Opting for White: choice, fluidity and racial identity construction in post civil-rights America |
Opting for White: choice, fluidity and racial identity construction in post civil-rights America
Race & Society
Volume 5, Issue 1 (2002)
Symposium on The Latin Americanization of Race Relations in the United States edited by Eduardo Bonilla-Silva
Pages 49–64
Kerry Ann Rockquemore, Associate Professor of Sociology
Univerisity of Illinois, Chicago
Patricia Arend, Lecturer in Sociology
Babson College, Babson Park, Massachusetts
Historically, racial identity for persons with one Black and one White parent assumed the development of a Black identity in accordance with the one-drop rule. However, empirical research on the multiracial population suggests that there exists wide variation in racial identification. We explore the interpretive power of [Eduardo] Bonilla-Silva’s Latin Americanization model to explain racial identity construction among a sample of 259 mixed-race respondents.We highlight case studies of individuals who have constructed a White identity in order to illustrate how structural changes in race relations have increased the range of racial identities available to multiracial people. While we observe variation in racial identification among our respondents, their “choices” continue to be differentially available due to their physical appearance and social context.
Read the entire article here.
Tags: Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, Kerry Ann Rockquemore, Patricia Arend, Race & Society