scholarly journals Structural Racism and the Will to Act

2018 ◽  
Vol 110 ◽  
pp. 33-45
Author(s):  
Tehama Lopez Bunyasi
Keyword(s):  
Presidential Election ◽  
Racial Inequality ◽  
Social Practices ◽  
Value Of Life ◽  
Color Line ◽  
Structural Racism ◽  
Graduate Course ◽  
Black Liberation ◽  
Black Liberation Movement ◽  
The Will

In only a few short years, Black Lives Matter has shaped mainstream discourse of racial inequality so as to emphasize the disparate ways our society tends to value certain lives and contributions over others.  In this essay, I describe how today's Black liberation movement inspired me to revise a graduate course on race and conflict that directs students to think about how contemporary institutions and social practices determine the value of life at the color line. In the epilogue, I ponder another round of revisions given the outcome of the 2016 presidential election.

Amidst pandemic and racial upheaval: Where Asian Americans Fit

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-17
Author(s):  
Whitney Hua ◽  
Jane Junn
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Asian Americans ◽  
Racial Inequality ◽  
White Supremacy ◽  
The United States ◽  
Structural Racism ◽  
Global Pandemic ◽  
American Capitalism ◽  
Racial History ◽  
History Of

Abstract As racial tensions flare amidst a global pandemic and national social justice upheaval, the centrality of structural racism has renewed old questions and raised new ones about where Asian Americans fit in U.S. politics. This paper provides an overview of the unique racial history of Asians in the United States and analyzes the implications of dynamic racialization and status for Asian Americans. In particular, we examine the dynamism of Asian Americans' racial positionality relative to historical shifts in economic-based conceptions of their desirability as workers in American capitalism. Taking history, power, and institutions of white supremacy into account, we analyze where Asian Americans fit in contemporary U.S. politics, presenting a better understanding of the persistent structures underlying racial inequality and developing a foundation from which Asian Americans can work to enhance equality.

scholarly journals Of Color Lines and Race Lines: John Marshall Harlan, W.E.B. Du Bois, and the Persistence of Racial Inequality in a Colorblind Regime

2017 ◽  
Vol 4 (4) ◽  
pp. 270
Author(s):  
Phillip Hutchison
Keyword(s):  
Racial Inequality ◽  
Racial Equality ◽  
Color Line ◽  
Du Bois ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Color Blind ◽  
John Marshall

<p><em>The life of the first Justice Harlan has been the subject of myriad studies, largely inspired by his declaration “Our Constitution is color-blind,” which appeared in his storied dissent in </em>Plessy v. Ferguson<em>. This article interrogates unaddressed angles of his dissent that, when given proper attention, can deliver fruitful insights into his intentions behind the colorblind metaphor. The focus is primarily trained upon Harlan’s concept of the “race line,” which he referenced twice in his dissent. Placing this “race line” up against the colorblind Constitution will reveal that he purposed to keep whites educationally and financially dominant “for all time” by means of (colorblind) legal racial equality. The article delves further into the race line by juxtaposing it with W.E.B. Du Bois’s notion of the “color line,” which was voiced at the same moment of </em>Plessy<em>.</em></p>

scholarly journals Developmental Origins of Anti-Black Bias in White US Children: Exposure to and Beliefs about Racial Inequality

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Rizzo ◽  
Tobias Britton ◽  
Marjorie Rhodes
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Early Childhood ◽  
Racial Inequality ◽  
Racial Bias ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
The United States ◽  
Racial Groups ◽  
Developmental Origins ◽  
Structural Racism ◽  
Racial Inequalities

Anti-Black racism remains a pervasive crisis in the United States today. Racist social systems are rooted in prejudicial beliefs that reinforce and perpetuate racial inequalities. These beliefs have their developmental origins in early childhood and are difficult to change once entrenched in adolescence and adulthood. What causes children to form prejudicial beliefs and racial biases—and what steps can be taken to preempt them from forming—remain open questions. Here we show that children’s exposure to and beliefs about racial inequalities predict the formation of anti-Black biases in a sample of 712 White children (4-8 years) living across the United States. Drawing from constructivist theories in developmental science, we outline a novel account of the emergence of racial bias in early childhood: As children observe racial inequalities in the world around them, they develop beliefs about the causal factors underlying those inequalities. Children who believe that inequalities reflect the inherent superiority/inferiority of racial groups develop biases that perpetuate this worldview, whereas those who recognize the extrinsic causes of racial inequalities develop attitudes geared towards rectification. Our results demonstrate the importance of early intervention to disrupt problematic beliefs before they emerge and highlight children’s awareness of structural racism as an important target for anti-racist intervention.

Critical Race Theory

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paula Groves Price
Keyword(s):  
Critical Race Theory ◽  
Knowledge Production ◽  
Racial Inequality ◽  
Educational Inequality ◽  
Critical Race ◽  
Race Theory ◽  
Structural Racism ◽  
Forthcoming Article ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Policies And Practices

This is an advance summary of a forthcoming article in the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Education. Please check back later for the full article. Race has historically been, and continues to be, a significant issue in all aspects of American society. In the field of education, racial inequality is prominent in the areas of access, opportunity, and outcomes. Critical Race Theory (CRT) is a framework that offers researchers, practitioners, and policy-makers a race-conscious approach to understanding educational inequality and structural racism to find solutions that lead to greater justice. Placing race at the center of analysis, Critical Race Theory scholars interrogate policies and practices that are taken for granted to uncover the overt and covert ways that racist ideologies, structures, and institutions create and maintain racial inequality. In the field of education, CRT is a helpful tool for analyzing policy issues such as school funding, segregation, language policies, discipline policies, and testing and accountability policies. It is also helpful for critically examining the larger issues of epistemology and knowledge production, which are reflected in curriculum and pedagogy. As education is one of the major institutions of knowledge production and dissemination, CRT scholars often push the field to critically examine the master or dominant narratives reproduced in schools and the counter-narratives that are silenced. CRT is a theoretical framework that provides education researchers, policy makers, and practitioners with critical lenses to deconstruct oppressive policies and practices and to construct more emancipatory systems for racial equity and justice.

Why Sociology Matters to Race and Biosocial Science

2020 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 195-214
Author(s):  
Dorothy E. Roberts ◽  
Oliver Rollins
Keyword(s):  
Racial Identity ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Racial Inequality ◽  
Social Practices ◽  
Scientific Study ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Future ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
Social Algorithms

Recent developments in genetics and neuroscience have led to increasing interest in biosocial approaches to social life. While today's biosocial paradigms seek to examine more fully the inextricable relationships between the biological and the social, they have also renewed concerns about the scientific study of race. Our review describes the innovative ways sociologists have designed biosocial models to capture embodied impacts of racism, but also analyzes the potential for these models normatively to reinforce existing racial inequities. First, we examine how concepts and measurements of difference in the postgenomic era have affected scientific knowledges and social practices of racial identity. Next, we assess sociological investigations of racial inequality in the biosocial era, including the implications of the biological disciplines’ move to embrace the social. We conclude with a discussion of the growing interest in social algorithms and their potential to embed past racial injustices in their predictions of the future.

scholarly journals Living at the Margins: Black Feminist Pedagogy as Transformative Praxis During the 1980s-1990s and Epistemic Exclusion in the 21st Century—Where Do We Go Now?

2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Dolana Mogadime
Keyword(s):  
Black Women ◽  
White Male ◽  
Feminist Pedagogy ◽  
Black Feminist ◽  
Black Liberation ◽  
Black Feminists ◽  
Black Liberation Movement ◽  
Institutional Challenges ◽  
University Settings ◽  
Black Feminist Pedagogy

In this essay I argue that Black women who teach Black feminist pedagogy experience “epistemic exclusion” (Buchanan, 2020) while advocating for the intersections between three disparate contexts: their activism in their communities, the women’s movement, and their work as educators in postsecondary settings. The period examined is the 1980s–1990s. I consider the institutional challenges and limitations Black women have undergone as knowledge producers and teachers. While pushing the boundaries erected between university settings and the Black liberation movement taking place in their communities (Joseph, 2003), they were limited to a precarious status as Black women teaching within White-male dominated institutions. The trailblazing theoretical pedagogical insights Black feminists have advanced in their work as educators in postsecondary settings is discussed at length. Additionally, connections are made to the present-day struggle among Black feminists for inclusion within contemporary educational contexts (Evans-Winters & Piest, 2014; Mogadime, 2002, 2003; Wane, 2009, 2011).

Combating Inequality in the Postwar City

2020 ◽  
pp. 115-136
Author(s):  
Joe William Trotter
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
African American ◽  
Labor Unions ◽  
Racial Inequality ◽  
Economic Restructuring ◽  
African American Community ◽  
Color Line ◽  
Public Officials ◽  
Urban Political Economy ◽  
Organizing Center

Despite significant achievements during the interwar years, the Pittsburgh branch encountered the persistence and even intensification of racial inequality in the postwar urban political economy. Deindustrialization, urban renewal, neighborhood depopulation, and global economic restructuring reinforced the color line in mid-20th century Pittsburgh. The Urban League emerged at the organizing center of early efforts to offset the destructive impact of these local, national, and transnational developments on the city's African American community. The agency pressed employers, public officials, and labor unions to increase opportunities for African Americans in a broad range of skilled, clerical, and professional occupations and stimulated the growth of the black middle class.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document