Review of Melanie Bush, Breaking The Code of Good Intentions: Everyday Forms of Whiteness.

• Date: 22 September 2005
• Author: Vera, Hernan
• Published date: 22 September 2005
• Author: Vera, Hernan

Breaking the Code of Good Intentions: Everyday Forms of Whiteness, Melanie E.L. Bush. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2004.

THIS BOOK IS HIGHLY SATISFYING FOR ALL READERS, BUT SCHOLARS, STUDENTS, AND administrators in higher education particularly have much to ponder about and learn from it. The research reported here, conducted among students at Brooklyn College, was not a study of that college but about "the daily experience of those classified as 'white' within the context of fundamental historical transformations that include economic pressures, an extended period of conservative ideological onslaught, and increasingly limited opportunities for all peoples" (p. 11). It also offers implications for academia in the hope that, by listening to our young people, we might discover opportunities for constructing a "better word and the strength of breath between us ..." in which "all of us matter" (p. 252). The great strength of the work lies in the fact that it is not just a study about white racial views, but an investigation of how these views are connected to the students' views on poverty, wealth, discrimination, and privilege.

This is a passionate work, committed to "reconstructing of the public understanding of the role of race today" (p. 50). No matter how critical its conclusions, it is done with much affection for the people who were part of the research and the organizations addressed in the analysis. Bush argues eloquently that social science research that studies how institutional inequality is maintained by the consciousness of ordinary people may eventually lead to its dismantlement.

Melanie Bush aims at "improving our effectiveness in educating our youth about civic responsibility and the importance of socially conscious leadership, broadly understood to be the millennial goals of academia" (p. 50). The research reported here is a superb example of sociological imagination, extremely useful as a class assignment or required textbook in undergraduate or graduate courses. It provides students in all stages of their careers with a model for social scientific research committed to social justice and that seeks to have a meaningful transformational impact. The style and organization of the book make it easy to read and hard to put down.

Bush says little about her methodology beyond the fact that it was "multilayered," relying on a comprehensive survey, focus groups, and interviews. About her own racial identity...