ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the subtle performance of everyday racism, legitimised by the invisibility which masks its dis-empowering, deleterious effects. It identifies some of the ways in which white privilege continues to impact adversely on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women in particular, but also other Indigenous women and women of colour everywhere, and suggests strategies for dismantling whiteness and building greater reflexivity in professional practice around the intersections of gender and race issues. It then considers how more critical reflexive approaches can contribute to the deconstruction of binaries, to open new conversations, new stories and new learning. The chapter aims to the 'unfolding relations' and inter-subjectivity of what people hope will be a more truly respectful and emancipatory cross-cultural feminism. White privilege is pervasive and insidious. The cultural milieu of social work in Australia, as in most western societies, is 'predominantly white' and whiteness is 'an omnipresent reality within the practice and the profession'.
