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This article surveys the interdisciplinary field of whiteness studies and outlines an emerging ‘third wave’ of research in this international and interdisciplinary field. This article begins by locating the origins of whiteness studies in the work of W.E.B. DuBois, who provided the intellectual foundations for this body of scholarship. We then identify three characteristics that distinguish this ‘third wave’ of research from earlier studies. This new wave of research utilizes: 1) innovative research methodologies including analyses of ‘racial consciousness biographies’, music and visual media; 2) an analysis of the recuperation of white innocence and reconstitution of white supremacy in neo-apartheid, post-imperial and post-Civil Rights contexts; and 3) analyses of white identity formation among members of racial and ethnic minorities.