Introduction

This introductory chapter sets the scene for the book ‘White Lies: Racism, Education and Critical Race Theory’. The book analyses the most important policies and practices that sustain and legitimize racist oppression in education in the UK and the USA. The chapter defines the author’s unusual use of the term white lies (an inversion of its common meaning) and explores how critical scholars have sought to deconstruct the myths and distortions that defend and extend white racism. The author explains their focus on anti-Black racism in the US and UK –- reflecting deep links between the nations, both historically (through the trade in enslaved people) and in contemporary race politics. The chapter defines ‘whiteness’ as a system of beliefs, practices, and assumptions that constantly centre the interests of white-identified people, especially white elites. ‘Whiteness studies’, therefore, is an attack on a racial ideology;, it is not an assault on all white-identified people. The analysis explores the development of ‘whiteness studies’ in education and addresses the author’s positionality, as a white-identified cisgender man, working with Critical Race Theory (CRT), a radical conceptual tradition founded and constantly refined by scholars of colour. The chapter ends by summarizing the structure and content of the book.