Race Relations Research Articles

Matripotência e biointeração: princípios contracoloniais de defesa da vida

The colonization process that built Modernity imposed dichotomous power structures on people all over the world based on the domination-subordination pair, which permeate relations of race, gender, social class, humanity-nature, among others. With Carla Akotirene and Nego Bispo, we understand that in resisting colonial violence it is important to forge our own concepts, based on the cosmoperpeptions of afropindoramic peoples. Therefore, we bring here a little of how racism and machismo are articulated based on colonial dynamics, perpetuating multiple oppressions and epistemicides in relation to the knowledge and ways of life of afropindoramic peoples. However, such knowledge is alive and powerful, organizing life in countercolonial communities and can help us break with essentialisms and rethink our social organization, by constituting a counterpoint to the power structures that determine relations in colonial capitalism. In this sense, we bring the concepts of Biointeraction, by Antônio Bispo dos Santos, and Matripotency, by Oyèrónkẹ́ Oyěwùmí.

Time for Tea: Representations of Postcolonial and Chinese Diaspora Culture and Identity in Chuah Guat Eng’s Echoes of Silence

Tea, the second most consumed beverage in the world, originates from China, and was then brought all over the world through trade, affecting the many different cultures that it encounters along the way. The way a person takes their tea can often reveal parts of their cultural identity and upbringing. This paper aims to examine the representations of the hybrid identities of the Chinese Diaspora in Malaysia through a close reading of tea scenes and tea culture in Chuah Guat Eng’s first novel, Echoes of Silence: A Malaysian Novel, first published in 1994. The novel explores the complex race relations and postcolonial politics and identity in Malaysia and provides an excellent springboard for the examination of Malaysian literary cultural politics, as well as postcolonial issues such as cultural hybridity, and the way that culture spreads and is spread from one part of the world to another and is manifested in diaspora identities. Through such an exploration, I hope to examine the negotiation between the hybridizing culture of being overseas Chinese as well as a British subject simultaneously in relation to representations of tea consumption and culture in Anglophone literature, which may provide more insight into the mentality of Anglophone Malaysian writers concerning issues of cultural identity and diaspora.

The African-American liberation perspectives of Dale P. Andrews in conversation with other practical theologies

This study endeavors a comprehensive conversation between the African-American liberation perspectives of Dale P. Andrews and other contemporary practical theologies and liberationist perspectives. A pertinent question here arises: Will Andrews’ approach to ethnic-specific liberation properly dialogue with other practical theologies in correlation? In response, the researched argument intends to evidence that his methodology does, in fact, resonate well with notable scholars from the guild, even those from other cultural backgrounds and diverse geographical locations. In that stride, consider that Westernization and its concomitant individualism has adversely affected ethnic cultures and their collectivist natures, also resulting in power imbalances between America’s elite classes and the poor and disenfranchised. African-Americans, specifically, are often marginalized and oppressed, which goes against the biblical narrative and imperative for the church to properly “love thy neighbor” (Mark 12:31) and to seek liberation for those who are poor and destitute (Ps. 9:18; Prov. 14:31). Towards potential resolution, Andrews emphasized robust ecclesiological practices, stressing the importance of a flourishing Black American church, with the additional hope that such Spirit-inspired thriving would pour over into society as a whole. The selected theologians brought into the researched dialogue are intentional in identifying and working toward solutions regarding reconciled race relations and socio-spiritual liberation. Moreover, the increasingly multicultural church of America would do well to allow itself to be openly influenced by Majority World spiritualities, most specifically the songfulness and communal/cultural aspects of African religion.

Scars of a Colonial History

Central to virtually any indictment of South African literature, its historiography, or otherwise culturally and politically influenced modes of representation persist themes of social, political, and racial inequality. That is not to say that all South African cultural productions revolve around a centrifuge of racially focused social commentary; rather, that when historicizing a work of South African aesthetics such themes inevitably arise because of the nation’s colonial history and the Eurocentrism that have pervaded its modern socio-political foundations. When examining South African aesthetic/cultural representations (in this case, a literary text) it is thus crucial to properly locate the work in as full a historical context as possible. My research therefore aims to link South Africa’s history of colonization with the damaged race relations that ensued in the twentieth century as represented in a prominent work of South African theater: Athol Fugard’s “Master Harold” … And the Boys. My essay traverses the history of British and Dutch colonization in South Africa and seeks therein to register foundations for the Eurocentric, whitewashed ideologies which would eventually translate into official state policy in 1948 and which precipitated the broken race relations that Fugard’s semi-autobiographical play interrogates. I discuss Fugard’s depiction of white privilege while systematically linking such representations back to their colonial foundations, and ultimately assess Fugard’s play as a condemnation of white supremacy and as a plea for the recalibration of prejudiced racial hierarchies.

On Being a Listening Church: The U.S. Catholic Church and Black Lives Matter

The article explores the intersection of Black Lives Matter and the synodal process within the U.S. Catholic Church, focusing on the church’s stance on racism and racial justice. Drawing upon Pope Francis’ call for the church to become a listening church, I argue that the church currently lacks crucial elements of inclusivity, engagement with the lived experiences of the faithful, and a willingness to address conflict in the context of racial justice. I propose a closer examination of Black Lives Matter and the synodal process as a means for the church to adapt and become a genuinely attentive church, improving discussions on race relations in the United States.

From chart-topper to gold record: The effects of Billboard chart popularity on RIAA gold or platinum certification of #1 R&B/Hip-Hop singles in the Pre-SoundScan and SoundScan eras, 1977–2008

IntroductionThe purpose of this paper was to examine the effects of genre-specific and mainstream Billboard chart popularity on RIAA gold or platinum certification of #1 R&B/Hip-Hop singles in the Pre-SoundScan (1977–1992) and SoundScan (1993–2008) eras. The first aim was to determine if there were any statistically significant differences in genre-specific and mainstream popularity between singles that achieved RIAA gold or platinum certification and those that did not reach that pinnacle in both eras. The second aim assessed the relative predictive power of genre-specific and mainstream popularity on RIAA gold or platinum certification of #1 R&B/Hip-Hop singles in the Pre-SoundScan and SoundScan eras while controlling for established brand. MethodsIn this comparative assessment of the relationships between Billboard chart data and RIAA gold/platinum certification data in the Pre-SoundScan and SoundScan eras, genre-specific popularity was measured by total weeks at #1 on Billboard's R&B/Hip-Hop charts and total weeks on the charts regardless of position. Mainstream popularity was evaluated with peak position on Billboard's Pop charts. The established brand construct was assessed with the artist's total prior #1 R&B/Hip-Hop singles and total prior #1s by the record label. ResultsA Mann–Whitney U test revealed statistically significant differences in mainstream popularity between gold or platinum singles and non-gold or platinum singles in both the Pre-SoundScan and SoundScan eras. Statistically significant differences in genre-specific popularity were also observed in both periods, but not in the hypothesized direction in the SoundScan era. A binary logistic regression model demonstrated that the two popularity constructs, while controlling for established brand, predicted RIAA gold or platinum certification of #1 R&B/Hip-Hop singles in both the Pre-SoundScan and SoundScan eras. The model better predicted gold or platinum certification in the Pre-SoundScan era. The most powerful predictor was mainstream popularity in both eras. ConclusionGold or platinum certified #1 R&B/Hip-Hop singles had a significantly higher peak position on the mainstream Pop charts than those not certified gold or platinum in both the Pre-SoundScan and SoundScan eras. When observing genre-specific popularity, gold or platinum singles spent significantly more total weeks on the R&B/Hip-Hop charts than non-gold or platinum singles in the Pre-SoundScan era. In contrast, the reverse was observed in the SoundScan era. Mainstream popularity, as measured by peak position on the Pop charts, and genre-specific popularity, as measured by total weeks on the R&B/Hip-Hop charts, were good predictors of gold or platinum certification in both the Pre-SoundScan and SoundScan eras. The model was a better predictor of RIAA gold or platinum certification in the Pre-SoundScan era, suggesting that the Billboard chart methodology in the earlier era was more aligned with the RIAA auditing process than the SoundScan era methodology. Findings also raise questions about whether the initial exclusion of several African American independent retailers, who were generally the primary source for sales data in the Pre-SoundScan era, reduced the validity of SoundScan sales data. In other words, did the SoundScan data measure what it intended to measure, which was the popularity of R&B/Hip-Hop singles among the target audience of that genre? Future research should examine how the transition to SoundScan may have contributed to redefining the target audience for R&B/Hip-Hop music, impacted the quantity and quality of R&B/Hip-Hop music available to the public, and the effects of those outcomes on the broader culture and society. Areas of InterestRecording industry, organizations, stratification, race and ethnic relations, medical sociology, political sociology, quantitative and qualitative methods.

Thinking through the Home: Work, Rent, and the Reproduction of Society

Abstract: This essay explores the tensions between two positions on revolutionary subjectivity. The first confines it to the production process and the creation of value, and the second ignores the value-form as economistic Marxist orthodoxy. I consider a third position that tries to capture the reach and open-endedness of capitalism, and in the process imagine a more expansive conception of revolutionary subjectivity. Accounting for the vastness of capitalism’s reach entails thinking with and beyond the production of value—about the preconditions that make the wage-relation possible—that is the reproduction of society, broadly conceived. This not only encompasses reproductive labor but also implicates broader gender and race relations through precarity and the gig economy, as well as struggles over homes and housing, health care, and border crossing.

Racism and the Rollback of Tunisian Democracy

Tunisia was the last surviving democracy to emerge from the Arab Spring, and had recently enacted legislation to combat racial discrimination. But President Kais Saied, since coming to power in a 2019 election, has returned the country to authoritarian rule. He has also rolled back progress on race relations, scapegoating sub-Saharan African migrants for Tunisia’s economic troubles. The failure of previous governments to root out corruption and consolidate the democratic transition with a new socioeconomic pact opened the way for a return to dictatorship.

Transpacific Connections in the Civil War Era

Abstract: This essay introduces the special forum on transpacific connections in the Civil War era. The forum investigates how US interaction with Asia and the Pacific shaped race relations, gender ideology, diplomacy, and legal rights in the United States during the second half of the nineteenth century. By examining the first Japanese diplomatic mission to the United States, the experience of Black migrants in Japan, Chinese women's habeas corpus litigations, and the naturalized citizenship of Chinese Americans, the forum integrates Asia and the Pacific into Civil War–era scholarship. Conceptually, the forum is informed by three strands of historiography: the international history of the Civil War era, the American West during the Civil War era, and the history of the Pacific World.

Fear of a Black (Southern) Planet: Kara Walker's Night Conjure

Abstract: Black folk have a dubious relationship with landscapes of the American South, where the living dead—Indigenous, enslaved, Confederate, and everyone in between—saturate the natural world with unresolved trauma. Kara Walker has long explored the complexity of race relations during the rise and fall of the plantation economy, and in Night Conjure (2001), she inverts the iconography of Black fright against a white cotton field to envision other ways in which the South begat terror and for whom. Walker picks up the seemingly contradictory relationship between women of African descent and geographic sites of oppression and unbearable cultural memory.

Racialized spatial attachments

Danish high school’s rising ethnic/racial diversity and tendencies of segregation call for explorations of students’ educational experiences of racialized differentiation. This article unfolds methodological reflections on this endeavor, by focusing on researcher access. Not only is space a medium through which racial relations materialize – space is also interconnected with access. If researchers depend on relations for access to sites of inquiry, which depends on how researchers are read by actors in the field, it is critical to scrutinize the spatial dimensions to such readings and what knowledge is (allowed to be) produced. Unfolding two ethnographic vignettes, the researcher’s positionality of passing is analyzed to explicate the relationship between racialized bodies and racialized spaces. I propose the notion of spatial attachments as an analytical lens for explaining such body–space conflations to illuminate the interconnectivity between educational spaces and the broader external world, and to expand the language to address racialization in the colorblind context of Danish high schools.

An Unbridgeable Gap? Racial Attitudes and Friendship in Prison

The United States is experiencing growth in racial and ethnic diversity, yet racial tensions remain high. Proponents of contact theory suggest that interracial contact should alleviate racial tensions when contact occurs under the right conditions. The current study uses a network approach to examine the relationship between race, racial attitudes, and friendship within a novel setting satisfying the “right” conditions: a good behavior prison unit. Using social network data from 133 men and Exponential Random Graph Models, we examine whether racial attitudes influence the patterns of intraracial versus interracial ties. Results reveal that negative racial attitudes do not differentially impact the sending of intraracial versus interracial ties, but reduce the odds of receiving interracial ties from other participants. We discuss the implications of these findings for contact theory as well as for research on race relations both within and outside of prison.

Identifying the Needs of a Diverse Cohort and Engagement Opportunities That Foster a Sense of Belonging at a Hispanic-Serving Doctoral Program

ABSTRACT This mixed method study assessed the perceptions of health professional graduate students on a sense of belonging and evaluated the engagement experiences valued most in a graduate program across three domains of belonging, academics and diversity, equity and inclusion. Hispanic students valued building professional relationships with faculty and mentors more than non-Hispanic students while non-Hispanic students valued opportunities to discuss race relations outside the classroom. Belonging at the graduate level in health professional programs is distinct from undergraduate programs because of new expectations of developing into entry level clinicians. This study showed that Hispanic students significantly valued building connections with mentors, faculty and staff, identifying a need of continued supportive mentoring relationships within this population at the graduate level. Implications of these findings across the available literature are discussed.

Whiteness Should Be Introduced to Postcolonial Critiques of FSTS

Subramaniam et al. (2016) exhorts postcolonial critiques of feminist STS to include Indigenous and decolonial knowledges from Latin America. I suggest that these intersecting contributions should also theorize whiteness as an important and overarching power structure. Whiteness historically contributed to and contemporarily still contributes to the shaping of our understanding of gender, sexuality, disability, class inequality and race relations, but has also structured and informed colonial conquests and empires. This also applies to the hierarchies of knowledge established within the academy, where, for example, contributions from Indigenous communities remain irrelevant and ignored. My article, using broad strokes of the brush, hopes to briefly establish the importance of considering whiteness in postcolonial analysis as it; 1) has globally structured socioeconomic and political relations by race, 2) was established through colonial violence, 3) necessitated the social construction of whites as a racial category, and 4) procured societal protections by law, enabling its op-erations to become entrenched in the norms of contemporary (postcolonial) society.

Defensive racism and Christian righteousness in the time of Trump

This paper interrogates the relationship between Christianity, race and politics in the US through what I call ‘defensive racism’ — a multi-modal form of anti-Black racism that displaces racism, denies its existence toward Black Americans, and deflects racism away from white people. Drawing on ethnographic data, including qualitative interviews and participant observation data, collected in the US with white conservative Evangelicals from October 2020 to November 2022, I show how white evangelicals reproduce a racial, moral order through expressions of defensive racism. By focusing on the meanings and enactment of righteousness, this paper also deepens and refines the concept of Christian nationalism, which seeks to uphold the idea of a righteous Christian nation. By situating conservative white Evangelicals' anti-Black racism in relation to Trump's presidency, the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests, the rise of racial consciousness around anti-Blackness in the US, I examine how white evangelicals reposition themselves racially and religiously in response to socio-political changes.

Place Matters

Place matters. In analyzing historical events and rights movements, we need to pay close attention to the divergent locales where they happened. This article focuses on one such event, the lettuce workers’ strike of 1936, as it played out in Salinas, California. The setting of Salinas made a difference in labor relations and race relations, both in the way the strike came about and, just as importantly, in how and why it was ended. Strikers and their adversaries (growers and labor contractors) were multiracial and multiethnic but shared a common bond in their deep attachment to the city of Salinas. They knew one another intimately and had every incentive to heal the breach.

Views From West Africa

In the 1950s, many Ghanaians identified with African Americans as they read about events involving American racial violence in Ghanaian newspapers. Yet the transnational connections appearing in those periodicals varied in depth, intensity, and sincerity depending on their political or commercial connections. This study analyzes the reactions in key Ghanaian newspapers, such as those affiliated with Kwame Nkrumah’s Convention People’s Party, the British-owned Daily Graphic, and the Ashanti Pioneer, to key moments in 1950s American race relations, including the Montgomery Bus Boycott, the events in Little Rock, and the infamous ‘Orange Juice’ incident involving discrimination against the Ghanaian minister of finance. By demonstrating that the Pioneer more often covered the personal angles of such events, while the tones of CPP-affiliated papers and even the Daily Graphic vacillated based on changing political needs, this study both shows the complicated nature of transnational racial identifications as they flowed west across the Atlantic and reveals the promises and limits of Ghanaian connections to members of the African diaspora during the decolonizing period in Ghana.

Navigating Transitioning Experiences: A Review of Ethnic Minority First-generation College Students in Chinese Higher Education

Since the 1980s, educational opportunity programs aimed at reducing the disparities between ethnic minority groups and the Han have been implemented in China. In reflection of the policies, the China College Student Survey (CCSS) finds a positive trend of enrollment from first-generation college students with rural backgrounds in the past ten years. An increasing number of scholarly works have also investigated the effects of policies on ethnic minority college students and proposed recommendations for improving policies to assist individuals in adapting to college life. This paper considers the importance of resilience in transitional experiences on both academic and life outcomes and reviews both quantitative and qualitative studies on ethnic minority university students experiences in Han-dominant urban areas. Through Tummala-Narras multicultural resilience framework, this paper concludes three dimensions of resilience employed by ethnic minority individualsresilience as active capital accumulation, resilience as hope and empowerment, and resilience as social supportand finds that to ensure well-being in the Chinese context, individuals most likely find resilience from their personal abilities and interactions with mainstream culture, while downplaying the role of community and family support. In the future, cross-sectional, periodic, and longitudinal data can be introduced to the topic as waves of cultural, economic, and policy shifts engender different experiences for each cohort generation and the diverse pool of ethnic minority students. Considering the fluidity and context-dependent nature of resilience, future studies could probe into how resilience functions in multicultural workspaces post-college and how identities concerning race and ethnicity shape economic relations.

Association between spinopelvic alignment and the development of degenerative spondylolisthesis: a systematic review and meta-analysis.

Spinopelvic parameter may result in the development of degenerative spondylolisthesis. However, previous studies show conflicting results; some found a significant relationship of some of these parameters with degenerative spondylolisthesis, while others did not. Previously, there was no meta-analysis regarding the association between spinopelvic alignment and degenerative spondylolisthesis. This meta-analysis aims to determine the association between spinopelvic alignment and degenerative spondylolisthesis. Systematic reviews and meta-analyses are based on the selected item reporting method for systematic review and meta-analysis (PRISMA). A literature search was performed using PubMed, EMBASE, ScienceDirect, Cochrane, and Google Scholar. Methodological quality is based on the cross-sectional checklist of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) quality check methodology and the Newcastle-Ottawa scale (NOS) for cohort studies. Statistical analysis was performed using Rev-Man 5.3. Subgroup analyses were performed based on ethnicity and study design to ascertain racial relations and heterogeneity. A total of 3236 articles were obtained. Of these, we found that pelvic incidence (mean difference [MD] = 11.94 [1.81-22.08], P = 0.02), pelvic tilt (MD = 4.47 [0.81-8.14]), P = 0.02), and age (MD = 11.94 [1.81-22.08], P = 0.02)were associated with the developmentofdegenerative spondylolisthesis. This meta-analysis proves that pelvic incidence, pelvic tilt, and age are associated with degenerative spondylolisthesis.

Transculturality, Anti‐Asian Racism and Student Mobility: A Case Study of Chinese International Student Experiences during the COVID‐19 Pandemic1

The breakout and spread of the SARS‐COV‐2/COVID‐19 virus in early 2020 caused a drastic increase in blatant racism and microaggressions against Asians/people of Asian descent. The rise of anti‐Asian racism can be viewed as a repeat of a century‐long narrative of Yellow Peril against Asian newcomers in western societies. While some reports/studies explained the phenomenon with the hegemony of race relations, it is imperative to examine the experiences of anti‐Asian racism in the context of the fast‐changing geopolitical economy and transcultural relations. Using the conceptual frameworks of Intellectual Migration and transculturalism, this study examines how the rise of anti‐Asian racism during the COVID‐19 pandemic affected Chinese international students in Nova Scotia and if their experience of racialization was critical enough to change their post‐graduation plan of staying in Canada or not. In order to provide an overview of international student experiences in Nova Scotia and to assess the significance of ethnicity and racism as factors in student mobility, we analyzed the data from two research projects. First, survey and individual interview data from the IM (Intellectual Migration) Halifax project provided detailed insights on Chinese international students' study and living experiences during the pandemic and their post‐graduation plans. Second, survey and focus group data from the NSIS (Nova Scotia International Students) project allowed a comparison of pandemic experiences between Chinese and other international students in the province of Nova Scotia. This case study aimed to examine the experiences of racialization among Chinese international students in Nova Scotia and assess the extent to which their post‐graduation mobility is shaped by racialization.