New Publication: Flipping the Script: White Privilege and Community Building

Posted by on April 28, 2006

[posted from Comm-Org]

We are pleased to announce a new publication:

Flipping the Script: White Privilege and Community Building
“…one of the major contradictions in our work: the intention to bring resources (people, ideas, time, money) into a community or a neighborhood to make something better, and how the ways we go about this work can maintain or even reinforce the power inequities and racially biased policies and practices that created the problems in the first place.”

Flipping the Script is a monograph designed for people who work in communities to identify and address issues of white privilege, oppression, racism and power as they play out in this work. It is for community builders, grant makers, technical assistance providers and others who are trying to develop more equitable and thoughtful partnerships with community residents and organizations. The monograph is in four major sections. The first section defines key terms, reviews the monograph’s premises, and analyzes early responses to Hurricane Katrina to illustrate white privilege and racism in action at multiple levels. The second section goes into depth about four key concepts: community building, racism, internalized racism, and white privilege. The third section applies these concepts to community/foundations partnerships specifically. It addresses interventions, evaluation, and multiracial coalitions and partnerships. The fourth section includes a chapter about doing one’s own work on white privilege, written primarily for white people, and a summary chapter with recommendations for the field.

Flipping the Script is written by Maggie Potapchuk – MP Associates, Sally Leiderman- Center for Assessment and Policy Development and with Donna Bivens – Women’s Theological Center and Barbara Major – St. Thomas Health Clinic. Collectively, we offer this resource as people deeply invested in community building work. An analysis of community building through the lens of white privilege suggests many places in which we might do our work differently. It also questions the most basic premises of this work. The file is available at http://www.capd.org/. Please feel free to share this announcement in your newsletter, website or listserv and any other way you wish. The authors also encourage readers to contact them to discuss any of the ideas put forth in the monograph. We look forward to hearing from you.

Maggie Potapchuk
MP Associates, Inc
301-460-1063
301-460-1064-fax
mpotapchuk@comcast.net