| No. | Emotion | Object of emotion | Participant's description of emotion | Xref. to accounts of behavior |
Positive or negative |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | hate | race | "I think it affects me and I hate the fact it affects me, that I am aware." | 2 | Negative |
| dislike | awareness of color [as difference] | "When I meet a person of color I'm immediately aware. That's...I mean I don't have a negative reaction but I'm immediately aware. I don't like it." | 2 | Negative | |
| feeling bothered | awareness of color [as difference] | "It bothers me." | 2 | Negative | |
| happiness | nonawareness of color | "They asked me was she black or white and I couldn't remember. And I was so happy I couldn't remember. I thought, 'Gee, I've made a real breakthrough.'" | 3 | Positive | |
| feeling bothered | awareness of color [as difference] | "But the fact that I'm aware bothers me. I'm not aware of other things." | 3 | Negative | |
| 2. | feeling unaccepted | black people | "I don't feel I'm accepted by black people as I used to be. I was able to have a much more open and friendly relation and certainly the way things have developed in the world, it's not possible to have that." | N/A | Negative |
| 3. | fear | employer | "I was dating a black guy. I was afraid I was going to get fired if they found out." | 6 | Negative |
| feeling assaulted | structural racism | "I mean, it was just, you know I came into the workforce and all of a sudden it sort of hit me in the face." | 6 | Negative | |
| 4. | feeling wonderful | transracial training program | Person 1 - "I was in a training program where I was definitely in the minority and it was a wonderful because..." Person 2 - "Racially?" Person - 1 "Yes, racially." |
9 | Positive |
| love & trust | people in training program | "What I really loved was that I, we accepted each other, we learned to love and trust one another." | 9 | Positive | |
| enjoyment | training program | "We had learned to trust one another and it was a really wonderful experience." | 9 | Positive | |
| 5. | feeling disturbed | racism directed at white people who have multicultural circles of friends | "I think it's really disturbing. You know, you get into a situation and you see what reality is, which isn't real pleasant that there are people that will hate you for no reason at all other than if you are white and your circle of friends is black or Hispanic or whatever diversity." | N/A | Negative |
| being untrue to oneself | hiding interracial relationships from racist white people | "I have a client who does not know I dated a black man... I remember when I was with this man he egged me, on his birthday, [for her to reveal her interracial relationship to the client]. And I wouldn't. So you think, 'Oh, my God, I'm living a lie.'" | 10 | Negative | |
| 6. | feeling of getting stiffed | governmental and other institutional policies on race and racial preference | Person 1 - "It's become a prime thing for the government to get involved in. It's become a major issue for our major employers, and everybody kind of gets the feeling that they're getting stiffed." Person 2 - "Don't say both sides." Person 1 (animated, with agreement from other group members) "Yeah, everybody. Everybody feels they're getting stiffed." |
N/A | Negative |
| 7. | feeling unwelcome | being in a room where militant black people are verbally bashing white people | "They were so vehement about their feeling about, you know, white people, and they just went on and ranted and raved and I was sitting there going 'Oh my gosh. Can I find some suntan lotion or something to color my skin. I don't like sitting here right now.'" | 27 | Negative |
| embarrassment | whiteness | "I was, and I think probably with good reason, a little embarrassed about being white because it just, the situation in that community was really bad." | 29 | Negative | |
| 8. | enjoyment | a black Baptist ritual | "[At the Christening of my godson] I had never been in a black Baptist church before, which is a wonderful experience" | 30 | Positive |
| not uncomfortable | being the only white | "And I was the only white in the entire church...But I didn't feel uncomfortable." | 30 | Positive | |
| vibrancy | participating in the ritual | "I just, I thought it was a blast. And I was, I can do this. This is fun." | 30 | Positive | |
| feeling uplifted | the Christening experience in a black Baptist church | "I mean it was such an uplifting experience to go to a church like that. Yeah, it was great." | 30 | Positive | |
| 9. | feeling discomfort | feeling different from the dominant culture | "[In a West African country] everybody's eyes were on me and that everything I did was magnified about ten times and to know just how differently I and my culture were from the place that I was. And it wasn't real comfortable." | 35 | Negative |
| feeling discomfort | being unfamiliar with the dominant culture | "Ninety-nine percent Muslim country that, just everything was not, was so unfamiliar to me, the language, the religion, the customs, everything. I just know how uncomfortable that felt." | 35 | Negative | |
| 10. | feeling flattered | being viewed as possibly not white | "The kid looked at me, and he goes, 'Yo, lady, you white?' And I realized when he said that, that I was very, I was extremely flattered that he thought I wasn't." | 39 | Positive |
| feeling complimented | being viewed as part of another culture | "He wanted me to be what he was. He wanted me to be Hispanic, or whatever. And I thought that was a great compliment and, and I was very complimented." | 39 | Positive | |
| 11. | guilt | white privilege | "[Upon being asked what feels good about being white] I think we're much more likely to say 'You know it felt good when someone thought I wasn't white.' And it gives a tremendous guilt almost." | N/A | Negative |
| guilt | assuming privilege, internalized dominance | "It's like there is a privilege that we operate with every single day and assume it, and at the same time there's a guilt about it." | N/A | Negative | |
| 12. | feeling terrible | black people in unfortunate situations | "I've felt terrible about the black people who were in unfortunate situations. I really felt for them." | N/A | Negative |
| feeling uncomfortable | condescension of friends based on internalized dominance | "And I always felt uncomfortable with that." | 40 | Negative | |
| embarassment | condescension of friends based on internalized dominance | "getting involved with that condescending nonsense, which I really, I was embarrassed by it." | 40 | Negative | |
| feeling sorry for | black people | "I don't know if I felt pity. It was more feeling sorry for people who are in that situation where they felt trapped, or where I felt they were trapped." | N/A | Negative | |
| 13. | never felt good | whiteness | "In terms of the question which we're having so much difficulty with, you know, 'What feels good about being white?' I don't think personally that's ever felt good to me." | N/A | Negative |
| jealousy | people with "distinctive" ethnic, racial or religious backgrounds | "In fact I consciously, any number of times throughout my life have been very jealous of people with some sort of distinctive ethnic, racial or religious background that I don't have." | N/A | Negative | |
| don't feel bad | whiteness | "I don't feel bad about being white, usually." | N/A | Ambivalent | |
| guilt | whiteness | "Although there is the guilt factor sometimes that's quite conscious." | N/A | Negative | |
| feeling unexcited | whiteness | "I do know that I feel unexcited about it most of the time." | N/A | Ambivalent | |
| 14. | liking | when differences among white people disappear | "One of the things I like about being white..." | N/A | Positive |
| disliking | being comfortable with whiteness | "is one of the things I also really dislike, or have come to dislike about being white," | N/A | Negative | |
| not comfortable | whiteness | "and that's that I can't be so comfortable with it." | N/A | Negative | |
| comfort | not being conscious of ethnic differences among whites | "like when I was growing up, white was just plain old white. I don't remember being conscious of anybody being particularly ethnic. We were all just white. And I think there's a kind of comfort that goes along with that, which I guess on some level I really like cause, it's a lot being comfortable," | N/A | Positive | |
| hate | feeling comfortable with undifferentiated whiteness | "but also, I've, I've come to, to pretty much hate that, too." | N/A | Negative | |
| 15. | concern | the nation | "I'm very concerned about the nation." | N/A | Negative |
| fear | dominance and power concentrated in one race | "I feel, I feel afraid only because you can have a white-dominated culture or you can have a black-dominated culture, but it's essentially who's in control. Who has the power, who has the leverage to run things." | N/A | Negative | |
| 16. | not threatening | whites becoming a numerical minority | "When you say to me in 2050 white people are going to be in the minority, that is not a particularly threatening thing to me given the places that I've lived." | N/A | Positive |
| fear | another group being the majority in power | "If you were to say to me that another group is going to be in the majority, that causes me a little bit of fear because I don't know that I want any other group to have the power that my group has had." | N/A | Negative | |
| fear | retribution for sins of whiteness | "Because I'm scared what they might do with it given the fact of what my group has done with it." | N/A | Negative | |
| 17. | worry | a safe nation for my [our] children | "I guess if I'm frightened about 2050, it's because I see this fragmentation coming to the point where, will there be cohesion in our nation for my children? Will they be part of a nation that has any cohesion? And I increasingly worry about that. I don't know if there will be." | N/A | Negative |
| 18. | aggravation | identifying oneself as white | Person 1 - "I find it aggravating actually."Facilitator - "Do you want to say more about that?"Person 1 - "Well it's just, I mean, what is white? Just like what is black, brown right. I don't know too much about my past. My father was adopted. All I know is I'm Italian. From my mom's side, who knows, I could have black, African American or Caribbean blood in me. Who knows. Everything, I don't think there's one race, one pure race if you want to call it that." | N/A | Negative |
| 19. | frustration | governmental and other institutional policies on race and racial preference | "...all the government tests. And I find that frustrating. So what are they going to take a white person over a black person if they're trying to fill a certain percentage of whatever comes across at the moment." | 56 | Negative |
| 20. | dislike | identifying oneself racially | "But it is a way of making yourself vulnerable being boxed in, whether you say on the phone, 'I'm white,' or 'I'm black,' doesn't mean anything really. It sets up some expectations that sometimes I don't, I wish we didn't do that to each other." | N/A | Negative |
| 21. | feeling pleased | to be part of a white family with diverse ethnic backgrounds | "I think how I feel about being white. The only way I can sort of get my mind around it is that I'm, I'm very pleased to be a part of my family, which is [?] and grandparents on both sides, and my husband is Scandinavian." | N/A | Positive |
| shame | white identity | "I also don't want to be put in the white box because the white box I'm ashamed of. I feel inordinately ashamed of what the race of which I was born a part has done." | N/A | Negative | |
| uneasiness | describing what feels good about being white | "And so when you start talking about those terms [pejorative terms about people of color], I get really uneasy both by association and I guess because of what I participate in. Describe virtue of being white, in terms of I'm a part of a race which has oppressed minorities so." | N/A | Negative | |
| 22. | feeling bothered | white racism, stereotyping of black people by whites | "I've even had a friend of mine say to me, 'You know, when you're not with me, if I go into a store, someone's watching me thinking that I'm going to shoplift.' And I can't believe it. Not only does it bother me,..." | 63 | Negative |
| disbelief | white racism, stereotyping of black people by whites | "...it's really unbelievable to me." | 63 | Negative | |
| 23. | anger | being accused of historical crimes | "When she says she's ashamed, I get angry. I, I see these people reaching in, in my neighborhood there's a... I didn't do a thing. I was not here. If I was here I'd probably be one of those people running the Underground Railroad or whatever. First of all, I don't even know if my family was here because of, of the mainly European descent, mostly." | N/A | Negative |
| aggravation | being accused of historical crimes | "and they talk about slavery, and that's another thing that gets me aggravated because we, we, the white man, didn't invent slavery, okay. It was always around." | N/A | Negative | |
| aggravation | being held accountable for something over which one has no control | "And that's what aggravates me. That's the biggest thing that aggravates me about everything. Why should I be put in this cast of people that did this, that perverted mistake. Why should I be there? I wasn't there. I had no control over anybody." | N/A | Negative | |
| 24. | feeling good | white identity | "I'll say I feel good about being white because that's what I happen to be, and I have to be comfortable with myself or be very uncomfortable." | N/A | Positive |
| not happy | many things whites have done | "I'm not happy with a lot of things whites have done. I'm also a Christian and I'm not happy with a lot of things Christians have done. And I'm a Protestant and I'm not happy with a lot of things Protestants have done to Catholics in Ireland. But I'm happy to be all three of those." | N/A | Negative | |
| not feeling guilty | not accountable for who went before | "I don't feel I have to be on a guilt trip because of it, because I'm accountable to me. I'm not accountable for who went before." | N/A | Ambivalent | |
| happiness | giving children values for the future | "And I think we give [our children] values to live by, and I think that's part of what makes me happy with what I am." | N/A | Positive | |
| 25. | anger | racist language, white hate speech | "It angers me when I hear people call black people 'niggers' or anything else derogatory. No, I really haven't [made racist remarks]. It's only because, because it makes me angry." | N/A | Negative |
| 26. | uneasiness, hate | racist language, white hate speech | Person 1 - "Thank you" [said to previous speaker who was angered by hate speech]. "Even hearing a discussion using those terms makes me uneasy."Person 2 - "Especially coming from the South because that was a common name..."Person 3 - "It makes everyone uneasy."Person 2 - "There were your coloreds, or there were 'niggers.'Person 1 - "That's why I hate it." | N/A | Negative |