When the R Word Ain't Enough

Abstract

For many, Barack Obama’s election validated criticisms that black youth in the post-Civil Rights era overemphasize racism and thereby undermine pursuits of opportunity. Research on black youths’ views of the opportunity structure show that they too embrace such motivational factors as explanations of racial disadvantage, even as they maintain an acute awareness of the significance of race in their lives. While the meanings underlying individual-level explanations of the racial hierarchy are clear, there remains a gap in scholarly understandings of structurally based views of racial disadvantage. This article utilizes interview data collected with a sample of black high school seniors residing in low-income neighborhoods in a major Midwestern metropolitan area to explore how they construct meanings of racial disadvantage, black affective bonds, and racial equality. I find that there is a range of meanings underlying “structural” or “systemic” explanations of racial disadvantage and that these variations have patterned relations to constructions of bonds and equality. Still, despite these variations, all of the youth describe depoliticized versions of “diversity” as the means to, and ends of racial equality. These findings suggest that system blame and variants of structural explanations of racial inequality frequently lack a substantive appreciation of the relational nature of oppression and privilege.