This glossary of terms was formatted and adapted by UWT’s Diversity Resource Center using a number of resources, including universities, community centers, and the wisdom and experience of various people engaged in social justice. This glossary is a comprehensive, but not exhaustive, listing of terminology used in our conversations about diversity and equity. Because language is a reflection of the lived experience, many of these words and terms will continue to evolve as the lived experience evolves. Even so, it is still useful to have a reference that provides basic working definitions to facilitate shared discussions. It is a work in progress, so please share your ideas and suggestions with us for this glossary.
Sources:
http://www.diversitytalks.com/Websites/diversityspeaks1/images/Diversity_Glossary.pdf http://www.racialequitytools.org/glossary
http://sociology.about.com/od/A_Index/fl/Agency.htm
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/logan-lynn/internalized-oppression-t_b_1342605.html
Ableism:
Prejudicial thoughts and discriminatory actions based on differences in physical, mental, and/or emotional ability; usually that of able-bodied/minded persons against people with illnesses, disabilities, or less developed skills/talents.
Accessibility:
The extent to which a facility is readily approachable and usable by individuals with physical disabilities, such as self-opening doors, elevators for upper levels, or raised lettering on signs. Also the term refers to being admitted to programs and activities and having the right to enter institutions, such as colleges and universities.
Androgynous:
1. A person whose biological sex is not readily apparent, whether intentionally or
unintentionally. The individual may reflect an appearance that is both masculine and feminine, or who appears to be neither or both a boy and a girl.
2. A person whose identity is between the two traditional genders.
3. A person who rejects gender roles entirely.
Advocate:
Someone who speaks up for her/himself and members of his/her identity group; e.g., a woman who lobbies for equal pay for women.
Ageism:
Prejudicial thoughts and discriminatory actions based on differences in age; usually evidenced as a societal predilection for younger persons over older persons.
Agent:
The perpetrator or perpetuator of oppression and/or discrimination; usually a member of the dominant, non-target identity group.
Agency:
Agency refers to the thoughts and actions taken by people that express their individual power in social context. The core challenge at the center of the field of sociology is understanding the relationship between structure and agency. Structure refers to the complex and interconnected set of social forces, relationships, institutions, and elements of society that work together to shape the thought, behavior, experiences, choices, and overall life courses of people. In contrast, agency denotes the power people have to think for themselves and act in ways that shape their experiences and life trajectories. Agency can take individual and collective forms.
Ally:
Someone who makes the commitment and effort to recognize their privilege (based on gender, class, race, sexual identity, etc.) and work in solidarity with oppressed groups in the struggle for justice. Allies understand that it is in their own interest to end all forms of oppression, even those from which they may benefit in concrete ways.
Anti‐Semitism:
The fear or hatred of Jews as an ethnic, religious, or racial group.
Asexual:
Having no evident sex or sex organs. In usage, may refer to a person who is not sexually active, or not sexually attracted to other people.
Assimilation:
The process by which one group takes on the cultural and other traits of a larger group; usually refers to the forced acculturation of a marginalized group by the dominant or White group.
Bias:
Prejudice: an inclination or preference, especially one that interferes with impartial judgment.
Bi‐racial:
A person who identifies as being of two races or who’s biological parents are of two different racial groups.
Bigendered/Dual Gendered (v):
A person who possesses and expresses a distinctly masculine persona as well as a distinctly feminine persona. This person is comfortable in, and enjoys, presenting in both gender roles.
Bigotry:
Intolerance and prejudice that glorifies one’s own group and denigrates other groups and their members.
Bisexual (adj.):
A person who is attracted to members of both the male and female sex.
Categorization:
The natural cognitive process of grouping and labeling people and other things based on their perceived similarities. Categorization becomes problematic when the groupings become oversimplified and rigid, thereby stereotyping people.
CIS:
An abbreviation for individuals in whom there is a match between the gender they were assigned at birth, their bodies, and their personal identity. Often referred to as cis-male or cis female, these terms describe the antonym to transgender.
Classism: Prejudicial thoughts and discriminatory actions based on difference in socio economic status and income, usually referred to as class. Most particularly refers to the hierarchical striation of people by class.
Coalition: A collection of different people or groups, working toward a common goal.
Codification:
The capture and expression of a complex concept in a simple symbol, sign or prop; for example, symbolizing “community” (equity, connection, unity) with a circle.
Collusion:
Willing participation in the discrimination against and/or oppression of one’s own group (e.g., a woman who enforces dominant body ideals through her comments and actions).
Colonialism/colonizing:
The invasion, dispossession and subjugation of a people that results in long-term institutionalized inequality in which the colonizer benefits at the expense of the colonized.
Color Blind:
The belief that everyone should be treated “equally” without respect to societal, economic, historical, racial or other difference. No differences are seen or acknowledged; everyone is the same.
Contact Hypothesis:
A theory that posits that bringing peoples of different backgrounds together (on a college campus, for example) will lead to improved relations among them. Research has shown this to be true only under certain conditions, including: sanction by authority, common goals, and equal status contact both numerically and psychologically. (Allport, 1957)
Critical Race Theory:
Refers to a critical analysis of race and racism that examines the intersection of race, law, and power. Critical race theory questions the very foundations of the liberal order, including equality theory, legal reasoning, Enlightenment rationalism and principles of constitutional law.
Cultural Appropriation:
Theft of cultural elements for one’s own use, commodification, or profit — including symbols, art, language, customs, etc. — often without understanding, acknowledgement, or respect for its value in the original culture. Results from the assumption of a dominant culture’s right to take other cultural elements.
Cultural Racism:
Cultural racism refers to representations, messages and stories conveying the idea that behaviors and values associated with the dominant societal group, generally identified as White, are automatically “better” or more “normal” than those associated with subordinate groups, generally other racially defined groups. It is a powerful force in maintaining systems of internalized supremacy and internalized racism by influencing collective beliefs about what constitutes appropriate and valued behavior, status, expression, or lifestyle. All of these cultural norms and values in the U.S. have explicitly or implicitly racialized ideals and assumptions.
Culture:
A social system of meaning and custom that is developed by a group of people to assure its adaptation and survival. These groups are distinguished by a set of unspoken rules that shape values, beliefs, habits, patterns of thinking, behaviors and styles of communication.
Dialogue:
‘Communication that creates and recreates multiple understandings” (Wink, 1997); it is bidirectional, not zero-sum and may or may not end in agreement. It can be emotional and uncomfortable, but is safe, respectful and has greater understanding as its goal.
Diaspora:
The dispersion of a group of people who live outside their homeland due to an historical event that caused them to flee or which forcibly removed them from their homelands into new regions: such as, Africans as a result of the trans-Atlantic slave trade.
Discrimination:
Actions stemming from conscious or unconscious prejudice, which favor and empower one group over others based on differences of race, gender, economic class, sexual orientation, physical ability, religion, language, age, national identity, religion and other categories.
Diversity:
Diversity refers to all the ways in which people differ, and it encompasses all the different characteristics that make one individual or group different from another. It is all inclusive and recognizes everyone and every group as part of the diversity that should be valued. A broad definition includes not only race, ethnicity, and gender — the groups that most often come to mind when the term “diversity” is used, but also age, national origin, religion, disability, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, education, marital status, language, and physical appearance.
Domestic Partner:
Refers to either member of an unmarried, cohabiting, and especially homosexual, couple who seeks employment benefits which are usually only available to spouses.
Dominant culture:
The cultural values, beliefs, practices, language and traditions that are assumed to be the most common, accepted, and influential within a given society.
Drag Queen/King (n):
A man or woman dressed as the opposite gender, usually for the purpose of performance or entertainment, which is many times overdone or outrageous and may present a “stereotyped image.
Ethnicity:
A socially constructed grouping of people who share a common cultural heritage derived from values, behavioral patterns, language, political and economic interests, history, geographical base, and ancestry. Examples include: Cape Verdean, Haitian, African American (Black); Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese (Asian); Cherokee, Mohawk, Navajo (Native American); Cuban, Mexican, Puerto Rican (Latino); Polish, Irish, and Swedish (White European)
F to M/FTM/F2M:
The abbreviation for female to male used to specify the direction of sex or gender role change, usually used by those who identify as transsexual.
First Nations People:
Tribal people who identify as those who were the first people to live on the Western Hemisphere continent; also identified as Native Americans.
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Fundamental Attribution Error:
A common cognitive action in which one attributes his/her own success and positive actions to his/her own innate characteristics (“I’m a good person”) and failure to external influences (“I lost it in the sun”), while attributing the success of other people to external influences (“he had help, was lucky”) and failure to others’ innate characteristics (‘they’re bad people”). This operates on the group levels as well, with the ingroup giving itself favorable attributions, while giving the outgroup unfavorable attributions, as way of maintaining a feeling of superiority. A “double standard.”
Gender:
The socially constructed concepts of masculinity and femininity; the ‘appropriate’ qualities accompanying biological sex.
Gendered:
Having a denotative or connotative association with being either (traditionally) masculine or feminine.
Gender Bending (v):
Dressing or behaving in such a way as to question the traditional feminine or masculine qualities assigned to articles of clothing, jewelry, or mannerisms.
Hate crime:
Law or legislation that designates a crime as being motivated by hate for the actual or perceived race, color, religion, national origin, ethnicity, gender, disability, or sexual orientation of any person and assigns a greater penalty for conviction of such a crime.
Heterosexism: The presumption that everyone is, and should be, heterosexual.
Heterosexual (adj.):
Attracted to members of the opposite sex.
Homophobia:
The fear or hatred of homosexuality (and other non-heterosexual identities), and persons perceived to be gay, lesbian, bisexual and /or transgender.
Homosexual (adj.):
Denotes a person who is attracted to members of the same sex. NOTE: The terms ‘gay’ or ‘lesbian’ are preferred because of the previous American Psychological Association definition of ‘homosexuality’ as a mental illness.
Implicit Bias:
Negative associations expressed automatically that people unknowingly hold; also known as unconscious or hidden bias. Many studies have indicated that implicit biases affect individuals’ attitudes and actions, thus creating real-world implications, even though individuals may not even be aware that those biases exist within themselves. Notably, implicit biases have been shown to trump individuals’ stated commitments to equality and fairness, thereby producing behavior that diverges from the explicit attitudes that people may profess. The Implicit Association Test (IAT) is often used to measure implicit biases with regard to race, gender, sexual orientation, age, religion, and other topics.
In‐group Bias (favoritism):
The tendency for groups to “favor” themselves by rewarding group members economically, socially, psychologically, and emotionally in order to uplift one group over another.
Intergroup Conflict:
Tension and conflict which exists between social groups, and which may be enacted by individual members of these groups.
Inclusion:
Authentically bringing traditionally excluded individuals and/or groups into processes, activities, and decision/policy making in a way that shares power.
Indigeneity:
The state of being from an indigenous population. Indigenous people are composed of the existing descendants of the peoples who inhabited the present territory of a country wholly or partially at the time when persons of a different culture or ethnic origin arrived there from other parts of the world, overcame them, by conquest, settlement or other means and reduced them to a non-dominant or colonial condition; and who today live more in conformity with their particular social, economic and cultural customs and traditions than with the institutions of the country of which they now form part, under a state structure which incorporates mainly national, social and cultural characteristics of other segments of the population which are predominant. (Example: Maori in territory now defined as New Zealand; Mexicans in territory now defined as Texas, California, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Nevada and parts of Colorado, Wyoming, Kansas, and Oklahoma; Native American tribes in territory now defined as the United States).
Individual Racism:
Refers to the beliefs, attitudes, and actions of individuals who support or perpetuate racism. Individual racism can be deliberate, or the individual may act to perpetuate or support racism without knowing what he or she is doing: for example, telling a racist joke or believing in the inherent superiority of Whites over other groups.
Institutional Racism:
Institutional racism refers specifically to the ways in which institutional policies and practices create different outcomes for different racial groups but always benefitting the dominant group. The institutional policies may never mention any racial group, but their effect is to create advantages for Whites and oppression and disadvantage for people from groups classified as people of color: for example, city sanitation department policies that concentrate trash transfer stations and other environmental hazards disproportionately in communities of color.
Internalized Oppression:
a process by which people come to accept and internalize the inaccurate myths and stereotypes they have been exposed to.
Internalized Racism:
The situation that occurs in a racist system when a racial group oppressed by racism supports the supremacy and dominance of the dominating group by maintaining or participating in the set of attitudes, behaviors, social structures and ideologies that undergird the dominating group’s power.
- Resources – broadly defined assets (e.g. money, time, etc.) that are unequally in the hands, and under the control, of White people. Internalized racism is the system in place that makes it difficult for people of color to get access to resources for their own communities and to control the resources of their community.
- Standards – With internalized racism, the standards for what is appropriate or “normal” that people of color accept are those of the dominant group, or White/Eurocentric standards. People of color have difficulty naming, communicating and living up to their deepest standards and values, and holding themselves and each other accountable to them.
- Naming the problem – There is a system in place that misnames the problem of racism as a problem of or caused by people of color and blames the disease – emotional, economic, political, etc. – on people of color. With internalized racism, people of color might, for example, believe they are more violent than White people and not consider state-sanctioned political violence or the hidden or privatized violence of White power structure.
Interpersonal Racism:
When private beliefs are put in interaction with others, racism resides in the interpersonal realm: for example, a public expression of racial prejudice, hate, bias and bigotry between individuals.
Intersectionality:
An approach largely advanced by women of color, arguing that classifications such as gender, race, class, and others cannot be examined in isolation from one another; they interact and intersect in individuals’ lives, in society, in social systems, and are mutually constitutive. For example, a Black woman in America does not experience gender inequalities in exactly the same way as a White woman, nor racial oppression identical to that experienced by a Black man. Each race and gender intersection produces a qualitatively distinct life.
Intersex:
A person who is biologically intermediate between male and female. (2) A person with both ovarian and testicular tissue. (3) A person with two ovaries or two testes, but ambiguous genitals.
‐Ism:
A social phenomenon and psychological state where prejudice is accompanied by the power to systemically enact it.
Lesbian:
A woman who is attracted to other women.
LGBTA:
Acronym encompassing the diverse groups of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered populations and allies and/or lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender alliances/associations.
LGBTIQQ:
Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Intersex, Queer, and Questioning.
M to F/MTF/M2F:
An abbreviation for Female to Male, used to specify the direction of sex or gender role change, usually used by those who identify as transsexual.
Marginalized:
Excluded, ignored, or relegated to the outer edge of a group/society/community.
Model Minority:
Refers to a minority ethnic, racial, or religious group whose members achieve a higher degree of success than the population average and who are assumed by the dominant group to be a model of assimilation for other marginalized groups. This success is typically measured in income, education, and related factors such as low crime rate and high family stability.
Movement Building:
Movement building is the effort of social change agents to engage power holders and the broader society in addressing a systemic problem or injustice while promoting an alternative vision or solution. Movement building requires a range of intersecting approaches through a set of distinct stages over a long-term period of time. Through movement building, organizers can • Propose solutions to the root causes of social problems;
• Enable people to exercise their collective power;
• Humanize groups that have been denied basic human rights and improve conditions for the groups affected;
• Create structural change by building something larger than a particular organization or campaign; and
• Promote visions and values for society based on fairness, justice and democracy
Multicultural Competency:
A process of learning about and becoming allies with people from other cultural backgrounds, thereby broadening our own understanding and ability to positively interact with diverse people and groups. The key element to becoming more culturally competent is respect for the ways that others live in and organize the world, and an openness to learn from them.
Multiplicity:
The quality of having multiple, simultaneous social identities; e.g., being male and Buddhist and working class.
Multiracial:
An individual that comes from more than one race. An individual who’s parent’s are born from more than one race.
Multiethnic:
An individual who comes from more than one ethnic group and/or whose parents are born from more than one ethnicity.
Naming:
When a thought that traditionally has not been discussed due to its counter-culture nature is articulated.
National Origin:
The political state from which an individual hails; may or may not be the same as that the person’s current location or citizenship.
Oppression:
The use of power to disenfranchise and marginalize groups of people, usually people of color, for the benefit of another, usually Whites, in order to dominate the culture and society. It may also be defined as the use of institutional power and privilege for domination.
People of Color:
A collective term for men and women of Asian, African, Latin and Native American backgrounds; as opposed to the collective “White” for those of European ancestry.
Personal Identity:
Our identities as individuals-including our personal characteristics, history, personality, name, and other characteristics that make us unique and different from other individuals.
Polyamory:
The practice of having multiple open, honest love relationships.
Power:
Power is unequally distributed globally and in U.S. society; some individuals or groups wield greater power than others, thereby allowing them greater access to and control over resources. Wealth, Whiteness, citizenship, patriarchy, heterosexism, and education are a few key social mechanisms through which power operates.
Prejudice:
A pre-judgment or unjustifiable, and usually negative, attitude of one type of individual or groups toward another group and its members. Such negative attitudes are typically based on unsupported generalizations (or stereotypes) that deny the right of individual members of certain groups to be recognized and treated as individuals with individual characteristics.
Privilege:
Unearned social power accorded by the formal and informal institutions of society to ALL members of a dominant group (e.g. White privilege, male privilege, etc.). Privilege is usually invisible to those who have it because they are taught not to see it, but nevertheless it puts them at an advantage over those who do not have it.
Queer:
An umbrella term that can refer to anyone who transgresses society’s view of gender or sexuality. The definitional indeterminacy of the word Queer, its elasticity, is one of its constituent characteristics: “A zone of possibilities.”
Questioning:
A term used to refer to an individual who is uncertain of her/his sexual orientation or identity.
Race:
An historical and political construction created to concentrate power with White people and legitimize dominance over non-White people.
Racial and Ethnic Identity:
An individual’s awareness and experience of being a member of a racial and ethnic group; the racial and ethnic categories that an individual chooses to describe him or herself based on such factors as biological heritage, physical appearance, cultural affiliation, early socialization, and personal experience.
Racial Equity:
Racial equity is the condition that would be achieved if one’s racial identity no longer predicted, in a statistical sense, how one fares. When we use the term, we are thinking about racial equity as one part of racial justice, and thus we also include work to address root causes of inequities not just their manifestation. This includes elimination of policies, practices, attitudes and cultural messages that reinforce differential outcomes by race or fail to eliminate them.
Racial Justice:
The proactive reinforcement of policies, practices, attitudes and actions that produce equitable power, access, opportunities, treatment, impacts and outcomes for all.
Racial Reconciliation:
Reconciliation involves three ideas. First, it recognizes that racism in America is both systemic and institutionalized, with far–reaching effects on both political engagement and economic opportunities for minorities. Second, reconciliation is engendered by empowering local communities through relationship- building and truth–telling. Lastly, justice is the essential component of the conciliatory process—justice that is best termed as restorative rather than retributive, while still maintaining its vital punitive character.
Racism:
Individual, cultural, institutional and systemic ways by which differential consequences are created for groups historically or currently defined as being advantaged, and groups historically or currently defined as disadvantaged or non-White (African, Asian, Hispanic, Native American, etc.). Racism may also be said to be prejudice plus power. The relationship and behavior of these interdependent elements has allowed racism to recreate itself generation after generation, such that systems that perpetuate racial inequity no longer need racist actors or to explicitly promote racial differences in opportunities, outcomes and consequences to maintain those differences.
Re‐fencing (exception‐making):
A cognitive process for protecting stereotypes by explaining any evidence/example to the contrary as an isolated exception.
Religion:
A system of beliefs, usually spiritual in nature, and often in terms of a formal, organized institution.
Safe Space:
Refers to an environment in which everyone feels comfortable in expressing themselves and participating fully, without fear of attack, ridicule or denial of experience.
Saliency:
The quality of a group identity of which an individual is more conscious and which plays a larger role in that individual’s day-to-day life; for example, a man’s awareness of his “maleness” in an elevator with only women.
Sex:
The biological classification of male or female (based on genetic or physiological features); as opposed to gender.
Sexism:
Prejudiced thoughts and discriminatory actions based on difference in sex/gender; usually by men against women.
Sexual Orientation:
An individual’s natural preference in sexual partners; predilection for homosexuality, heterosexuality, or bisexuality.
Silencing: The conscious or unconscious processes by which the voice or participation of particular social identities is excluded or inhibited.
Social Identity:
The ways in which an individual characterizes oneself, the affinities she/he has with other people, the ways she/he has learned to behave in stereotyped social settings, the things she/he values in oneself and in the world, and the norms that she/he recognizes or accepts governing everyday behavior.
Social Identity Development:
The stages or phases that a person’s group identity follows as it matures or develops.
Social Justice:
A broad term for action intended to create genuine equality, fairness and respect among peoples.
Social Oppression:
“Exist when one social group, whether knowingly or unconsciously, exploits another group for its own benefit.” (Hardiman and Jackson, 1997)
Social Self‐Esteem:
The degree of positive-negative evaluation an individual holds about his/her particular situation in regard to his/her social identities.
Social Self‐View:
An individual’s perception of social identity group(s) to which an individual belongs.
Spanglish:
A colloquial and contested mixture of Spanish and English words, phrases and grammar.
Spotlighting:
The practice of inequitably calling attention to particular social groups in specific language, while leaving others as the invisible, de facto norm: for example, “black male suspect”(versus “male suspect,” presumed White); “WNBA” (as opposed to “NBA,” presumed male).
Stereotype:
Blanket beliefs and expectations about members of certain groups that present an oversimplified opinion, prejudiced attitude, or uncritical judgment. They go beyond necessary and useful categorizations and generalizations in that they are typically negative, are based on little information, and are highly inflammatory.
Structural Racism:
The normalization and legitimization of an array of dynamics – historical, cultural, institutional and interpersonal – that routinely advantage Whites while producing cumulative and chronic adverse outcomes for people of color. Structural racism encompasses the entire system of White domination, diffused and infused in all aspects of society including its history, culture, politics, economics and entire social fabric. Structural racism is more difficult to locate in a particular institution because it involves the reinforcing effects of multiple institutions and cultural norms, past and present, continually reproducing old and producing new forms of racism. Structural racism is the most profound and pervasive form of racism – all other forms of racism emerge from structural racism. For example, we can see structural racism in the many institutional, cultural and structural factors that contribute to lower life expectancy for African American and Native American men, compared with White men. These include higher exposure to environmental toxins, dangerous jobs and unhealthy housing stock, higher exposure to and more lethal consequences for reacting to violence, stress and racism, lower rates of health care coverage, access and quality of care and systematic refusal by the nation to fix these situations.
System of Oppression:
Conscious and unconscious, non-random, and organized harassment, discrimination , exploitation, discrimination, prejudice and other forms of unequal treatment that impact different groups.
Tolerance (n):
An outdated term that alludes to the idea of acceptance and open-mindedness to different practices, attitudes, and cultures, but that does not mean agreement with the differences. For instance, an individual might say “I don’t mind if you’re Gay as long as I don’t have to see it.”
Transgender:
Appearing as, wishing to be considered as, or having undergone surgery to become a member of the opposite sex. Transgendered people can include transsexuals, cross-dressers, drag kings/queens, masculine women, feminine men, and those who defy what society tells them is appropriate for their gender.
Transsexual:
One who identifies as a gender other that of their biological sex.
Two Spirit:
A Native American term for individuals who identify both as male and female. In western cultures these individuals are identified as lesbian, gay, bi-sexual or transgendered.
Veteran Status:
Whether or not an individual has served in a nation’s armed forces (or other uniformed service)
White Privilege:
Refers to the unquestioned and unearned set of advantages, entitlements, benefits and choices bestowed on people solely because they are White. Generally White people who experience such privilege do so without being conscious of it.
Structural White Privilege:
A system of White domination that creates and maintains belief systems that make current racial advantages and disadvantages seem normal. The system includes powerful incentives for maintaining White privilege and its consequences, and powerful negative consequences for trying to interrupt White privilege or reduce its consequences in meaningful ways. The system includes internal and external manifestations at the individual, interpersonal, cultural and institutional levels.
The accumulated and interrelated advantages and disadvantages of White privilege are reflected in racial/ethnic inequities in life- expectancy and other health outcomes, income and wealth and other outcomes, and through differential access to opportunities and resources. These differences are maintained in part by denying that these advantages and disadvantages exist at the structural, institutional, cultural, interpersonal and individual levels and by refusing to redress them or eliminate the systems, policies, practices, cultural norms and other behaviors and assumptions that maintain them.
Interpersonal White Privilege:
Behavior between people that consciously or unconsciously reflects White superiority or entitlement.
Cultural White Privilege:
A set of dominant cultural assumptions about what is good, normal or appropriate that reflects Western European White world views and dismisses or demonizes other world views.
Institutional White Privilege:
Policies, practices and behaviors of institutions — such as schools, banks, non-profits or courts — that have the effect of maintaining or increasing accumulated advantages for those groups currently defined as White, and maintaining or increasing disadvantages for those racial or ethnic groups not defined as White. The ability of institutions to survive and thrive even when their policies, practices and behaviors maintain, expand or fail to redress accumulated disadvantages and/or inequitable outcomes for people of color.
White Supremacy:
White supremacy is a historically based, institutionally perpetuated system of exploitation and oppression of continents, nations and peoples of color by White people and nations of the European continent, for the purpose of maintaining and defending a system of wealth, power and privilege.
Worldview:
The perspective through which individuals view the world; comprised of their history, experiences, culture, family history, spiritual beliefs and other influences.