Scientific Racism
Thinkers like Carl Linnaeus and Johann Blumenbach developed racial classification systems that categorized humans based on physical and cultural traits.
Europeans came to see themselves as members of a “Caucasian” or “white” race, distinguished from “Negroid,” “Mongoloid,” etc.
This idea was used to justify colonial rule, slavery, and European supremacy.
4. 19th Century: Institutionalization
In the U.S. and European empires, whiteness became linked to citizenship, property rights, and social status.
Immigration laws and census categories reinforced “white” identity (e.g., Naturalization Act of 1790 in the U.S. restricted citizenship to “free white persons”).
Summary:
Europeans did not always see themselves as “white.” This identity emerged in the modern colonial era, primarily as a racial and political construct used to distinguish Europeans from colonized and enslaved peoples. It evolved alongside imperialism, capitalism, and scientific racism, becoming a tool of social and economic power.
📚 Key References on the Construction of Whiteness
1. Theodore W. Allen – The Invention of the White Race (Vol. 1 & 2)
Argues “whiteness” was invented in 17th-century Virginia to divide poor Europeans from enslaved Africans.
Whiteness served the interests of the planter class by preventing class solidarity among laborers.
2. David Roediger – The Wages of Whiteness (1991)
Shows how 19th-century European immigrant workers in the U.S. adopted “whiteness” to gain status and distance from Black Americans.
Whiteness became a psychological wage, aligning workers with white elites.
3. Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz – Not “A Nation of Immigrants” (2021)
Whiteness emerged within settler colonialism and genocide, not as a natural identity.
Places whiteness in the broader context of imperial conquest and Indigenous dispossession.
4. Nell Irvin Painter – The History of White People (2010)
Traces how the concept of "white" evolved from ancient notions of beauty and virtue to modern racial taxonomies.
Details how scientific racism and nationalism shaped white identity.
5. Gerald Horne – The Counter-Revolution of 1776 (2014)
Shows how the American Revolution aimed to preserve slavery and white supremacy.
Highlights the political use of racial identity to justify land theft and forced labor.
6. Winthrop D. Jordan – White Over Black: American Attitudes Toward the Negro, 1550–1812 (1968)
A classic tracing early English colonial racial attitudes and the hardening of distinctions over time.
7. Cedric J. Robinson – Black Marxism: The Making of the Black Radical Tradition (1983)
Introduces the concept of racial capitalism and shows how racial hierarchies underpinned European capitalism.
Emphasizes that premodern Europe already had racialized distinctions, later globalized through colonialism.
These authors collectively show that whiteness was not a timeless identity but a modern construct, created and adapted to support systems of power, colonialism, and exploitation.
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