Autocorrecting for Whiteness
101 Boston University Law Review 191 (2021)
Northeastern University School of Law Research Paper No. 403-2021
97 Pages Posted: 10 Mar 2021 Last revised: 12 Mar 2021
Date Written: March 8, 2021
Abstract
Autocorrect presumes Whiteness. Across a range of products and applications, autocorrect consistently “corrects” names that do not look White or Anglo. Sometimes autocorrect changes names to their closest Anglo approximations (as in Ayaan to Susan). Sometimes it suggests replacements that are not proper names (as in DaShawn to dash away). Often, autocorrect asserts the implausibility of non-Anglo names by underlining them in red. Autocorrect’s changes to names such as these are not just trivial product glitches. In a world rife with the multiplying effects of algorithmic bias in increasingly essential domains of decision-making, autocorrect produces social and cultural harms that disproportionately affect communities of color and those who do not have Anglo identities.
Harnessing both empirical evidence and theory, this Article argues that while autocorrect’s Anglo bias harms such individuals and communities, it adds value to the intellectual property of autocorrect’s proprietors as well as to the “status property” of more privileged users. We all increasingly rely on smartphones, tablets, word processors, and apps that use autocorrect. Yet autocorrect incorporates a set of defaults—including dictionaries—that help some of its users to communicate seamlessly at the expense of others who cannot. It is a simple but powerful means of self-realization, providing a modern forum for the reinstantiation of Cheryl Harris’s concept of Whiteness as property. It is a medium for governing social relations that depends on the devaluation of non- Anglo names. It is a form of smart technology that maintains structural racism today.
The essential nature of autocorrect technology—and its far-reaching effect in structuring social, cultural, and even epistemic understandings of our world—demands legal intervention to fix autocorrect’s Anglo bias. Drawing on core norms from property law, as well as consumer law and culture, this Article proposes design principles for ensuring more transparency, access, and participation in the design and deployment of autocorrect technology.
Keywords: algorithms, bias, whiteness, identity
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