white privilege

American  

[wahyt priv-uh-lij, priv-lij, hwahyt] / ˈwaɪt ˈprɪv ə lɪdʒ, ˈprɪv lɪdʒ, ˈʰwaɪt /

noun

1. the unearned and mostly unacknowledged societal advantage that members of the dominant white racial group have and members of nonwhite groups do not, separate from but compounding with wealth, income, class, education, and other demographic factors that form individual identities.

   One aspect of white privilege is never thinking about your race, because most things in society are designed with whiteness as the normal default.

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Etymology

Origin of white privilege

First recorded in 1920–25

Example Sentences

Swann, as a Black man, was accustomed to negotiating a world of white privilege, which deepened the antipatriarchy acuity of his drag aesthetic.

From Los Angeles Times • Feb. 22, 2023

“Boys! Boys! Boys!” examines how gay male capitalist culture relates to their own white privilege and identity as dancers in Seattle’s struggling arts economy.

From Seattle Times • Sep. 7, 2022

Like white students from rural Idaho who are exposed for the first time to concepts like white privilege and systemic racism, some students of color, especially from other states, endure culture shock on campus.

From Salon • Jun. 29, 2022

If anyone had "white privilege", it was surely me, a descendant of Caribbean slave owners.

From BBC • May 10, 2022

I remember an essay you wrote in 2015 about white privilege, with the headline: “Why I Almost Slapped a Fellow Theater Patron, and What That Says About Our Theaters.”

From New York Times • Mar. 10, 2022