I Bring the Voices of My People: A Womanist Vision for Racial Reconciliation (Prophetic Christianity)

by Chanequa Walker-Barnes

The Four Frames of Color-Blind Racism. Bonilla-Silva identifies four central “frames” for color-blind racism: abstract liberalism, naturalization, cultural racism, and minimization of racism. The first frame, abstract liberalism, is the foundation of color-blind racial ideology. Liberalism, in this case, does not refer to a place on the political spectrum (i.e., conservative versus liberal, right versus left). Rather, it refers to liberal humanism, the core philosophy undergirding Western modernity that emphasizes individualism, universalism, egalitarianism, and meliorism (“the idea that people and institutions can be improved”). Abstract liberalism, then, dismisses the reality of racism or the need for corrective action to ameliorate racial inequality by using the language of equal opportunity, meritocracy (the idea that success is the result of individual merit), government non-intervention (the idea that social change should result from voluntary action and not from government legislation or action), and individual choice.33 The second frame, naturalization, justifies and dismisses racial disparities by claiming that they occur naturally rather than as the result of intentional practices and policies of exclusion. This frame is often employed by Whites to rationalize school and neighborhood segregation.34 For example, employing the naturalization frame, a White Christian might claim that worshipping in an all-White congregation is acceptable because people “naturally” g...