ABSTRACT
This chapter provides an analysis of white supremacist movements and their discourse within a broader context of white supremacy as a social system. White supremacy in the United States is a central organizing principle of social life rather than merely an isolated social movement. It also provides an account of the historical development of white supremacy as institutionalized privilege and as ideological justification for such a practice. The idea that a social identity like 'Jewishness' was linked to inheritable characteristics first emerged within the Christian imagination about the Jews. As James Baldwin suggests, the invention of the 'white race', was an effective means of denying the Black presence and simultaneously justifying their oppression. Emergence of the term 'white' as a meaningful category was tied to the development of an economic system of racial slavery, after the subjugation of Blacks became a firmly entrenched practice.
