insider/outsider/the “other”
week 7: rumors (chiang)
“the ivory tower”. “white privilege”. i’ve heard these two terms come up a few times throughout my prolific college career. usually, the response to these terms is mixed. on one hand, non-white people, both men and women (white women can also be included here) tend to agree that we exist in a society that caters to this notion of “white (male) privilege”, and that the university is an “ivory tower” that ultimately reinforces institutionalized notions of white privilege. on the other hand, most white people — and about 99.9% of white men — believe that this is just another attack by non-white people on the white man for things done many, many (yet not so many) years ago, and that it is the white man who is in fact facing marginalization and discriminatory practices as he is being devalued in american society. white folks, at least those that aren’t really paying attention, believe that racism ended already, and that any talk of it still existing is based on rumors, usually spread by non-white contingencies that want to bring the white man down.
chiang did a great job of putting the spotlight on her attempt to “recenter herself in the discourse communities” that simultaneously accept her and consider her an outsider, or “other”. she can be included in a debate about, say, the composition practices of high school history book in the united states, but her experience as an immigrant has shaped her perception in a way that disallows her to ignore the obvious bias in the production of these types of texts. thus, while she is allowed in the discourse community, she is considered an outsider because she doesn’t share the same interpretation of the text.
