Editing Racism (section)

=== Popular usage ===
According to dictionary definitions, racism is prejudice and discrimination based on race.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/racism |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160927163823/https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/racism |url-status=dead |archive-date=27 September 2016 |title=Definition of racism in English |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |access-date=3 January 2018}}</ref><ref>{{cite dictionary |url=https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/racism |title=Definition of racism |dictionary=Merriam-Webster |access-date=3 January 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171225025723/https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/racism |archive-date=25 December 2017}}</ref>

Racism can also be said to describe a condition in society in which a dominant racial group benefits from the [[oppression]] of others, whether that group wants such benefits or not.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/reverse-racism-isnt-a-thing_us_55d60a91e4b07addcb45da97 |title='Reverse Racism': 4 Myths That Need To Stop |date=26 August 2015 |access-date=28 February 2016 |last=Blay |first=Zeba |publisher=[[HuffPost|Huffpost Black Voices]] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240511024537/https://www.huffpost.com/entry/reverse-racism-isnt-a-thing_n_55d60a91e4b07addcb45da97 |archive-date=11 May 2024}}</ref> Foucauldian scholar Ladelle McWhorter, in her 2009 book, ''Racism and Sexual Oppression in Anglo-America: A Genealogy'', posits modern racism similarly, focusing on the notion of a dominant group, usually whites, vying for racial purity and progress, rather than an overt or obvious ideology focused on the oppression of nonwhites.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Racism and sexual oppression in Anglo-America: a genealogy |last=McWhorter |first=Ladelle |year=2009 |publisher=[[Indiana University Press]] |isbn=978-0-253-35296-5 |location=Bloomington |oclc=406565635}}</ref>

In popular usage, as in some academic usage, little distinction is made between "racism" and "[[ethnocentrism]]". Often, the two are listed together as "racial and ethnic" in describing some action or outcome that is associated with prejudice within a majority or dominant group in society. Furthermore, the meaning of the term racism is often conflated with the terms prejudice, [[bigotry]], and discrimination. Racism is a complex concept that can involve each of those; but it cannot be equated with, nor is it synonymous, with these other terms.{{Citation needed|date=April 2020}}

Some academics use a new [[Stipulative definition|stipulative definition]] of racism, seeing racism not only in terms of individual prejudice, but also seeing it in terms of a power structure that protects the interests of the dominant culture and actively discriminates against ethnic minorities. From this newly defined perspective, racism means "[[Prejudice plus power]]".<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Hoyt |first1=Carlos |title=The Pedagogy of the Meaning of Racism: Reconciling a Discordant Discourse |journal=Social Work |date=2012 |volume=57 |issue=3 |pages=225–234 |doi=10.1093/sw/sws009 |jstor=23719752 |pmid=23252314 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/23719752 |issn=0037-8046}}</ref>