Philomena Johanna Maria Essed (born

Utrecht Utrecht ( ; ; ) is the List of cities in the Netherlands by province, fourth-largest city of the Netherlands, as well as the capital and the most populous city of the Provinces of the Netherlands, province of Utrecht (province), Utrecht. The ...

, 1955) is a professor of Critical Race, Gender and Leadership Studies at

Antioch University Antioch University is a private university with multiple campuses in the United States and online programs. It is the continuation of Antioch College, which was founded in 1852. Antioch College's first president was politician, abolitionist, and ...

Yellow Springs, Ohio.

Biography

Essed's parents are Surinamese. Her father Max Essed was a pediatrician. She grew up in

Suriname Suriname, officially the Republic of Suriname, is a country in northern South America, also considered as part of the Caribbean and the West Indies. It is a developing country with a Human Development Index, high level of human development; i ...

and the

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

. From the age of fifteen she lived in

Nijmegen Nijmegen ( , ; Nijmeegs: ) is the largest city in the Dutch province of Gelderland and the ninth largest of the Netherlands as a whole. Located on the Waal River close to the German border, Nijmegen is one of the oldest cities in the ...

, until moving in 1974 to

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , ; ; ) is the capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, largest city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It has a population of 933,680 in June 2024 within the city proper, 1,457,018 in the City Re ...

Career

In 1983, Essed passed her doctoral exams in

cultural anthropology Cultural anthropology is a branch of anthropology focused on the study of cultural variation among humans. It is in contrast to social anthropology, which perceives cultural variation as a subset of a posited anthropological constant. The term ...

at the

University of Amsterdam The University of Amsterdam (abbreviated as UvA, ) is a public university, public research university located in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Established in 1632 by municipal authorities, it is the fourth-oldest academic institution in the Netherlan ...

, and received her PhD ''cum laude'' in the social sciences in 1990 under the supervision of Chris Mullard. She worked at the University of Amsterdam from receiving her doctorate until 2003. She was a member of the Dutch ''Tijdelijke Expertise Commissie Emancipatie in het Nieuwe Adviesstelsel'' (Temporary Expert Committee on Emancipation in the New Advisory System) from 1998 to 2001, appointed by the Dutch

Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment The Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment (; SZW) is the Dutch ministry responsible for social affairs, relations between employers and employees, social security, trade unions and emancipation. It was established in 1918 as the Ministry ...

. She served as a deputy member of the Netherlands Institute for Human Rights (''College voor de Rechten van de Mens'') from 2004 to 2016. Between 2001 and 2005, she was a visiting professor at the

University of California, Irvine The University of California, Irvine (UCI or UC Irvine) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Irvine, California, United States. One of the ten campuses of the University of California system, U ...

. In 2005, she became a professor at Antioch University. She has also held visiting positions at

Umeå University Umeå University (; Ume Sami language, Ume Sami: ) is a public university, public research university located in Umeå, in the mid-northern region of Sweden. The university was founded in 1965 and is the fifth oldest within Sweden's present bord ...

and the

University of Johannesburg The University of Johannesburg, colloquially known as UJ, is a public university A public university, state university, or public college is a university or college that is State ownership, owned by the state or receives significant fundi ...

, and has served as faculty at the Black Europe Summer School since 2008.

''Everyday Racism''

Essed is primarily known for her books ''Alledaags racisme'' (1984) and ''Understanding Everyday Racism: An Interdisciplinary Theory'' (1990). The latter, following its Dutch translation in 1991 (as ''Inzicht in alledaags racisme''), created a strong reaction in the Dutch public debate.

Recognition

Essed received honorary doctorates from the

University of Pretoria The University of Pretoria (, ) is a multi-campus public university, public research university in Pretoria, the administrative and ''de facto'' capital of South Africa. The university was established in 1908 as the Pretoria campus of the Johan ...

in 2011 and

in 2015. In 2011, she was made a knight in the

Order of Orange-Nassau The Order of Orange-Nassau () is a civil and military Dutch order of chivalry founded on 4 April 1892 by the queen regent, Emma of the Netherlands. The order is a chivalric order open to "everyone who has performed acts of special merits for ...

Published works

* ''Alledaags racisme'', 1984 * ''Understanding Everyday Racism: An Interdisciplinary Theory'' (Inzicht in Alledaags Racisme), dissertation, 1990 * ''Everyday Racism. Reports From Women of Two Cultures.'' Hunter House, 1990 * ''Diversity. Gender, Color and Culture'', University of Massachusetts Press, 1996 * ''Refugees and the Transformation of Societies'', with David Theo Goldberg, 2004 * ''A Companion to Gender Studies'', with David Theo Goldberg, 2009 * ''Clones, Fakes and Posthumans: Cultures of Replication'', Rodopi/Brill, 2012 * ''Dutch Racism'', with Isabel Hoving, 2015

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Essed, Philomena 20th-century Dutch women writers 21st-century Dutch women writers 1955 births Antioch University faculty Dutch anti-racism activists Gender studies academics Knights of the Order of Orange-Nassau Living people People from Paramaribo University of Amsterdam alumni