Blurred Borders for Some but not “Others”: Racialization, “Flexible Ethnicity,” Gender, and Third-Generation Mexican American IdentityPosted in Articles, Media Archive, Social Science, United States on 2011-01-01 23:11Z by Steven |
Sociological Perspectives
Volume 53, Number 1 (Spring 2010)
Pages 45–72
DOI: 10.1525/sop.2010.53.1.45
Jessica M. Vasquez, Assistant Professor of Sociology
University of Kansas
How are the lives of middle-class third-generation Mexican Americans both racialized and gendered? Third-generation Mexican Americans in California experience a racialization process continuum that extends from “flexible ethnicity,” the ability to be considered an “insider” in different racial/ethnic communities, to racialization as nonwhite that is enforced through the deployment of negative stereotypes. Using interview data, the author finds that women are afforded more “flexible ethnicity” than men. Accordingly, men are more rigorously racialized than women. Women are racialized through exoticization, whereas men are racialized as threats to safety. Lighter skinned individuals escaped consistent racialization. These findings have consequences for the incorporation possibilities of later-generation Mexican Americans, as women and light-skinned (often multiracial) individuals are more frequently granted “flexible ethnicity” and less strongly racialized than men and dark-skinned (often monoracial) individuals. Even among the structurally assimilated, contemporary racial and gender hierarchies limit the voluntary quality of ethnicity among third-generation Mexican Americans.
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