Intergenerational Inferiority: Whites's Construction of Latinos as a Race
Although a rich body of work addresses the Latino experience of race and ethnicity, most of it is historical, quantitative, and measures discrimination only through Latinos’ own accounts. This study examines contemporary Latino racialization by focusing on white attitudes toward Latinos. As the country’s diversity increases and more areas of the country become majority minority, questions of race relations and stratification arise. This study draws on 40 in-depth interviews with whites from Orange County, California. The findings show that this group of white Americans holds overwhelmingly negative and racist views toward Latinos. They believe not only that Latino culture is deficient and inferior but also that Latino characteristics are permanent. Moreover, they explicitly ascribe these problems to the group as a whole regardless of national origin, citizenship status, or generation. The interviews reflect the justification whites create to construct Latinos as a racial group, that include characterizing them as inherently lawless, culturally deficient, undeserving, and unwilling to assimilate. In doing so they reveal a comprehensive racial ideology toward Latinos that I call “intergenerational inferiority.” This study also addresses the important implications of this racial ideology, particularly the opportunity to expand theoretical notions of racism that account for different groups’ experiences in the United States.
"Intergenerational Inferiority:Whites's Construction of Latinos as a Race" Social Problems ( In Review)
Although a rich body of work addresses the Latino experience of race and ethnicity, most of it is historical, quantitative, and measures discrimination only through Latinos’ own accounts. This study examines contemporary Latino racialization by focusing on white attitudes toward Latinos. As the country’s diversity increases and more areas of the country become majority minority, questions of race relations and stratification arise. This study draws on 40 in-depth interviews with whites from Orange County, California. The findings show that this group of white Americans holds overwhelmingly negative and racist views toward Latinos. They believe not only that Latino culture is deficient and inferior but also that Latino characteristics are permanent. Moreover, they explicitly ascribe these problems to the group as a whole regardless of national origin, citizenship status, or generation. The interviews reflect the justification whites create to construct Latinos as a racial group, that include characterizing them as inherently lawless, culturally deficient, undeserving, and unwilling to assimilate. In doing so they reveal a comprehensive racial ideology toward Latinos that I call “intergenerational inferiority.” This study also addresses the important implications of this racial ideology, particularly the opportunity to expand theoretical notions of racism that account for different groups’ experiences in the United States.
"Intergenerational Inferiority:Whites's Construction of Latinos as a Race" Social Problems ( In Review)
