100 Patrick M. Whitehead
encounter the totality of things in our experience, but phai-noumenal or
phenomenal things. Phenomenology studies these.
Consequently, our vantage point transforms our perception of the thing
that we are seeing. An outdoor light is helpful at night to see what is going
on in the backyard, but it is an impediment to star-gazing. We are not
indifferent to the outdoor light, but our relationship to it also is not
unidimensional. In order to understand outdoor lights, we need to examine
the varieties of relationships people take up with them.
The same goes for race-based biases in perceptual judgment. The
probability of the anonymous “people” or “brains” having such biases has
been demonstrated by Wilson et al. (2017), but it does not examine the
manner through which such perceptions occur. In the study, these
perceptual biases are occurring without context. To examine these biases
phenomenologically, participants would have to describe how these
perceptions emerge in terms of the relationship between self and other. The
judgments are not products of brain activities, but meaningful ways of
engaging with the world. Such an examination would bring identity,
subjectivity, and reflexivity into the discussion of racial discrimination.
Readers who are interested in exploring the phenomenology of race and
racism are encouraged to read Fanon (1952), Polizzi (2003), Gordon
(1995), and Parker (1999).
REFERENCES
Adams, G., & Salter, P. (2011). A critical race psychology is not yet born.
Connecticut Law Review, 43(5), 1355-1377.
Adams, G., & Salter, P. (2013). Toward a critical race psychology. Social
and Personality Psychology Compass, September 11, 781-793.
American Psychological Association. (2017). People see black men as
larger, more threatening than same-sized white men. March 14.
[https://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2017/03/black-men-
threatening.aspx] URL viewed November 28, 2018.
Cole, M. (2016). Racism: A critical analysis. London: Pluto Press.