issue 1 09 - APS Member Groups - Australian Psychological Society

Multiculturalism and Whiteness32research by Zevallos (2003), phenotypediscourses informed who the real Australian is,that is someone who is white, fair, blond andblue eyed an as someone from the Anglo culticbackground. The participants have certainAustralian capital such as the language oraccent however they have accumulated andacquired this capital unlike those who are‘naturally’ white (Hage, 1998).Participants who perceived themselvesas having a ‘white’ appearance were able topass as an Australian because ethnicity wasnot physically observable. They also noted thebenefits of being “the right colour” (Halil)and blending in with the Australian identity.For instance, they know that you can betreated differently depending on your skincolour. In this case skin colour works in theirfavour.HalilI actually cannot think of anydownside at all (to ethnic identity).But I think, the thing is that we arequite, how do I say this in a way,quite right looking. So we don’treally stand out in a crowd in termsof what we look like. I don’t reallystand out in terms of how I look. IfI was a real karasakal (darkfeatured Turk) maybe I’ll betreated differently. That will havean influence on how you arereacted to. But cause you do notlook different you do not sounddifferent so you aren’t different,but underneath you are.MehmetI don’t feel like a minority. I guessit is because I do not look veryTurkish so I never felt persecutedor singled out. I guess I didn’t haveany problems there. I don’t lookdifferent to what ever your averageAustralian is. If I was in a crowd noone would pick me out as differentunless I told them my name.Everyone has this generalunderstanding of an Australianand I guess I fit into that.Halil expressed feeling silenced aboutgovernmental issues due to his Muslimidentity. Although he notes that he is “quiteright looking” and the benefits associatedwith being white and a fair person he is wellaware that his Muslimness can be a threat tohis privileged position. Similarly, Mehmetalso notes the benefits of his phenotype andthe fragile acceptance as a white because hisname can be an identifying marker ofdifference. These two preceding quotationsdemonstrates how whiteness intersects withother social identity markers (Frankenberg,1993) limiting access to privilege even forpeople that are “right looking”.Using Hage’s (1998) term, these twopeople are naturalised whites in that theyhave fair skin and they also have accumulatedcultural capital. However, they can still beexcluded from the Australian identity becausethey have ‘different’ names and a ‘different’religion. This adds a level of complexity toHage’s explanation of naturalised andaccumulated whiteness. One can accumulatecultural capital and also be white; howeverthis is not sufficient to access the whiteprivilege and governmental belongingbecause they are not of an Anglo-Saxonbackground, the aristocracy of all Australians(Hage, 1998).Although in these preceding paragraphswe can see access and exclusion to whiteprivilege whiteness is also being challengedby arguing the need for indigenoussovereignty. Indigenous Australians are usedas a point of reference to position ethnicAustralians and Anglo Australians as equalAustralia. In doing so whiteness is challengedas it is positioned as another migrant ethniccategory, just like all other migrantdescendents.SamiInterviewer: What doesAustralian mean to you?The Australian Community Psychologist Volume 21 No 1 June 2009