Mindshaping, Racist Habits, and White Ignorance. Maiese, M. In Arfini, S. & Magnani, L., editors, Embodied, Extended, Ignorant Minds: New Studies on the Nature of Not-Knowing, of Synthese Library, pages 77–98. Springer International Publishing, Cham, 2022. ![Mindshaping, Racist Habits, and White Ignorance [link]](https://bibbase.org/img/filetypes/link.svg "link")
Paper doi abstract bibtex Theorists such as Charles Mills have argued that racism and white supremacy are pernicious, in part, because they result in an “epistemology of ignorance” whereby white people come to know the world in systematically distorted ways. Drawing upon insights from the enactivist approach and associated notions of habit and mindshaping, I argue that so-called white ignorance is the result of overdetermining social influences that frequently operate covertly and lead to inflexible habits of mind. These socially inculcated habits make it difficult for individuals to attend to relevant considerations, form accurate interpretations, or revise their beliefs in response to new evidence. But in addition, white subjects actively, though not necessarily self-consciously or intentionally, maintain their ignorance and investment in whiteness in order to hold on to racial privilege, preserve their self-image, and avoid painful confrontations. In my view, an enactivist account of mindshaping and habit can help us to make sense of how subjects are both molded by their social environment, and also play an active role in enacting and reproducing oppressive patterns of cognitive and practical engagement.
@incollection{maiese_mindshaping_2022,
address = {Cham},
series = {Synthese {Library}},
title = {Mindshaping, {Racist} {Habits}, and {White} {Ignorance}},
isbn = {978-3-031-01922-7},
url = {https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-01922-7_5},
abstract = {Theorists such as Charles Mills have argued that racism and white supremacy are pernicious, in part, because they result in an “epistemology of ignorance” whereby white people come to know the world in systematically distorted ways. Drawing upon insights from the enactivist approach and associated notions of habit and mindshaping, I argue that so-called white ignorance is the result of overdetermining social influences that frequently operate covertly and lead to inflexible habits of mind. These socially inculcated habits make it difficult for individuals to attend to relevant considerations, form accurate interpretations, or revise their beliefs in response to new evidence. But in addition, white subjects actively, though not necessarily self-consciously or intentionally, maintain their ignorance and investment in whiteness in order to hold on to racial privilege, preserve their self-image, and avoid painful confrontations. In my view, an enactivist account of mindshaping and habit can help us to make sense of how subjects are both molded by their social environment, and also play an active role in enacting and reproducing oppressive patterns of cognitive and practical engagement.},
language = {en},
urldate = {2023-08-29},
booktitle = {Embodied, {Extended}, {Ignorant} {Minds}: {New} {Studies} on the {Nature} of {Not}-{Knowing}},
publisher = {Springer International Publishing},
author = {Maiese, Michelle},
editor = {Arfini, Selene and Magnani, Lorenzo},
year = {2022},
doi = {10.1007/978-3-031-01922-7_5},
keywords = {Enactivism, Habit, Mindshaping, OA, PRINTED (Fonds papier), White ignorance, White supremacy},
pages = {77--98},
}
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