White: Essays on Race and Culture

White people are not simply or singularly white, yet they are called white. What does this mean in today's world where notions of race and racial representation continually reveal their complexity? Although many studies have examined the racial imagery of people of color, whiteness remains an invisible position; an absence against which other ethnicities are defined. InWhite, Richard Dyer looks beyond the apparent unremarkability of whiteness and reveals the importance of analyzing images of white people. He traces the representation of whiteness in Western visual culture, focusing on photography, fine art, cinema, television and advertising. Dyer begins by situating white imagery in the context of Christianity, "race" and colonialism and explores the significance of using the term "white." In fascinating case studies, he shows the construction of whiteness in the technology of photography and film as part of a wider "culture of light", discusses heroic white masculinity inmuscle-man action cinema, from Tarzan and Hercules to Conan and Rambo, and analyzes the stifling role of white women in end-of-empire fictions likeJewel in the Crown. Finally, Dyer traces the troublesome associations of whiteness with death in horror movies and cult dystopian films such asBlade Runnerand theAlienstrilogy. Richly illustrated with 69 black and white images and 16 pages of color plates,Whiteis an innovative and provocative exploration of racial imagery.