From the moment you are born, you enter a system already defined and put in place by those who came before you. Since the beginning, you are taught the rules and ways of being in order to strive within this system. When I entered this world, born in a “former” colony of France, from a father born and raised in Germany, western society as a system and its ideologies has always been part of my construction.

In this thesis, western society takes on the form of a house: a house with the promise of hybridity and equality that in my opinion has yet to be reached. In this house, white remains ascendant while the others –the non-white– struggle to establish their place. Through this arises the importance to talk about “White” as a race or non-race, as a colour or the lack thereof, as invisible but at the same time representative of all. How can we achieve true hybridity without white supremacy?

This thesis is a deconstruction of the house as an act of marking: making the invisible visible. It’s an exploration of the many nuances of white that define the foundation of the house. I start by identifying the processes that have transformed the house into a place of comfort for white by looking at its violent expansion and how it became naturalised. I will then proceed to identify the methods used to reinforce the status quo including the use of mass media, an array of defence mechanisms that render discussion about race difficult and superfluous and technologies that erase non-white bodies from our imagined future.

Parallel to this deconstruction of white, this thesis explores the act of disobedience: The disruption of whiteness and the system put in place through the lens of artists that have aimed to do just that. This part is about reclaiming the space and transforming it into a place where multiple identities and non-white bodies can flourish. By confronting the status quo with works that refuse to be part of it, this thesis takes you on a journey of learning and unlearning. The aim is to identify the status quo in order to move away from it and facilitate the designing of a future of true hybridity without white supremacy.

In the nothing of white, we see a lot.²

As the door closes behind me, I find myself standing in this vast sea of nothingness.³ It looks so polished, almost slippery. At first, I don’t dare to move, I try to make sure that my shoes are clean enough to leave no traces behind. When I finally feel confident enough I immerse myself into the space, once step after the other, like a careful calculation. The more I venture myself into the space, the smaller I become. I’m unsure if the room is gaining in volume or if I’m reaching into myself. As I walk the emptiness dictates my movements, yet with every step I make I become less and less comfortable. My presence feels out of place and my body alienating. Even so, there is no turning back now, I’m set on my way.

On my destination towards the uncertainty, I sense that I am not alone. I can feel that I’m being watched as if a ghost is following me around to make sure I stay on the right path: the path towards the light. I try to blend in, to follow the invisible rules omnipresent in the air. With time my body orients itself to the rhythm of the nothingness. My walk, my speech, my thoughts they mutate, slowly morphing into something new and yet so familiar. It almost feels natural. I venture myself deeper and deeper into the void until the brightness overwhelms me. I’m hoping that now I won’t be so visible anymore. However as the light bounces from side to side, my body acts as an obstacle that impales it on its perfect path and the ghost, it won’t stop following me. I’ve reached now what seems to be a wall. At first, I assumed that I’ve arrived at the end but maybe it’s just the beginning, I can’t tell anymore. Fortunately, my eyes have started to adapt over time and I’m able to recognise patterns in the vacuum, able to navigate better. This void is not empty, I can see others. We are all in here, we’ve always been here. Some wandering aimlessly, some perfectly blending into the environment and some others trying to escape this big white cube, with its big white walls and its big white sky.

The white I’m talking about here is not the white that was.⁴ It’s the white of the here and now, the point from which the world unfolds, which is also the point of inheritance.⁵ A room painted white, is rarely described as such because white is not seen as a colour and therefore not described as one. In this process white becomes invisible. It’s hard to define something so present but at the same time so transparent. Technically white is the absence of colour but as a light, it’s the reflection of all, the bending of all colours: A compelling paradox of a white that needs always to be everything and nothing, literally overwhelmingly present and yet apparently absent.⁶ Pure white is the absence of colour in the strictest sense of the definition because you can’t mix colours to create it. However, when you examine the pigment chemistry of white, ground-up substances are used to create the many nuances of white. This white is then reproduced in all parts of our modern society and its presence has an agency. This is the white I want to talk about, the fabricated white with its many nuances to comprehend how it came to define the house we live in.

Standing here in such an approximation to the wall, I feel the urge to touch it. I want to make sense of this white that reproduces itself regardless of intention, power differences and goodwill, and overwhelm­ingly because it is not seen as white.8 I want to touch it, to feel and understand it. I want to disrupt it. I reach to the wall, I scratch its surface until I manage to remove parts of it, small particles of a white powder gliding through my fingers. A little mark on an imposing structure, barely something to make a difference but enough to get a warning as the ghost behind me starts screaming “If you don’t like it here, you can just leave”. I’m perplexed, I’m unaware of the possibility to exit that which infused itself in all aspects of our being. There is no escaping this whiteness, no running away or hiding from it. All there seems to be is to continue scratching –like many others have done before– until we‘ve put enough marks onto its structure that it falls, opening up to new ways of becoming. Disobeying the rules by cracking the wall and disrupting the smooth surface gives leeway for an entry point and so I scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch...

“Historic elegance. The soft Old White deserves its name because it is the most historic shade of white on the colour chart. He feels just as comfortable in the old building as in the kitchen of a modern single-family house. Old white is part of the Traditional Neutrals range. White and light primer tones.” Adler Wohndesign GmbH ⁹

To be able to understand the white all around us –the white of the here and now– is to understand the white that was and how it came to occupy the space. In the same process in which my body came to be shaped by the space it inhabited, spaces are also being shaped by the bodies that inhabit them. Spaces are formed by being orientated around some bodies, more than others.¹⁰ For a space to become white it has to be moulded by the repetitive proximity of white bodies.

The white that was operated in a system of expansion and oppression by which the white body came to occupy more spaces. With the expansion came the reshaping of the spaces through the institutionalisation of white bodies, their ideologies, signs and symbols. The spaces this white came to occupy was not given but taken with violence. The bodies that inhabited these spaces were either recruited or discarded. Recruitment meant to make them part of its institution while neglecting those who do not have access.¹¹ To be part of an institution is to inhabit its buildings and follow its line. ¹²

One of the prevalent signs installed through the expansion is language: not only as a marker of those belonging to the institution and a tool for recruitment but also as a powerful instrument for demarcation. Through a set of grammar of difference, white placed itself as that which others have to be compared to and judged.¹³ With the use of language, the self-proclaimed “developed” white classified the world and put itself in the first position, while placing others as below: as second or third. By taking the highest position in the hierarchy it created, the white that was was able to put in place a set of rules and standards that others have to follow if they ever want to be seen as equal. In contrast to the “developed” white, the others become underdeveloped or in the process of becoming developed. As the self-appointed leader, white then feels entitled to impose its help on others, justifying its expansion as charity.

This is the white we inherited, the accumulation of past actions that have formed the house that built us. Through processes of expansion, recruitment and demarcation, white came to shape the spaces around us and painted it in its own colour. The violent habitual proximity of white bodies moulded the space and turned it white.

“Silent friendliness. White in its purest form. If white is to represent its own theme in the room, All White is the right choice. It is a pure white, completely neutral and free of pigments. Use it for the paintwork and ceilings. The wall colours will appear fresher and brighter. All White is a tone from the Modern Neutrals range. White and light primer tones.”
Adler Wohndesign GmbH ¹³

Through the process of expansion, the white of the here and now has become all-encompassing. It's in every room and every corner. It's a whiteness we’ve inherited from the white that was and our colonial history. The white that was cannot be changed but its effect will always remain in the space we navigate and its expansion, even if more subtle in the now, is still on the rise. Whiteness has become our familiar world, the one we know. ¹⁴ Because white is so widespread, it becomes impossible to not be affected by it. We all swim in this sea of whiteness, the difference is while some swim with the current, others are being drowned. To be able to fully inhabit this world, you have to show a sameness to the omnipresent whiteness. Familiarity becomes an important key to feeling like you belong. Important parts of this familiarity are inherited, making some bodies more capable of inhabiting this whiteness, while others are bound to fail. The body-at-home becomes the body that is capable of inhabiting whiteness. ¹⁵ In this space we navigate, White is the body-at-home and consequently, it is produced as the host of the house.

As the body-at-home, white has shaped its surrounding to better fit it’s own image, reinforcing the idea of “others” as unfamiliar. ¹⁶ Bodies stand out when they are out of place and such standing re-confirms the whiteness of the space. ¹⁷ As a host, white welcomes those who are not at home, the others become the guests, but let us not forget that however warmly welcomed, ultimately a guest is expected to return home again. ¹⁸The way that white positions itself within the space transmutes the rest as the other, the non-white. Against this white background, non-white bodies become exposed and framed.

Through its omnipresence white becomes assumed, which renders it natural and in turn invisible. It forms the unnamed background and functions as the norm from which all is derived. This puts white in the privileged position of being able to see without being seen.¹⁹ Inevitably this naturalisation of white is also being shaped through language. Against this normative background, others are being marked and named, while white stays unnamed. This process of naming and marking of the others is found within all levels, even within academic discourses. In the example of my higher education facility “The Royal Academy of Art, the Hague” every year fashion students are given an assignment, to create an “ethnic costume”. The definition of ethnic is relating to or characteristic of a large group of people who have the same national, racial, or cultural origins, and who usually speak the same language. ²⁰ However, as Gloria Wekker remarks in her book “White Innocence” (2014) when ethnicity is invoked in those settings, it is “they”, the others, meaning everything except white. As the more powerful member, it is consistently bracketed and thereby invisibilized and installed as the norm. ²¹ This commodification of the other can seem like a tempting way to render visible those who have been ignored but in a predominantly white institute that has been shaped by the repetitive approximation of the white bodies that inhabit them, the ethnic costume assignment reinforces the normalcy of white.

As the body-at-home, White bodies are comfortable as they inhabit spaces that extend their shape, while simultaneously shaping the space to fit them better. ²² Others become guests, framed by white. The body-at-home takes the powerful position of being the representative of the house and the claim of power to talk for the commonality of the inhabitants.²³

“Modern living. White in its coldest way. Blackened is a cold white with a subtle touch of grey. It creates both minimalist and modern looks in industrial chic. Its complex depth of colour is particularly evident in the high-gloss full gloss finish. In conjunction with All White, Blackened ensures a puristic look. White and light primer tones.”
Adler Wohndesign GmbH ²⁴

In our current society, the primary mean of communication used to reach the vast majority of the general public is mass media.²⁵ We are constantly exposed to images and informations produced by mass media and it has become central in shaping our way of making sense of the world. Stuart Hall explains this theory in his lecture on media and representation (1997), in which he describes the process of meaning-making through media representation.²⁶ According to Hall, an event possesses no fixed meaning at the point of occurrence, only through the process of representation in media is meaning given to the event. This means that media is able to create and assign a fixed meaning to an event. Having the ability to generate such meaning can give people the power to shape consumers perception. In a society dependent on mass media, those who have the power over it, hold the power to reshape our perception of the world in their favour.

In the white cube we live in, the body-at-home that took the claim for the universal and the power to talk for the commonality of the inhabitant, holds the power to generate meaning by the use of mass media. In return, the media tends to reflect this white hegemony by perpetually reasserting the naturalisation and dominance of white. Meaning is being created by the habitual exposure of white bodies against those presented as others: stories are being whitewashed and stereotypes are being perpetuated. Whitewashing is the tendency of media to be dominated by white characters, played by white actors, navigating their way through a story that will likely resonate most deeply with white audiences, based on their experiences and worldviews.²⁷ The film industry is notoriously known for this act of whitewashing. In 2017, the live action film remake of the movie Ghost in the Shell was accused of whitewashing. The film is based on an anime of the same name whos protagonist is a Japanese woman named Motoko Kusanagi. In the remaking of the anime into a movie, the role of the protagonist was given to a white American actress, instead of casting a Japanese woman to play the role of a Japanese character.²⁸ Whitewashing in films can take on multiple forms. It occurs when a story that takes place in a culturally diverse setting only focuses on white characters, when a story about culturally diverse characters is told from the perspective of a white character (with the white character usually being the one saving the day) or when white actors are being cast to play roles that were originally meant for people of different ethnicities. The act of whitewashing erases non-white bodies from our imaginations by only putting the focus on white bodies. Over time, this unilateral representation in the media has narrowed our perception of the world within and outside of the cube.

The power to generate meaning can also be used to oppress and exploit those who don’t conform to the stream of white. When the others are constructed as different, they come to internalise this otherness.²⁹ The naturalisation of white bodies and the construction of otherness in media reflects the white gaze: the notion that everything has to be made with white in mind. The white gaze is omnipresent. It represents the idea of looking at white as the highest standard from which all should be measured against and has control over the images that can circulate.³⁰ To be capable of entering the stream of circulation, one has to conform to the accepted narrative by whitewashing and erasing important aspects of oneself. This reshaping enables easy entry into the white cube. As long as white aesthetic still defines beauty and worth, coloured bodies will be denied or shaped to appeal to a white audience.³¹

The notion that one can create without white in mind is difficult to comprehend for the white gaze as it disrupts the idea of white hegemony. When Kendrick Lamar –a black American rapper– stopped a white fan he invited on stage from using a specific word in his lyrics, it became a scandal. The word in question is a racial slur directed at black people who has been reappropriated by the black community. Some people criticized Kendrick Lamar for constantly making use of this word and integrating it in his lyrics while simultaneously expecting his white fans to not make us of it.³² The thought that the song was not produced with or for his white fans in mind, is a concept that either sparked confusion or outraged in those white fans. The concept that some forms of media and culture are not explicitly produced for a white audience can come across as disrespectful and invalid to the white consumers. This ethnocentricity allows white people the belief that all cultures are for their consumption.³³ The creation of spaces for others, devoid of the white gaze becomes a treat for the maintaining of the status quo and thus a treat against its power over the other.

Mass media as a system of knowledge and power production is a powerful tool for creating meaning. As the more powerful member, white is able to make use of it to look, represent, shape, appropriate, and commodify the bodies in space to make them fit within its own narrow cube. The white gaze becomes a constant companion that influences the bodies and behaviours of those it looks at.

“Bright and modern. A fresh creamy white. New White is one of the “Yellow-Based Neutrals” series. It feels a lot fresher than traditional whites. An ideal “white” for interplay with a stronger colour. New White always brings warmth to the room.”
Adler Wohndesign GmbH ³⁴

The naturalised, invisible whiteness that has put together a system in place to keep its power, has turned the white cube into a place of comfort for itself. The body-at-home has forgotten or refused to remember how it got put in place. It resides in the comfort of the system it dominates, feeling entitled and deserving of its privilege and advantages. This internalised sense of superiority can turn into fragility when confronted. The mere suggestion that white yields meaning can trigger a range of defensive responses to return to the white comfort.³⁵ This is what DiAngelo describes as “White Fragility” in her book of the same name. This fragility is a powerful means of racial control.³⁶

The white of the now assumes that differences and prejudices are in the past, that it ended. It’s the white that was not the white of the here and now. The white of the here and now is invested in the myth of sameness.³⁷ This supposed colourblindness exposes a natural sense of superiority vis-a-vis the coloured body. The white of the here and now –the progressive– assumes that to be equal we need to stop talking about our differences, but if you are different from us, then you are not equal.³⁸

The white progressive living in the white bubble is unable to see or refuses to see that their actions perpetuate the system in which they live in, rendering black bodies invisible and discussions around race more difficult or superfluous by obscuring the system put in place while simultaneously perpetuating it when refusing to be confronted by it. This is what Gloria Wekker calls “white innocence”: Innocence as: not knowing, forgetting, not wanting to know or even rejecting the possibility of knowing –a process where innocence can turn into ignorance–.³⁹ And a process in which denial also results in never engaging in acknowledging a factual setting. These defence mechanisms are put in place to maintain the status quo. They comfort because to acknowledge the terrorising reality of white is to disrupt the fantasy of whiteness as representing goodness.⁴⁰ This in return makes it difficult to speak out against the system, as those who speak are silenced or accused of demanding special treatment.⁴¹

In her book, Gloria Wekker chooses the example of Zwarte Piet (the figure of the Black Piet) as a reflection of this white innocence when dealing with the Netherlands, a country that for many of its inhabitants is viewed as an example of progressiveness for countries across the globe.⁴² In her deconstruction of Zwarte Piet, Gloria Wekker enables us to see all aspect of this white innocence in action. Zwarte Piet is a beloved folkloric figure in the Netherlands. It's the figure of a blackened man played by a white man or woman. The costume is composed of black face, thick red lips, folded earrings, an afro wig and a colourful Moor’s costume. Zwarte Piets (plural) are the silly black servants accompanying by foot the huge wise old white bishop Sinterklaas (singular) riding on a horse bringing presents to children.⁴³ Over time the figure of the Black Piet came to be seen by many as a racist caricature but discussion about Black Piet in the Netherlands often brings out aggressive reactions in white people defending it.

The three main reasons Gloria Wekker names for the refusal to end this tradition is the fear of losing one's culture, the supposed innocence of the celebration and a reversal of the narrative. The fear of losing one's culture is the sense that the Dutch culture should be defended against exterior forces. White –the body-at-home– is feeling a sense of loss and is being triggered by the idea that their culture is being taken away from them by what they perceive as the guests. The supposed innocence stems from the notion that Black Piet is a children figure. Taking away the figure of Black Piet would be to deny children of sweet childhood memories and in return spoiling adults' existing memories. This reflects a white self-image that insists on seeing itself as inherently good. The reversal of the narrative is the statement that Black Piet isn’t a racist caricature and that those who see a problem with him are those who have a problem themselves. This technique of silencing and victim-blaming enables the maintaining of the status quo by leaving white unchecked and reversing the narrative onto the others. These techniques render discussion about the figure of Black Piet more difficult or superfluous.

The white of the here and now is invested in the myth of sameness while perpetuating the same system that has always favoured it, because to acknowledge the system requires an openness for change and loss, the disruption of the fantasy of white as innocent and acountability. Instead, white finds comfort in the house it shaped, the walls it painted in its own colours and the stories it tells itself because it doesn't hurt.

“Subtle lemony tones. Lemon creamy white. House White appears minimally lime-coloured due to its light green undertone. This pure off-white is therefore not a typical cream colour. Due to the subtle citrus tone, it fits easily into houses of any era. As a wall coating, House White harmonises particularly well with All White for the paintwork. Medium primer tones.”
Adler Wohndesign GmbH ⁴⁴

If the white that was shaped the white of the here and now, we can assume that the white of the here and now will shape the white that will be. In the words of William Gibson, “the future is already here, it’s just not very evenly distributed”, alluding that the things that will constitute the normal of those living in the future already exist in some form in the today. However, it can also suppose that the processes in the present that "write the future" will be tainted by the same inequalities that exist in the present. ⁴⁵Thinking about the future is in some way thinking about technology as the ongoing advances in artificial intelligence (AI), and innovations in technology encompass ever-larger aspects of our modern society.⁴⁶ When looking at technology we see similarities with mass media, as it reflects the dominant culture.

Comparable to the naturalisation of white in mass media, the idea of white as default seems to be widespread in technology. In the video game culture whiteness as a norm and white-centric characters is nothing new.⁴⁷ More than often the default character when creating an avatar reflects a white normative body. Daz 3D is a 3D software that helps create and position characters in a digital setting. The software is free but the given models are white normative bodies. To be able to create a diverse range of bodies or skin colours, you have to purchase add-ons. This system of white bodies as default setting perpetuates the idea of white as the norm from which the rest is derived.

At the same time, the physicality of the robots themselves reflect our white culture. Many machines are anthropomorphised—that is, made to be human-like to some degree—to facilitate human-machine interaction.⁴⁸ Stephen Cave and Kanta Dihal from the University of Cambridge conducted an investigation into search engines and found that all non-abstract results for AI had either Caucasian features or were literally the colour white.⁴⁹ They found a lack of diversity in robot morphology and behaviour from the prevalent whiteness of humanoid robots, to the sociolinguistic markers of the chatbots and virtual assistants whiteness, to the whiteness of AI in stock images, films and television. It’s whiteness reproducing whiteness.⁵⁰ This normalisation of whiteness leads to the whiteness of AI to be considered simply as default and erases the coloured body in the imagined future.

AI learns from the information that is fed into it. A unilateral worldview will create unilateral AI that will continue to perpetuate the power dynamic of our current society. There already exist many cases of biased AI incidents. In 2015 an image-recognition algorithm from google auto-tagged pictures of black people as “gorillas”. The company's solution to the algorithmic racism was to ban “gorilla” as a label, instead of teaching the machine to recognize black people as human.⁵¹ The fact that whiteness has overflowed our technology has immediate consequences. A few examples are facial recognition technologies that target criminal suspects based on skin colour, trained automated risk profiling systems that disproportionately identify Latinx people as illegal immigrants and devised credit scoring algorithms that disproportionately identify black people as risks and prevent them from buying homes, getting loans, or finding jobs.⁵²

Ruha Benjamin calls the phenomenon of computational racism the New Jim Code.⁵³ Similarly to the way whiteness has been encoded into behaviour and law, it is now being built into our technology. In return, this technology comes to represent those in power and perpetuates the creation of things that only serve them. The one-sided representation and understanding of the world is being used to predict, control and shape the future with the use of technology that perpetuates the same system we live in and in the abstractions in computation inherent in data and algorithms lurks the racism that erases identities from our future.⁵⁴

I’ve been scratching now for months and my fingers start to hurt. I take a step back and contemplate what I have done. Gazing at the wall, it suddenly feels different, less imposing. The structure is still standing but it weakened. The marks I have left behind have created indents and dust is scattered all around the scene.

As I look at this white, a white we inherited from the white that was and our colonial history, I recognize the structures put in place to maintain the status quo. The white of the here and now turned into the body-at-home through familiarity whilst the others became guests, framed by white. As the body-at-home, white then took the claim for the universal and the power to talk for the commonality of the inhabitants. To reinforce its position, white makes use of media as a tool for creating and shaping meaning in its favour. It’s able to use it to look, represent, shape, appropriate, and commodify the bodies in space and mold them to fit its narrow cube. The white of the here and now is unable to see or refuses to see that their current actions keep on perpetuating a system that only favours them. To truly acknowledge the system would require an openness for change and loss, a disruption of the fantasy of white as innocent and accountability. Instead white chooses to reside in the comfort of the house because it doesn’t hurt. This unilateral representation and understanding of the world has become so naturalised that it is being used to predict, control and shape the future with the use of technologies that perpetuates the same system we live in. It’s whiteness reproducing whiteness.

Many artists and thinkers trying to navigate this white cube have constructed ways to disrupt the smooth surface of this whiteness. This act of disobedience towards the body-at-home helps to reinstate and redefine the non-white bodies in spaces. Every attempt produces marks on the structure which weakens it. These artists seek to create places where multiple identities can flourish by imposing their bodies in space, reversing the white gaze and being unapologetic for their skin colour and ethnicities. Their actions mark the way for a future of true hybridity.

I’ve questioned if by writing about whiteness I was not engaging in the same narrative that focuses on whiteness at the expanse of marginalised groups. I’m aware that by focusing on whiteness, I’m putting it again in the centre of it all. However, in order to dismantle or challenge the categories that are made invisible through privilege, we are bound to participate in its critique.65 To be able to talk about what we can do to whiteness and how we can find ways to reshape a system that only favours them, it’s important to understand what whiteness does to us. Only when white is being seen and named can it be disrupted.

This is not the end, nor is it the beginning. The indents and traces left behind have shown me that I’m capable of making changes, even if those appear small against this structure. My scratches merge with the existing marks left behind by those who were here before and those who are still to come. The patterns created by those scratches signify hope for change. My body is slowly unlearning the omnipresent rules, as I explore new ways of navigating in the space. My work is ongoing, the journey has no end. The more I scratch the freer I become and so I scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch, and scratch...

9, 13, 24, 34, 44 Adler Wohndesign GmbH. (2018). Farrow & Ball Farben. Retrieved October 13, 2020, from https://www.adler-wohndesign.de/farrowandball/farrow-and-ball-farben/all-white/

3, 11 Adusei-Poku, N. (2017). On Being Present Where You Wish to Disappear, from https://www.e-flux.com/journal/80/101727/on-being-present-where-you-wish-to-disappear

5, 10, 12, 14, 15, 17, 22, 65 Ahmed, S. (2007). A phenomenology of whiteness. Feminist Theory, 8(2), 149-168. doi:10.1177/1464700107078139

53, 54 Benjamin, R. (2019). Race after technology: Abolitionist tools for the New Jim Code. Cambridge: UK.

48, 49, 50 Cave, S., Dihal, K. (2020). The Whiteness of AI. Philos. Technol. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13347-020-00415-6

35 Chatterton, T., & Newmarch, G. (2017). The future is already here – it’s just not very evenly distributed. Interactions. Retrieved October 20, 2020, from https://interactions.acm.org/archive/view/march-april-2017/the-future-is-already-here

25 Coleman, S. (2015). What Is Mass Media? - Definition, Types, Influence & Examples. from study.com/academy/lesson/what-is-mass-media-definition-types-influence-examples.html

58 Collymore, N. (2017). The Colour Black. Contemporary And, contemporaryand.com/magazines/the-colour-black/.

56 D’Aliesio, Susanna, et al. (2018). Zanele Muholi’s Somnyama Ngonyama - Hail the Dark Lioness. 1854 Photography, www.1854.photography/2018/04/show-zanele-muholis-somnyama-ngonyama-hail-the-dark-lioness/

35, 36 DiAngelo, R. (2019). White Fragility: Why It’s so Hard for White People to Talk about Racism. London: Allen Lane, an imprint of Penguin Books.

6, 8, 23 Dyer, R. (1996). White: Essays on Race and Culture. London: Routledge

64 Feeney, M. (2004). “The Winning Malice of Dave Chappelle.” Slate Magazine, Slate, slate.com/culture/2004/03/the-winning-malice-of-dave-chappelle.html.

42 Frawley, R. (2019). “Book Review: White Innocence: Paradoxes of Colonialism and Race by Gloria Wekker.” Feminist Review, vol. 121, no. 1, pp. 90–91, doi:10.1177/0141778918813330.

60 Gonzales, D. (2020). Erased Lynchings. from kengonzalesday.com/projects/erased-lynchings/.

26 Hall, S. (1997). Representation and the Media. Lecture.

51 Hern, A. (2018). Google’s solution to accidental algorithmic racism: Ban gorillas. Retrieved November 02, 2020, from https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/jan/12/google-racism-ban-gorilla-black-people

29, 31, 37, 40, 41 Hooks, B. (1992). Black looks: race and representation. Boston Ma: South End Press

28 Jeunesse, M. L. (2018). 10 Movies That Have Been Accused of Whitewashing. Insider, Retrieved October 18, 2020, from www.insider.com

32 “Kendrick Lamar Stops White Fan Using N-Word on Stage at Concert.” BBC News, BBC, 2018, Retrieved October 13, 2020, from www.bbc.com/news/newsbeat-44209141.

61 Little, C. (2019). ‘The White Album,’ Arthur Jafa Invents a New Film Language to Take on the Cliché of Empathy. Artnet News, news.artnet.com/exhibitions/arthur-jafa-white-album-1448167.

63 Ma, C. (2014). “What are you laughing at? A social Semiotic Analysis of Ironic Racial Stereotypes in Chappelle’s Show”, MSc in Media and Communication (Research), London School of Economics and Political Science.

52 McIlwain, C. (2020). Of course technology perpetuates racism. It was designed that way. Retrieved October 18, 2020, from https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/06/03/1002589/technology-perpetuates-racism-by-design-simulmatics-charlton-mcilwain/

46 Mohamed, S., Png, M., & Isaac, W. (2020). Decolonial AI: Decolonial Theory as Sociotechnical Foresight in Artificial Intelligence. Philosophy & Technology. doi:10.1007/s13347-020-00405-8

7 Morton J.L. (n.d). Are Black & White Colors? Retrieved October 13, 2020, from https://www.colormatters.com/color-and-design/are-black-and-white-colors

47 Oakley, S. (2019). White by Default: An Examination of Race Portrayed by Character Creation Systems in Video Games. University of Cincinnati, ProQuest Dissertations. 27765755.

59 Pejcha, C. S. (2020). Miles Greenberg Is Creating Spaces to Transcend. Document Journal, www.documentjournal.com/2020/11/miles-greenberg-is-creating-spaces-to-transcend/

30 Pitchford, M. (February 21). Beware of the White Gaze. Retrieved October 18, 2020, from http://fourteeneastmag.com/index.php/2020/02/21/11505/

2 Pracejus, John W., et al. (2006). “How Nothing Became Something: White Space, Rhetoric, History, and Meaning.” Journal of Consumer Research, vol. 33, no. 1, pp. 82–90. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/

16, 33 Staszak, J. (2020). Other/Otherness. International Encyclopedia of Human Geography, 25-31. doi:10.1016/b978-0-08-102295-5.10204-5

57 Sooke, A. (2014). Kerry James Marshall: Challenging Racism in Art History. BBC Culture, BBC, www.bbc.com/culture/article/20141023-i-show-black-is-beautiful.

18, 55 Te Velder, R. (2017). Patricia Kaersenhout: Revealing Black Spots in the Radiant White Cube. Kunstlich, Breaking the Frame, Subversion from Within.

21, 38, 39, 43 Wekker, G. (2016). White Innocence: Paradoxes of Colonialism and Race. Durhan: Duke University Press.

62 Whaley, N. (2016) “Solange’s ‘Don’t Touch My Hair’ Is An Anthem Reclaiming Black Autonomy”, HuffPost, www.huffpost.com/entry/solanges-dont-touch-my-hair-is-an-anthem-reclaiming_b_57f67383e4b030884674abca?guccounter=1.

19 Yancy, G. (2012). Look, a White!: Philosophical essays on Whiteness. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.

Written and designed by

Anke Sondi
www.ankesondi.com

Typeset in

Halyard Text
Akzidenz Grotesk bq
Sang Bleu Versailles
Source Serif Pro

Thesis Supervision

Fusun Turetken

Design Supervision

Thomas Buxo
Silvio Lorusso

Special thanks to

Maria Jacquin

Copyright

Anke Sondi
Royal Academy of Art
The Hague
2020 -2021