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Whiteness of a Different Color: European Immigrants and the Alchemy of Race
America's racial odyssey is the subject of this remarkable work of historical imagination. Matthew Frye Jacobson argues that race resides not in nature but in the contingencies of politics and culture. In ever-changing racial categories we glimpse the competing theories of history and collective destiny by which power has been organized and contested in the United States.
Capturing the excitement of the new field of "whiteness studies" and linking it to traditional historical inquiry, Jacobson shows that in this nation of immigrants "race" has been at the core of civic assimilation: ethnic minorities in becoming American were re-racialized to become Caucasian. He provides a counter-history of how nationality groups such as the Irish or Greeks became Americans as racial groups like Celts or Mediterraneans became white.
Jacobson tracks race as a conception and perception, emphasizing the importance of knowing not only how we label one another but also how we see one another, and how that racialized vision has largely been transformed in this century. The stages of racial formation--race as formed in conquest, enslavement, imperialism, segregation, and labor migration--are all part of the complex, and now counterintuitive, history of race.
Whiteness of a Different Color traces the fluidity of racial categories from an immense body of research in literature, popular culture, politics, society, ethnology, anthropology, cartoons, and legal history, including sensational trials like the Leo Frank case and the Draft Riots of 1863.
Capturing the excitement of the new field of "whiteness studies" and linking it to traditional historical inquiry, Jacobson shows that in this nation of immigrants "race" has been at the core of civic assimilation: ethnic minorities in becoming American were re-racialized to become Caucasian. He provides a counter-history of how nationality groups such as the Irish or Greeks became Americans as racial groups like Celts or Mediterraneans became white.
Jacobson tracks race as a conception and perception, emphasizing the importance of knowing not only how we label one another but also how we see one another, and how that racialized vision has largely been transformed in this century. The stages of racial formation--race as formed in conquest, enslavement, imperialism, segregation, and labor migration--are all part of the complex, and now counterintuitive, history of race.
Whiteness of a Different Color traces the fluidity of racial categories from an immense body of research in literature, popular culture, politics, society, ethnology, anthropology, cartoons, and legal history, including sensational trials like the Leo Frank case and the Draft Riots of 1863.
364 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1998
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About the author
Matthew Frye Jacobson
11 books18 followersMatthew Frye Jacobson, a professor of American Studies at Yale, is the author of Whiteness of a Different Color and Special Sorrows. He lives in New York City.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 47 reviews
May 4, 2024
This was a slow read for me but an interesting one. The author has done some in-depth research into the rush of immigration to the US at the turn of the 20th century and delves into the type casting of those immigrants into racial/ethnic/cultural groups.
How does one become a Caucasian?....which in the US of that time was the ultimate category to which one must belong. "Whiteness" was acceptable, all others need not apply! He follows the path of certain ethnic minorities who were not considered Caucasian, even though they were "white skinned" and shows that it was ethnicity as well as race that defined "white".
It was an ugly time for those who came to America where every man was considered free, only to find that this was not exactly the case. Thankfully, over the years they became assimilated into the "white population" but as we well know, prejudices continue to exist. This history gives the reader an idea of why those attitudes still linger.
How does one become a Caucasian?....which in the US of that time was the ultimate category to which one must belong. "Whiteness" was acceptable, all others need not apply! He follows the path of certain ethnic minorities who were not considered Caucasian, even though they were "white skinned" and shows that it was ethnicity as well as race that defined "white".
It was an ugly time for those who came to America where every man was considered free, only to find that this was not exactly the case. Thankfully, over the years they became assimilated into the "white population" but as we well know, prejudices continue to exist. This history gives the reader an idea of why those attitudes still linger.
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February 7, 2022I think this could easily be read along with How the Irish Became White and A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America to complicate the history of whiteness, immigration and racism in the U.S. Very good overall.
November 1, 2015
This book looks at racial definitions and prejudices among the white immigrants prior to World War II, including a discussion of around 20 citizenship cases that wrestled with definitions and often came to conflicting conclusions. It was surprising to learn that people believed they could look at any European immigrant and figure out their race based on facial features, though these days we would think that is ridiculous and only consider those differences ethnicity. The failure of eugenics in World War II had leaders scrambling to solidify a binary white-black divide more firmly. This book also reviews popular movies, shows and books promoting these changing definitions, some of which I have added to my bookshelf on Race & Reconciliation since I never heard of them before and want to read more. It's very informative and gives a lot of perspective on the controversies around us today.
December 1, 2019
As a second-generation Italian-American, I’ve always been fascinated how those previously thought to be non-white (Jews and Italians, specifically, given my upbringing in Queens) eventually qualified as Caucasian.
Whiteness of a Different Color details how race is a mostly political construct and, as in my example above, varies not on biology primarily but on politics. Racial categories have been fluid over time to suit political and socioeconomic needs.
Matthew Frye Jacobson did a remarkable amount of research focusing mostly on European immigrants and their assimilation into non-Anglo-Saxon whites. This is an eye-opener for those who aren’t familiar with European immigrants in America in the early 20th century.
Whiteness of a Different Color details how race is a mostly political construct and, as in my example above, varies not on biology primarily but on politics. Racial categories have been fluid over time to suit political and socioeconomic needs.
Matthew Frye Jacobson did a remarkable amount of research focusing mostly on European immigrants and their assimilation into non-Anglo-Saxon whites. This is an eye-opener for those who aren’t familiar with European immigrants in America in the early 20th century.
December 4, 2014
Jacobson traces "the political history of whiteness." In the American nation of immigrants, "race" has been at the core of civic assimilation: ethnic minorities were re-racialized to become Caucasian. Jacobson "provides a counterhistory of how nationality groups such as the Irish or the Greeks became Americans as racial groups like Celts or Mediterraneans became Caucasian." He concludes that "whiteness is clearly a socially constructed category infinitely malleable as a political tool."
+ 1790 Naturalization Law: any free white person can come to America and gain citizenship. Inclusive of many Europeans.
+ 1840s immigration of Irish and Germans began to challenge the concept of “whiteness”
+ 1924 Johnson Immigration Act: white immigrants as distinctive
+ 1960 Caucasian race after first non-Anglo President elected: probationary
+ beware of anachronisms: “race” meant “ethnicity” through the early twentieth century and only after WWII did “race mainly become more black and white
+ Capitalism and republicanism (read citizenship) have fashioned and refashioned whiteness in America.
+ Catholicism as a marker of racial difference: conflated (72)
+ Nativism and citizenship: Celts, Italians, Hebrews and Slavs were becoming less and less white in debates about who should be coming into as immigrants yet whiter and whiter in debates over who should be granted full rights of citizenship (75)
+ more practical: how race gets constructed—racial others (who later become “white”)
+ “variegated” or “probationary” white people—they are “problem whites” but they are still white. Is it "race"?
pp. 1-90, 138-170, 203-222
+ 1790 Naturalization Law: any free white person can come to America and gain citizenship. Inclusive of many Europeans.
+ 1840s immigration of Irish and Germans began to challenge the concept of “whiteness”
+ 1924 Johnson Immigration Act: white immigrants as distinctive
+ 1960 Caucasian race after first non-Anglo President elected: probationary
+ beware of anachronisms: “race” meant “ethnicity” through the early twentieth century and only after WWII did “race mainly become more black and white
+ Capitalism and republicanism (read citizenship) have fashioned and refashioned whiteness in America.
+ Catholicism as a marker of racial difference: conflated (72)
+ Nativism and citizenship: Celts, Italians, Hebrews and Slavs were becoming less and less white in debates about who should be coming into as immigrants yet whiter and whiter in debates over who should be granted full rights of citizenship (75)
+ more practical: how race gets constructed—racial others (who later become “white”)
+ “variegated” or “probationary” white people—they are “problem whites” but they are still white. Is it "race"?
pp. 1-90, 138-170, 203-222
October 30, 2020
I am sure that this is a good book, but is was too academic and too dense for me. I did not want to take the time or make the effort to read it.
February 8, 2024
Re-read this after several years to write lectures about the creation of whiteness in the late 19th/early 20th century. There is so much to like about this book in terms of content, but the lack of chronological (and at times even thematic) order makes it hard to follow. In writing lectures from it, I am having to significantly reorganize content. Perhaps best to view this monograph as a set of loosely-connected, but separate essays.
January 20, 2013
This was one of the books I read in my “Introduction to Graduate History” course, back in the dark mists of time when I was a young and enthusiastic aspiring historian. I found it a useful introduction to then-current thinking about race as a social construction, and a curative for assumptions that concepts such as “race,” “nationality” or “ethnicity” exist as absolutes in the objective world. I found it useful in several other senses: it gives a good introduction to the history of American immigration, it works as an introduction to historical debate, and it helps to contextualize the more ultra-nationalist movements I study in the European context as they would have been perceived by contemporaries across the pond. It is written clearly enough to be accessible by advanced undergraduate or educated non-academic readers.
In focusing on “whiteness,” Frye departs from studies of the racial “other” to ask about the less-visible construction of the supposed “norm.” This is not to say that the bulk of the book is really about the secure dominant race, but rather it tends to focus on the racial borderlands, and ask how it is the whiteness has been ascribed and defined to exclude different groups at different times in American (and, by extension, European) history. He provides evidence that, at different times and in different circumstances, many people who would be today accepted as white (Poles, Italians, Jews, Swedes, Germans, Irish) were at one time considered beyond the pale of whiteness. He uses visual as well as documentary sources to find “conventions of physiognomy” which signaled the inclusion or exclusion of new immigrants. Most fascinating to me was the visual evidence that Irish people were once portrayed with dark skin in popular illustrations to emphasize their alien-ness. Frye is also very interested in the language of race, and the changing use of terms such as “Celt,” “Slav,” “Nordic,” and “Iberic” to define certain groups as in or out of the in-group. While this lends itself to a degree of discourse analysis, Frye avoids wandering into post-structuralist abstraction and jargon, keeping his argument grounded in evidence and historical relevance.
Although it attempts a fairly sweeping study of its subject, from colonial times to the civil rights era, the bulk of the book focuses on the late-nineteenth century, when the immigration on a mass scale from many different parts of Europe threw conceptions of the “Yankee” into question. He covers the period from 1860 to the early 1920s (when new laws restricting immigration were passed) in considerable detail, using one chapter to focus in on 1877 as a case study in racial re-definition. Frye is also interested in challenging the slippery ways in which white privilege is studied and critiqued today, making a special case that whiteness is an identity which many academics or educated people find it expedient to repudiate, while still benefitting from inclusion when it suits them. People who have never experienced exclusion themselves still attempt to distance themselves from accusations of white supremacy because their ancestors were inscribed as “non-white,” therefore exculpating them (for instance) from acts of genocide against Native Americans (ignoring the fact that they continue to benefit from the oppression of the same groups as modern-day “whites”). Frye seems to have a particular bone to pick on this score with the writer Michael Novak, but I am unfamiliar with him and cannot comment.
Overall, the book is a useful insight into aspects of American history that often go overlooked in traditional accounts.
In focusing on “whiteness,” Frye departs from studies of the racial “other” to ask about the less-visible construction of the supposed “norm.” This is not to say that the bulk of the book is really about the secure dominant race, but rather it tends to focus on the racial borderlands, and ask how it is the whiteness has been ascribed and defined to exclude different groups at different times in American (and, by extension, European) history. He provides evidence that, at different times and in different circumstances, many people who would be today accepted as white (Poles, Italians, Jews, Swedes, Germans, Irish) were at one time considered beyond the pale of whiteness. He uses visual as well as documentary sources to find “conventions of physiognomy” which signaled the inclusion or exclusion of new immigrants. Most fascinating to me was the visual evidence that Irish people were once portrayed with dark skin in popular illustrations to emphasize their alien-ness. Frye is also very interested in the language of race, and the changing use of terms such as “Celt,” “Slav,” “Nordic,” and “Iberic” to define certain groups as in or out of the in-group. While this lends itself to a degree of discourse analysis, Frye avoids wandering into post-structuralist abstraction and jargon, keeping his argument grounded in evidence and historical relevance.
Although it attempts a fairly sweeping study of its subject, from colonial times to the civil rights era, the bulk of the book focuses on the late-nineteenth century, when the immigration on a mass scale from many different parts of Europe threw conceptions of the “Yankee” into question. He covers the period from 1860 to the early 1920s (when new laws restricting immigration were passed) in considerable detail, using one chapter to focus in on 1877 as a case study in racial re-definition. Frye is also interested in challenging the slippery ways in which white privilege is studied and critiqued today, making a special case that whiteness is an identity which many academics or educated people find it expedient to repudiate, while still benefitting from inclusion when it suits them. People who have never experienced exclusion themselves still attempt to distance themselves from accusations of white supremacy because their ancestors were inscribed as “non-white,” therefore exculpating them (for instance) from acts of genocide against Native Americans (ignoring the fact that they continue to benefit from the oppression of the same groups as modern-day “whites”). Frye seems to have a particular bone to pick on this score with the writer Michael Novak, but I am unfamiliar with him and cannot comment.
Overall, the book is a useful insight into aspects of American history that often go overlooked in traditional accounts.
February 25, 2015
While in 2015 a lot of the material in here has become widely taught and accepted, this is still a valuable read, especially if you're new to the area of whiteness/race and ethnicity studies. Jacobson presents a good historicization of white privilege and the mutating and fluid category of whiteness in the U.S., using sources from court cases to popular films and novels. While the book isn't as theoretically ambitious as it could be, he covers a whole lot of ground and is consciously writing for a broader audience, making the text extremely accessible. There's very little discussion of lived experience or gender, and some groups (Mexicans and Native Americans) notably get the short end in terms of analysis, but the examples he uses definitely supports the central argument of race and racialization as being central to the formation and continuation of the United States.
June 17, 2020
Interesting book that examines how the variegated white races merged in the public consciousness into Caucasians from the nineteenth century through the mid-twentieth century. He argues, “The contest over whiteness – its definition, its internal hierarchies, its proper boundaries, and its rightful claimants – has been critical to American culture throughout the nation’s history, and it has been a fairly untidy affair”
Following World War II, culture dominated notions of race rather than biology, with a focus on how races related to one another (pg. 98). In the realm of popular discussions of race, Jacobson writes, “In 1944 a sixteen-year-old black student in Columbus, Ohio, won an essay contest on the theme ‘What to Do with Hitler after the War’ by submitting the single sentence, ‘Put him in a black skin and let him live the rest of his life in America” (pg. 112). Further, Jacobson writes, “Race seems among the organizing principles of the worldview at once demonstrated and reinforced by the magazine’s format” (pg. 161). Most stories discussed the white races in terms familiar to their audience, spreading the ideology of a hierarchy of whites. This, however, changed with the expansionism of the late nineteenth century.
Jacobson writes, “Continual expansion and conquest pulled for a unified collectivity of European ‘white men,’ monolithic and supreme, even while nativism and the immigration question fractured that whiteness into its component – ‘superior’ and ‘inferior’ – parts” (pg. 204). By the time of the early Civil Rights Era, “the emergent race politics of the 1930s and after dramatically heightened the salience of ‘Caucasian’ identity by imploring whites to dwell upon their whiteness and to work toward the eradication of its unjust privileges” (pg. 248). Jacobson concludes, “If race as a conceptual category is indeed a theory of history, then race as a perceptual category embodies that history in all its complexity and contradiction” (pg. 142).
Dare I say, it is scary to think how this book could be weaponized into saying and communicating an idea of white struggle. The notion that "white" has been as troublesome to some groups that became absorbed into the greater construct of "whiteness" is a easy to see and sit with, if a reader chooses. I do not know if this is what Jacobson intended and/or would argue; yet, as a casual reader, this is quite obvious.
Following World War II, culture dominated notions of race rather than biology, with a focus on how races related to one another (pg. 98). In the realm of popular discussions of race, Jacobson writes, “In 1944 a sixteen-year-old black student in Columbus, Ohio, won an essay contest on the theme ‘What to Do with Hitler after the War’ by submitting the single sentence, ‘Put him in a black skin and let him live the rest of his life in America” (pg. 112). Further, Jacobson writes, “Race seems among the organizing principles of the worldview at once demonstrated and reinforced by the magazine’s format” (pg. 161). Most stories discussed the white races in terms familiar to their audience, spreading the ideology of a hierarchy of whites. This, however, changed with the expansionism of the late nineteenth century.
Jacobson writes, “Continual expansion and conquest pulled for a unified collectivity of European ‘white men,’ monolithic and supreme, even while nativism and the immigration question fractured that whiteness into its component – ‘superior’ and ‘inferior’ – parts” (pg. 204). By the time of the early Civil Rights Era, “the emergent race politics of the 1930s and after dramatically heightened the salience of ‘Caucasian’ identity by imploring whites to dwell upon their whiteness and to work toward the eradication of its unjust privileges” (pg. 248). Jacobson concludes, “If race as a conceptual category is indeed a theory of history, then race as a perceptual category embodies that history in all its complexity and contradiction” (pg. 142).
Dare I say, it is scary to think how this book could be weaponized into saying and communicating an idea of white struggle. The notion that "white" has been as troublesome to some groups that became absorbed into the greater construct of "whiteness" is a easy to see and sit with, if a reader chooses. I do not know if this is what Jacobson intended and/or would argue; yet, as a casual reader, this is quite obvious.
January 23, 2022
I have read about half of this, and I'm having real trouble getting the thread of his argument - I'm not sure if it's me, or what. Also, it's depressing to read how racist and xenophobic this country has always been. Bottom line: I'm going to stop.
As near as I can tell from reading just over half the book, the argument is that from the mid 1800s, when the famine Irish began coming to the US In large numbers, until 1924 when severely racist exclusionary immigration laws were passed, it was non-English European immigrants who caused the most stress to the white people who were already here. In 1790, Congress said citizenship was open to "free white persons" - which was intended to rule out the perils racists were concerned about at the time - black people and native people. When the Irish, Italians, French Canadians, and Eastern Europeans began pouring into the US, suddenly "free white persons" seemed like it was too broad - it let in all these undesirables! So the nativists scrambled to break Europeans into 'races."
After the 1924 law was passed, the flow of white undesirables slowed to a trickle (luckily my grandparents got in before that!), and then the racists looked around and realized that lots of descendants of freed slaves had migrated into northern cities. Yikes! a new peril! So then they set about emphasizing the color line and enlisting all those formerly undesirable Europeans into the ranks of the white. While the color line had always been paramount in the US ("free white persons"...) it just became hardened. This conversion of immigrant Europeans into "Caucasians" accelerated after World War II when it became clear what Hitler had been doing to certain "races" of white people; everyone then scrambled to announce they weren't advocating THAT, just the continued subjugation of black people as well as those dangerous Chinese who'd been coming to California for 100 years.
I already hated having to choose 'Caucasian' to represent my racial background on forms and surveys, now I hate it more. It's so fake. The whole idea came from some 18th century anthropologist who decided a skull found in the Georgia region of the Caucasus was the most beautiful one he'd ever seen. There is no such thing as "Caucasians." I'm considering choosing "other" and writing in "European" because that's really what I am.
Also - "Anglo-Saxon" is being thrown around by today's racists, but that doesn't really mean anything either. To the extent it DOES mean anything, it refers to a couple of tribes of German semi-barbarians who took over England and held it until they in turn were conquered by those French-speaking Normans. So if anybody tries to talk about Anglo-Saxons, ask them if they mean Germans. Today's English people are only part "Anglo-Saxon."
Phew. I'm pretty mad for having read only half the book. It is very important, I wish it were easier to read.
Note added later - before I finally returned this to the library, I read the conclusion. In it, Jacobson adds some current (1999) notes on how whiteness is talked about. He points out that after wanting to be accepted as white for most of the 20th century, non-English/Nordic/German white people are beginning to choose to emphasize they aren't "really" white, or I guess WASPs, starting in the "ethnic revivalism" of the 1970s when people were starting to discover their roots and the Civil Rights movement had introduced lots of ideas and terms into American discourse. It's obvious that one reason they do this is to disclaim white privilege and the responsibility for American racism. He cites an author who points out the disjunction many economically non-privileged people feel, between their "perceived privilege" and their politically assigned privilege. Placing these two points in conjunction is prescient, the two points together go a long way to explain how someone like Trump could suddenly command such a following. Yes, none of my direct ancestors were in the US between 1760 and about 1855 or 1860 - but that doesn't mean I don't have white privilege now, and it would be irresponsible for me to assert otherwise. No matter how you choose to label it, I'm 100% European-origin white person, and so is any given Irish/Italian/Albanian/Greek American.
As near as I can tell from reading just over half the book, the argument is that from the mid 1800s, when the famine Irish began coming to the US In large numbers, until 1924 when severely racist exclusionary immigration laws were passed, it was non-English European immigrants who caused the most stress to the white people who were already here. In 1790, Congress said citizenship was open to "free white persons" - which was intended to rule out the perils racists were concerned about at the time - black people and native people. When the Irish, Italians, French Canadians, and Eastern Europeans began pouring into the US, suddenly "free white persons" seemed like it was too broad - it let in all these undesirables! So the nativists scrambled to break Europeans into 'races."
After the 1924 law was passed, the flow of white undesirables slowed to a trickle (luckily my grandparents got in before that!), and then the racists looked around and realized that lots of descendants of freed slaves had migrated into northern cities. Yikes! a new peril! So then they set about emphasizing the color line and enlisting all those formerly undesirable Europeans into the ranks of the white. While the color line had always been paramount in the US ("free white persons"...) it just became hardened. This conversion of immigrant Europeans into "Caucasians" accelerated after World War II when it became clear what Hitler had been doing to certain "races" of white people; everyone then scrambled to announce they weren't advocating THAT, just the continued subjugation of black people as well as those dangerous Chinese who'd been coming to California for 100 years.
I already hated having to choose 'Caucasian' to represent my racial background on forms and surveys, now I hate it more. It's so fake. The whole idea came from some 18th century anthropologist who decided a skull found in the Georgia region of the Caucasus was the most beautiful one he'd ever seen. There is no such thing as "Caucasians." I'm considering choosing "other" and writing in "European" because that's really what I am.
Also - "Anglo-Saxon" is being thrown around by today's racists, but that doesn't really mean anything either. To the extent it DOES mean anything, it refers to a couple of tribes of German semi-barbarians who took over England and held it until they in turn were conquered by those French-speaking Normans. So if anybody tries to talk about Anglo-Saxons, ask them if they mean Germans. Today's English people are only part "Anglo-Saxon."
Phew. I'm pretty mad for having read only half the book. It is very important, I wish it were easier to read.
Note added later - before I finally returned this to the library, I read the conclusion. In it, Jacobson adds some current (1999) notes on how whiteness is talked about. He points out that after wanting to be accepted as white for most of the 20th century, non-English/Nordic/German white people are beginning to choose to emphasize they aren't "really" white, or I guess WASPs, starting in the "ethnic revivalism" of the 1970s when people were starting to discover their roots and the Civil Rights movement had introduced lots of ideas and terms into American discourse. It's obvious that one reason they do this is to disclaim white privilege and the responsibility for American racism. He cites an author who points out the disjunction many economically non-privileged people feel, between their "perceived privilege" and their politically assigned privilege. Placing these two points in conjunction is prescient, the two points together go a long way to explain how someone like Trump could suddenly command such a following. Yes, none of my direct ancestors were in the US between 1760 and about 1855 or 1860 - but that doesn't mean I don't have white privilege now, and it would be irresponsible for me to assert otherwise. No matter how you choose to label it, I'm 100% European-origin white person, and so is any given Irish/Italian/Albanian/Greek American.
November 8, 2021
Ultimately, Matthew Frye Jacobson's point is simple: racial categories are affected and defined more often by government, law, and politics than we assume. The real impressive nature of his work is just how exhaustively researched his work is from there. He pulls from record after record and paper after paper to prove himself to the point that outright refutation is impossible. The most clear evidence he offers that I still think about whenever race talks come back to the forefront of the American consciousness is how the Census presented options for ethnicities that we'd now lump in as white. At a certain point in American history, my family wasn't white, but Irish. Now, I'm just white. If that isn't a plain enough explanation for Jacobson's point, I don't know what really is. So while the work could use some variety, this was still an impactful read. I firmly believe that government, law, and politics do more than just choose what gets into the Melting Pot: they choose what to call the ingredients too.
December 8, 2021
In this fascinating book, Jacobson traces the development of racial identity in America. Between the 1840s and the 1920s, racial differences and hierarchy between Anglo-Saxons and other white ethnic groups were given great significance. ‘White ethnics’ were generally considered as distinct and inferior to the original Anglo Saxon immigrants… [Whiteness of a Different Color] explodes the myth of the American melting pot. Jacobson demonstrates how white racial inclusion was inextricably linked with the exclusion of non-whites and, interestingly, how their widely-recognised whiteness is partly due to the presence of non-white groups…This is a thought-provoking account of an often overlooked topic.
September 2, 2017
This is a placeholder review for me, a memo to myself to go back and read this again. I read it during a period of heavy research where I was working off of several sources at once. And I would be lying if I said I absorbed everything. "Whiteness of a Different Color" doesn't particularly stick out in my mind when I think back to that time, but I think that was because I also discovered "Working Toward Whiteness" for the same research, which ended up totally eclipsing it. It's a better read, it's better argued. "Whiteness of a Different Color" has occupied in my mind the position of "that book about European immigrants that was 'Working Toward Whiteness'".
March 29, 2020
I greatly appreciated Jacobson's well-documented historical account about the formation of "whiteness" in America. As he notes in the introduction, "it is one of the compelling circumstances of American cultural history that an Irish immigrant in 1877 could be a despised Celt in Boston-a threat to the republic-and yet a solid member of The Order of Caucasians for the Extermination of the Chinaman in San Francisco, gallantly defending U.S. shores from an invasion of 'Mongolians'." These are the kinds of "compelling circumstances" that Jacobson uncovers in this book.
April 26, 2021
This book is hugely education! And eye opening! Since my ancestors were of those who experienced this, I needed to know what they went through in relatively recent history. It is especially important since this history is being deleted from the United States, and a made-up version of retroactive white privilege implanted. We cannot learn from the past if we do not know history.
The author does focus more on Jews than anyone else, but that's understandable since he is Jewish. There are other books that fill in more for the other ethnicities.
The author does focus more on Jews than anyone else, but that's understandable since he is Jewish. There are other books that fill in more for the other ethnicities.
April 8, 2022
I didn't like it much. Kind of repetitive. I've been reading a lot of books about racism; this covered some of the same ground, but was short on vivid examples and compelling storytelling. As the granddaughter of immigrants from Finland, who were discriminated against, I had high hopes for this book, but my experience wasn't as hoped.
July 8, 2023
This is a great book for teaching about the ways immigrant groups we now think of as white were racialized by the White Anglo Protestants who dominated the country in the 19th century when these groups arrived. The book complicates our understanding of race and extends it far beyond the black- white binary.
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November 1, 2023i read this for class so giving it a rating doesn’t feel appropriate. it served its purpose, learning, and for that i appreciate it. i can’t say i loved reading it, but i definitely learned a lot so that’s cool.
not much else to say. jacobson sure did his research, and there’s SO much information in this book. that alone is kind of epic!
not much else to say. jacobson sure did his research, and there’s SO much information in this book. that alone is kind of epic!
September 2, 2017
Learning about my Germanic farmer-settler ancestors was an unexpected delight, as was the last chapter featuring Communist Party antiracists from the 1930s and 1940s. The rest was... ok, but the lack of acknowledgement of Jews of color within the author's argument was a definite weaknss.
August 25, 2019
A tough read, dense and academic, but very good. Excellent look at development of the concept of whiteness from a European-American perspective. Fascinating look at how the concepts of whiteness came to be, from a cultural, "scientific," and political perspective.
July 3, 2023
deconstructs whiteness in early colonised America to current thought through an anlysis of statements like “I’m not white, I’m italian.” yet the formation of a “caucasian” race to bolster the oppression of native Americans, Mexicans. Chinese and African people in the states.
July 10, 2024
A discussion of the legal and social uses of race as a category. A very complex situation. Hits on such issues as everyone not black being white for segregation purposes -- but not necessarily for naturalization purposes. The various races across history -- the shifting status of the Irish. And much more. Perhaps could be better organized, but it's not a neat topic.
February 17, 2017
A difficult book to read, because one prefers to think the best of one's country and there is very little "best" in America's history of inventing, re-inventing, and cementing race as a major social, economic, and political institution.
The last chapter discusses how even efforts to address the "race problem" have had a distressing tendency to reinforce what should be an obviously absurd black/white dichotomy. I say "obviously absurd" because Native Americans have been here all along, and "Mexicans," Chinese, Japanese, and many others have been here nearly as long as Africans. Apparently our construction of whiteness has come to require the elimination of any appearance of ambiguity.
In fact it looks like we need to add "whiteness so fragile" to the "masculinity so fragile" meme and stop being so surprised about the current surge of white rage. I'd add "Christianity so fragile" but that wouldn't be fair to the many perfectly decent Christians I know. Maybe "fundamentalism so fragile"?
The last chapter discusses how even efforts to address the "race problem" have had a distressing tendency to reinforce what should be an obviously absurd black/white dichotomy. I say "obviously absurd" because Native Americans have been here all along, and "Mexicans," Chinese, Japanese, and many others have been here nearly as long as Africans. Apparently our construction of whiteness has come to require the elimination of any appearance of ambiguity.
In fact it looks like we need to add "whiteness so fragile" to the "masculinity so fragile" meme and stop being so surprised about the current surge of white rage. I'd add "Christianity so fragile" but that wouldn't be fair to the many perfectly decent Christians I know. Maybe "fundamentalism so fragile"?
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July 29, 2011Very informative about the fluid, in-between status of so-called "white ethnics" - groups who are today considered "white", but who in the past were seen as separate "races". I use the quotation marks to indicate that these terms are social constructions, not biological realities.
Revealing discussion of how the civil rights movement and resulting attention to a binary black-white dynamic actually helped to solidify a monolithic whiteness and erase differences among white ethnic groups - as well as push to the margins the concerns of Native Americans, Asians, Latinos ... just about anyone not tracing his or her heritage from Europe.
Revealing discussion of how the civil rights movement and resulting attention to a binary black-white dynamic actually helped to solidify a monolithic whiteness and erase differences among white ethnic groups - as well as push to the margins the concerns of Native Americans, Asians, Latinos ... just about anyone not tracing his or her heritage from Europe.
February 15, 2015
This book provides a really interesting look at the concept of "whiteness" and how it has been used over time to maintain dominant/subordinate power relations. It also shows how socially constructed and malleable the concept of "race" is by providing examples of immigrant groups over time who moved to the U.S. and were at varying times included as being "white" or excluded, depending on the political/societal context of the time. A fascinating but disturbing history of power dynamics in the U.S. and a good historical background for those who are interested in learning more about probationary or "ethnic" whiteness and the stigmas that were attached to it in the 19th and 20th centuries.
September 10, 2013
Jacobson fragments culturally constructed notions of "race" as natural or biological, to argue that conceptualizations of race are in fact political and cultural. He examines shifting definitions of "whiteness," to reveal the subtle nuances in the conceptualization of race and citizenship in America over time, beginning with the 1790 naturalization law. Jacobson traces the racial treatment of the Chinese, Irish, Jewish, and Aryan people in America, and the assimilation of formerly racial "others" into an inclusive "Caucasian" identity.
February 19, 2017
Really, this is an interesting book and a really exciting filed of study.
But I read it hoping I could use it for my BA and honestly, I haven't read it as closely as I think one should read these kinds of books. Because it very quickly became clear that I only needed a small part of this book.
Nevertheless, I read it. And I like the hypothesis that Jacobson presents, it's definitely not sometihng I've considered myself, but he does make some excellent points.
WEll worth reading, if you're interested in this subject.
But I read it hoping I could use it for my BA and honestly, I haven't read it as closely as I think one should read these kinds of books. Because it very quickly became clear that I only needed a small part of this book.
Nevertheless, I read it. And I like the hypothesis that Jacobson presents, it's definitely not sometihng I've considered myself, but he does make some excellent points.
WEll worth reading, if you're interested in this subject.
February 15, 2011
Okay, I'm inspired to rate some of the books I've worked most closely with... or at least the ones that were the most useful. And this was BY FAR the MOST useful for work on issues of race production in turn-of-the-century America. I really can't say enough about this book. Extremely well researched, deftly written, interesting to read, etc. More should be said, but the bottom line is: read this book.
November 1, 2013
Jacobson traces the instability of race, demonstrating how whiteness has been racialized and de-racialized to serve specific economic, political, and social ends. Divided into three sections, the book focuses on three time periods (1790-1840, 1840-1925, and 1924-1960), all of which build upon the historical legacy of the 1790 naturalization act and “the core principle that only certain peoples [of certain races] were sound candidates for good citizenship” (223).
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