In living color
Black Mexicans, Conjunctural Ethnicity, and Operating Identities: Long-Term Ethnographic Analysis
Robert Courtney Smith
American Sociological Review, forthcoming
Abstract:
This article draws on more than 15 years of research to analyze “Black Mexicans,” phenotypically “Mexican-looking” youth who identified as Black during adolescence, used this identity to become upwardly mobile, and then abandoned it in early adulthood. Black Mexicans are potentially iconic cases among emerging varieties of U.S. ethnic and racial life, given Mexicans’ status as a key, usually negative, case in assimilation theory. Most such theory posits that assimilation into Black, inner-city culture leads to downward mobility. To explain how and why this did not happen for Black Mexicans, I propose a sensitizing framework using the concepts of conjunctural ethnicity, emphasizing analysis of racial and ethnic identity in local, historical, and life course contexts; and operating identity, which analyzes identities in interactions and can accommodate slippage in informants’ understanding or use of ethnic and racial categories. Some Mexicans used a Black culture of mobility to become upwardly mobile in the late-1990s and early-2000s in New York, adopting a socially advantaged operating identity that helped them in ways they felt Mexicanness could not in that historical conjuncture, especially given intra-ethnic competition between teen migrants and second-generation youth. This article uses case-based ethnographic analysis and net-effects analysis to explain why and how Blackness aided upward mobility among Black and non-Black Mexicans, but was left behind in early adulthood.
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Skin Tone Stratification among Black Americans, 2001–2003
Ellis Monk
Social Forces, forthcoming
Abstract:
In the past few decades, a dedicated collection of scholars have examined the matter of skin tone stratification within the black American population and found that complexion has significant net effects on a variety of stratification outcomes. These analyses relied heavily on data collected between 1950 and 1980. In particular, many scholars have utilized the National Survey of Black Americans (1979–1980). This leaves the question of whether or not the effect of skin tone on stratification outcomes remains decades later. Newly available data from the National Survey of American Life (2001–2003) are used to examine this question. I find that skin tone is significantly associated with Black Americans' educational attainment, household income, occupational status, and even the skin tone and educational attainment of their spouses. Consequently, this study demonstrates that skin tone stratification among Black Americans persists into the 21st century. I conclude by discussing the implications of these findings for the study of ethnoracial inequality in the United States and beyond.
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Partisanship, Structure, and Representation: The Puzzle of African American Education Politics
Kenneth Meier & Amanda Rutherford
American Political Science Review, forthcoming
Abstract:
The 1982 amendments to the Voting Rights Act targeted electoral structures as significant determinants of minority representation. The research regarding electoral structures and representation of constituents, however, has produced conflicting results, and the continued application of some of the provisions set forth in the Voting Rights Act is in doubt. This article addresses the impact of at-large elections on African American representation and reveals a striking and unanticipated finding: African Americans are now overrepresented on school boards that have at-large elections when African Americans are a minority of the population. Using the 1,800 largest school districts in the United States (based on original surveys conducted in 2001, 2004, and 2008), we find that partisanship changes the relationship between electoral structures and race to benefit African American representation.
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Eve Garrow
Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, April 2014, Pages 381-405
Abstract:
Salamon (Salamon, Lester. M. 1995. Partners in public service. Baltimore, MD: The John Hopkins Univ. Press) and others have argued that government and nonprofit human service organizations work in partnership to address poverty, with government funding the efforts of nonprofits that provide services to the poor. However, this approach does not consider how the racial composition of high-poverty neighborhoods might influence government’s willingness to support the nonprofit human service organizations that locate in them. Using data from a probability sample of nonprofit human service organizations in Los Angeles County that were surveyed in 2002, I estimate logit models predicting receipt of government funding. In neighborhoods with a low percentage of African Americans, I find that greater poverty increases the likelihood that the organization will receive government funding. As the percentage of African Americans increases, however, the relationship between government funding and poverty is reversed. Findings suggest that the influence of race on the government–nonprofit partnership in serving poor neighborhoods is an important, if overlooked, issue that should take its place in scholarship on government–nonprofit relations and policy analysis.
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Subprime lending over time: The role of race
Marvin Smith & Christy Chung Hevener
Journal of Economics and Finance, April 2014, Pages 321-344
Abstract:
In light of the increased scrutiny of the subprime market nationally and the concerns raised that low- and moderate-income and minority homeowners are targeted for high-cost loans, this paper examines the extent to which subprime lending occurs in selected states and the role that race plays in obtaining prime versus subprime loans. It focuses on explaining the gap in subprime rates between African–Americans and whites and estimating its change over time (1999 to 2006) for the study states. We use a unique data set comprised of data from several data sources, including loan-level information, which allows for better controls over factors correlated with race so that better inferences can be drawn. Also, an estimating procedure is employed that fine-tunes the influence of race in the allocation of mortgage capital between the prime and subprime markets. After taking into accounts various controls, the results suggest the possibility of bias in mortgage lending for the period studied.
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Sandra Wilde et al.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 1 April 2014, Pages 4832–4837
Abstract:
Pigmentation is a polygenic trait encompassing some of the most visible phenotypic variation observed in humans. Here we present direct estimates of selection acting on functional alleles in three key genes known to be involved in human pigmentation pathways — HERC2, SLC45A2, and TYR — using allele frequency estimates from Eneolithic, Bronze Age, and modern Eastern European samples and forward simulations. Neutrality was overwhelmingly rejected for all alleles studied, with point estimates of selection ranging from around 2–10% per generation. Our results provide direct evidence that strong selection favoring lighter skin, hair, and eye pigmentation has been operating in European populations over the last 5,000 y.
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Did southerners favor slavery? Inferences from an analysis of prices in New Orleans, 1805–1860
Jeffrey Grynaviski & Michael Munger
Public Choice, June 2014, Pages 341-361
Abstract:
During the years immediately following the American Revolution, it was common for Southern elites to express concerns about the morality or long-term viability of slavery. It is unclear, however, whether such expressions of anti-slavery sentiment were genuine, especially given the failure of so many slave owners to emancipate their slaves. In this paper, we show that there was a change in elite rhetoric about slavery, initiated by Whig politicians in the mid-1830s seeking a campaign issue in the South, in which anti-slavery rhetoric became linked to attempts by abolitionists to foment slave unrest, making anti-slavery an unsustainable position for the region’s politicians. Before that development, we contend that some planters believed that slavery might some day be abolished. After it, those concerns largely went away. We argue that the change in slave owners’ beliefs about the probability of abolition in the mid-1830s should have been reflected in slave prices at auction and test that claim using evidence from the New Orleans auction market.
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Samantha Friedman, Joseph Gibbons & Chris Galvan
Social Science Research, July 2014, Pages 155–168
Abstract:
Middle- and upper-class status along with suburban residence are together considered symbolic of the American dream. However, the question of whether they mean access to better quality residential environments has gone largely unexplored. This study relies on data from the 2009 panel of the American Housing Survey and focuses on a range of neighborhood conditions, including indicators of physical and social disorder as well as housing value and a neighborhood rating. Contrary to the tenets of the spatial assimilation model, we find that middle-class and affluent status do not consistently lead to superior conditions for all households. Neighborhood circumstances vary considerably based on householder race and ethnicity, with blacks and Hispanics experiencing the greatest disparities from whites. In addition, suburban residence does not attenuate such differences, and in some cases, well-to-do minorities do even worse than whites in neighborhood quality in suburbs.
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Henry Knight
Journal of American Studies, February 2014, Pages 251-273
Abstract:
In the late nineteenth century, white land and tourism promoters invested in the selling of Florida to American migrants and winter visitors began to recast the Seminoles. From being feared and denigrated as mixed-race killers, associated with runaway slaves, who had defied earlier US attempts to remove them to the West, the Seminoles were “realigned” by boosters into praiseworthy specimens of moral and racial purity. According to promoters, the Seminoles were now human emblems of the Florida wilderness, but also pure-blood primitives. As such, they fitted much better with the Jim Crow ideals of benign racial separation. Although neither smooth nor complete, this process of racial realignment transformed the Seminoles from terrifying threat to marketable curiosity, easing the incorporation of the Seminoles into the selling of south Florida.
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Multiple Disadvantaged Statuses and Health: The Role of Multiple Forms of Discrimination
Eric Anthony Grollman
Journal of Health and Social Behavior, March 2014, Pages 3-19
Abstract:
The double disadvantage hypothesis predicts that adults who hold more than one disadvantaged status may experience worse health than their singly disadvantaged and privileged counterparts. Research that has tested this thesis has yielded mixed findings due partly to a failure to examine the role of discrimination. This article uses data from the National Survey of Midlife Development in the United States (N = 2,647) to investigate the relationship between multiple disadvantaged statuses and health, and whether multiple forms of interpersonal discrimination contribute to this association. The results suggest that multiply disadvantaged adults are more likely to experience major depression, poor physical health, and functional limitations than their singly disadvantaged and privileged counterparts. Further, multiple forms of discrimination partially mediate the relationship between multiple stigmatized statuses and health. Taken together, these findings suggest that multiply disadvantaged adults do face a “double disadvantage” in health, in part, because of their disproportionate exposure to discrimination.
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Ceren Akdeniz et al.
JAMA Psychiatry, forthcoming
Importance: Relative risk for the brain disorder schizophrenia is more than doubled in ethnic minorities, an effect that is evident across countries and linked to socially relevant cues such as skin color, making ethnic minority status a well-established social environmental risk factor. Pathoepidemiological models propose a role for chronic social stress and perceived discrimination for mental health risk in ethnic minorities, but the neurobiology is unexplored.
Objective: To study neural social stress processing, using functional magnetic resonance imaging, and associations with perceived discrimination in ethnic minority individuals.
Design, Setting, and Participants: Cross-sectional design in a university setting using 3 validated paradigms to challenge neural social stress processing and, to probe for specificity, emotional and cognitive brain functions. Healthy participants included those with German lineage (n = 40) and those of ethnic minority (n = 40) from different ethnic backgrounds matched for sociodemographic, psychological, and task performance characteristics. Control comparisons examined stress processing with matched ethnic background of investigators (23 Turkish vs 23 German participants) and basic emotional and cognitive tasks (24 Turkish vs 24 German participants).
Results: There were significant increases in heart rate (P < .001), subjective emotional response (self-related emotions, P < .001; subjective anxiety, P = .006), and salivary cortisol level (P = .004) during functional magnetic resonance imaging stress induction. Ethnic minority individuals had significantly higher perceived chronic stress levels (P = .02) as well as increased activation (family-wise error–corrected [FWE] P = .005, region of interest corrected) and increased functional connectivity (PFWE = .01, region of interest corrected) of perigenual anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). The effects were specific to stress and not explained by a social distance effect. Ethnic minority individuals had significant correlations between perceived group discrimination and activation in perigenual ACC (PFWE = .001, region of interest corrected) and ventral striatum (PFWE = .02, whole brain corrected) and mediation of the relationship between perceived discrimination and perigenual ACC–dorsal ACC connectivity by chronic stress (P < .05).
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Asian American cancer disparities: The potential effects of model minority health stereotypes
Alicia Yee Ibaraki, Gordon Nagayama Hall & Janice Sabin
Asian American Journal of Psychology, March 2014, Pages 75-81
Abstract:
Racial/ethnic disparities exist in health care that are not fully explained by differences in access to care, clinical appropriateness, or patient preferences (Smedley, Stith, & Nelson, 2002). An important health disparity that exists within the Asian American population is in preventive cancer screenings. The rates of physicians recommending cancer screening among Asian Americans are disproportionately lower than justified by the relatively small ethnic group differences in cancer and mortality rates (U.S. Cancer Statistics Working Group, 2012). Despite cancer being the leading cause of death for Asian Americans, (National Center for Health Statistics, 2011) screening rates for cervical and breast cancer in Asian American women, and colorectal cancer in Asian American women and men are well below those of any other ethnic group (King, 2012; U.S. Cancer Statistics Working Group, 2012). In this article, we present a conceptual model that seeks to explain a factor in these lower screening rates. We review and incorporate in our model established mechanisms in the literature including physician-patient communication, patient variables, and physician variables. We also propose a new mechanism that may be specific to the Asian American population — the impact of the model minority myth and how that may translate into positive health stereotypes. These positive implicit or explicit health stereotypes can interact with time pressure and limited information to influence physician decision making and cancer screening recommendations. Suggestions are offered for testing this model including using the Implicit Association Test and the Error Choice technique.
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Does perceived racial discrimination predict changes in psychological distress and substance use over time? An examination among black emerging adults
Noelle Hurd et al.
Developmental Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
We assessed whether perceived discrimination predicted changes in psychological distress and substance use over time and whether psychological distress and substance use predicted change in perceived discrimination over time. We also assessed whether associations between these constructs varied by gender. Our sample included 607 Black emerging adults (53% female) followed for 4 years. Participants reported the frequency with which they had experienced racial hassles during the past year, symptoms of anxiety and depression during the past week, and cigarette and alcohol use during the past 30 days. We estimated a series of latent growth models to test our study hypotheses. We found that the intercept of perceived discrimination predicted the linear slopes of anxiety symptoms, depressive symptoms, and alcohol use. We did not find any associations between the intercept factors of our mental health or substance use variables and the perceived discrimination linear slope factor. We found limited differences across paths by gender. Our findings suggest a temporal ordering in the associations among perceived racial discrimination, psychological distress, and alcohol use over time among emerging adults. Further, our findings suggest that perceived racial discrimination may be similarly harmful among men and women.
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Racial Prejudice, Partisanship, and White Turnout in Elections with Black Candidates
Yanna Krupnikov & Spencer Piston
Political Behavior, forthcoming
Abstract:
How does racial prejudice affect White turnout in elections with Black candidates? Previous research, which largely focuses on the relationship between prejudice and vote choice, rarely examines the relationship between prejudice and turnout, leading to an incomplete picture of the impact of prejudice on the fate of Black candidates. In this project, we examine a key condition under which partisanship and partisan strength moderate the effect of prejudice on electoral behavior. Specifically, we argue that when a prejudiced strong partisan shares the partisanship of a Black candidate, she is likely to experience a decision conflict — prejudice and partisanship point in opposing directions — increasing the likelihood that she stays home on Election Day. We test this argument through observational analyses of the 2008 presidential election. Our findings illuminate an additional barrier to Black electoral representation: racial prejudice undermines Black candidates’ efforts to mobilize strong partisans.
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Finding Common Ground? Indian Immigrants and Asian American Panethnicity
Ariela Schachter
Social Forces, forthcoming
Abstract:
The common political usage of the term Asian American includes Indians, but historical, religious, and phenotypic differences among Indians and East and Southeast Asians raise the question of how far the boundaries of Asian American identity extend. Using the National Asian American Survey, I examine whether the forces that propel Indian immigrants toward selecting a panethnic identification are similar to those of other Asian subgroups. I find that for Indian immigrants who live among large non-Indian Asian populations — the setting most likely to encourage panethnicity for other Asians — both immigrant integration and discrimination serve to discourage a panethnic Asian identification. My findings suggest that the boundaries of Asian American identity are not open for many Indian immigrants, and highlight the importance of group relations for understanding panethnic identification.
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Identity Isomorphism: Role Schemas and White Masculinity Formation
Matthew Hughey
Sociological Inquiry, forthcoming
Abstract:
This article explores a counterintuitive intersection of class, gender, and race within two politically antagonistic white movements — white nationalists and white antiracists. Ethnographic field-notes, in-depth interviews, and content analysis provide comprehensive data and triangulation for how implicit perceptions of class and gender are intertwined with the social construction of an ideal white, male, middle-class identity. While both organizations express antithetical political goals, they together reinforce broader discourses about whiteness and white supremacy. In so doing, these two organizations present an empirical and theoretical puzzle: How and why do two supposedly antithetical and divergent white male organizations simultaneously rationalize the inclusion and exclusion of women and the lower class from their ranks? Findings gesture toward tempering conceptual models of white male identity formation to further explore how cultural schemas are utilized toward the construction of both identity formation and interest protection.
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Chinyere Osuji
Qualitative Sociology, March 2014, Pages 93-115
Abstract:
Different approaches to race mixture in the U.S. and Brazil have led to the notion that they are polar opposites in terms of race relations. However, the end of de jure segregation in the U.S., the acknowledgement of racial inequality, and subsequent implementation of affirmative action in Brazil have called into question the extent to which these societies are vastly different. By examining race mixture as a lived reality, this study offers a novel approach to understanding racial boundaries in these two contexts. I analyze 87 interviews with individuals in black-white couples in Los Angeles and Rio de Janeiro to examine the cultural repertoires and discursive traditions they draw on to understand white families’ reactions to black spouses. I find that U.S. couples employ “color-blindness” to understand opposition to Blacks marrying into the family. Brazilian couples perceive overt racism and the use of humor from white family members. Nevertheless, couples with black males experienced more hostility in both sites. In addition, white male autonomy was related to the lower hostility that black female-white male couples experienced in both societies. By examining contemporary race mixture as a lived reality, this study complicates simplistic understandings of race relations as similar or different in these two societies. Furthermore, with the increase of multiracial families in both societies, it reveals the family as an important site for redrawing and policing racial boundaries.
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“Fix My Life”: Oprah, post-racial economic dispossession, and the Precious transfiguration of PUSH
Kim Hester Williams
Cultural Dynamics, March 2014, Pages 53-71
Abstract:
This article examines the critical interventions of Black feminist discourses that advocate for oppositional knowledges and a womanist ethics of care and communalism versus the media-driven hypervisible representation of Black racial subjects that promote neoliberal individualism. The article devotes particular attention to how the 1996 novel, PUSH, by Sapphire, foregrounds the racially oppressive neoliberal welfare reform policies of the 1980s and 1990s while Oprah Winfrey’s coproduction of the 2009 film adaptation of the novel, retitled Precious, functions in opposition to Sapphire’s feminist narrative. The article highlights the Oprah brand’s emphasis on neoliberal self-sufficiency and personal responsibility despite ongoing racial and economic dispossession and discusses, in relation, the promotion of Iyanla Vanzant’s Oprah Winfrey Network television program, Fix My Life, as further reinforcing the post-racial, neoliberal antiwelfare state.
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The Orientalized “Other” and Corrosive Femininity: Threats to White Masculinity in 300
David Oh & Doreen Kutufam
Journal of Communication Inquiry, April 2014, Pages 149-165
Abstract:
The film 300 tells a fictionalized account of 300 Spartans’ courageous stand against Xerxes’s Persian army that provided Greece a beacon of masculine strength, independence, and freedom. This study seeks to understand the racist and sexist ideologies represented in the film’s characterization of the Spartan and the Persian armies. To uncover ideologies in the film, we conducted a textual analysis focusing on the intersecting constructions of nation, race, and gender. Our findings suggest that the film advances ideological support for the duty of Whiteness and masculinity in the United States, specifically, and the West, generally, to protect itself from the external, invading forces of the Orientalized racial “other” and against the internal, corrosive forces of femininity.