Annie Gilbert ColemanÆs ôThe Unbearable Whiteness of Skiing uses a variety of rhetorical devices to support the authorÆs contention that commercial ski resorts exclude ethnicity both on the slopes and in their promotions. Tracing the European ethnic roots of skiingÆs popularity in the U.S., the author argues that the convergence of class and ethnicity in the ski industry has created a condition she refers to as ôethnic whiteout,ö an oxymoron in its own right as ethnicity typically refers to people of color (Coleman 144). ColemanÆs (163) main argument is that the American ski industry is an increasingly wealthy culture that excludes minorities and transforms people of color into ôinvisible workers or exotic objects of tourismö in order to appeal to wealthy whites.
Even before she begins her essay, ColemanÆs title ôThe Unbearable Whiteness of Skiingö is a rhetorical device used to demonstrate the lack of ôcolorö in the American ski industry. For her title is an allusion to the novel and film known as ôThe Unbearable Lightness of Being.ö In that film, a dominant culture (Russia) crushes a minority group of Czechoslovakian rebels. This allusion is a meaningful reference because, according to Coleman (141), even in the American West, a region known for its racial and ethnic diversity, ôSki resorts have remained as white as snow.ö By using this simile, Coleman adopts another rhetorical device to demonstrate how the American ski industry typically excludes people of color from its promotion and its slopes.
Ski tourism has often been used by the ski industry to exclude minorities, primarily because white western and European images have been used to promote tourism among white, wealthy Americans. Coleman (142) uses personification to make this point more vivid when she maintains the ski tourism has reshaped western culture, ôpeddling western and European images in powerful advertising campaigns.ö Tourism doe...