As a senior Sociology student here at Illinois Wesleyan, we’re tasked with completing a senior project of our choice and I’ve chosen to explore the awareness of white privilege among the white students at my institution. White privilege is “is a term for societal privileges that benefit white people in western countries beyond what is commonly experienced by the non-white people under the same social, political, or economic circumstances.” Although many of you may not have heard of white privilege it’s been studied (in one form or another) since the W.E.B. Dubois 100 years ago. For the study I’m posing questions- in interview form- to white students that get a their attitudes and perceptions of white privilege, if any. I’ve currently sent out my survey twice and plan to send it out a second time next week and will soon code and analysis my results. I’ll be presenting this project to the community at a conference in a couple weeks! Wish me luck!
