Portland Community College Is Having A 'Whiteness History Month', But It's Not What You'd Think

Washington Post- You might already have seen headlines about “Whiteness History Month,” an upcoming event at Portland Community College in Oregon.

The event caused a little buzz online recently. It’s scheduled for April, though, and the organizers of “Whiteness History Month: Context, Consequences, and Change” are still taking presentation proposals, so that attention caught school officials a bit off-guard, said Kate Chester, PCC spokeswoman.

“We really don’t know what set this off yesterday,” Chester told The Washington Post on Tuesday. 

Regardless, the story made the rounds online, and so this week, Chester found herself discussing the proposed project, which is expected to focus on exploring “the construction of whiteness, its origins and heritage,” according to its website.

“The intent was to look at whiteness as a social construct,” Chester told The Post.

To put it another way, that means talking about concepts like white privilege and examining them through an academic lens. The event “seeks to inspire innovative and practical solutions to community issues and social problems that stem from racism,” the website states.


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Okay so Portland Community College could probably use a little work on their branding. 'Whiteness History Month' has a decidedly righteous tone to it. Pretty much sounds like a direct plagiarism of 'Black History Month', and that only exists because the other 11 months are predominately dedicated to white people. That doesn't mean I don't support the cause of 'Whiteness History Month'. After all, if this ladies description is correct it's entire purpose is to help a bunch of white hipster douches in the Pacific Northwest realize how spoiled, entitled, and privileged they are. Who can't respect that? I just wish they brought in someone that wasn't educated at their school to do the marketing. It seems that Community College graduates don't exactly have a way with words. I'm pretty sure that's the only reason people are upset by this. They simply let the name fool them, which is easy to do given how certifiably stupid the name happens to be. You hear 'Whiteness History Month' and you think about classrooms full of students sitting around learning about the accomplishments of pale skinned figureheads and to most people that just sounds like a general education. Didn't need to claim ownership of a month to celebrate caucasians. White people play just as well in September as they do in March. Ironically enough, white people are like baseball. We're pretty relevant for almost every month of the year other than February. We don't need a month long pat on the back. However, it probably wouldn't kill us to get a month long stick pulled out of our ass. That's what 'Whiteness History Month' is for, even if the fine people of Portland Community College did a terrible job labeling it as such.