Campus groups have long set aside time for examining minority culture: Black History Month, Festival Latino, QPenn for the gay community. Now, a group has decided to give white culture a week of its own.
Penn's first "White Week" kicked off Tuesday night with a discussion on the history of white culture. Events will continue through mid-April.
But even with a name seemingly intended to create controversy, the series of events isn't intended to celebrate white culture.
Instead, its purpose is "to provoke" students and foster multiracial dialogue, College senior Miji Park said.
"We think it's important for all ethnic groups to talk about their perspectives on whiteness," White Week organizer and College senior Fatimah Muhammad said.
The week was put together by the Race Dialogue Project, a campus group that discusses issues of race and privilege.
The kickoff event Tuesday night aimed to explore the meaning of white culture and examined its roots in history. Participants also compared various current stereotypes.
Moderators College junior Shakirah Simley, chairwoman of the United Minorities Council, and College senior Julija Zubac said their purpose was to understand, not to condemn, white culture in America and on Penn's campus.
One handout -- adapted from an article in The Counseling Psychologist, a scholarly journal -- says that it highlights "common characteristics of most U.S. white people most of the time."
Over 40 people discussed "assumptions" from the article, such as that white people avoid conflict and intimacy.
"Society has a mindset of what 'white' is," said College sophomore Alex McCobin, who participated in Tuesday's event. "The stereotypes we are dealing with are inherent in every culture."
Other events planned for White Week include discussions on white-Asian relations, a documentary on race relations in general and forums on the status of minorities in gay culture.
"We are want to discuss these issues by making them accessible to everyone," Park said.
