Tag Archives: Race

Letter of Support to Parents and Loved Ones of Wake Forest Students

Although the university’s response to threatening emails sent to 7 individual faculty and staff associated with the sociology department and 5 other units on campus was slow, the response of our department was not. In addition to the email noted in my previous post, drafted by our department chair Joseph Soares, our newest faculty member,ContinueContinue reading “Letter of Support to Parents and Loved Ones of Wake Forest Students”

Sociology Department Response to Hostile Emails Sent to Wake Forest Faculty and Staff

My academic home, Wake Forest University, is not innocent of the open and blatant racism of the past or the more hidden and subtle racism of the present. Many on campus, including members of my home department (sociology), have pressed for the university to address this. Recently, Wake Forest became the target of open andContinueContinue reading “Sociology Department Response to Hostile Emails Sent to Wake Forest Faculty and Staff”

Historical Background to the Internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII

Having discussed my “discovery” of the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II, in this post I offer some historical background to the internment, based on my reading of scholarly studies which I note as I go along. To contemporary sensibilities, the evacuation and detention of  Americans of Japanese ancestry during World War II seemsContinueContinue reading “Historical Background to the Internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII”

What We Talk About When We Talk About Racism, Post-Ferguson Reflections on the Need for Basic Distinctions

Discussions of race, more often than not in my experience, generate more heat than light. I learned this early on in my own education when I was doing the research for my book, Student Movements for Multiculturalism: Challenging the Curricular Color Line in Higher Education. Anger, frustration, hurt, misunderstanding, and other emotions were abundant onContinueContinue reading “What We Talk About When We Talk About Racism, Post-Ferguson Reflections on the Need for Basic Distinctions”

Poverty and Racial Attitudes

One of the most significant books I read as an undergraduate was Racial Attitudes in America: Trends and Interpretations, by sociologists Howard Schuman, Charlotte Steeh, and Lawrence Bobo (1985). (A revised edition was published in 1998 by Harvard University Press.) In fact, my first ever academic conference presentation (at the Western Anthropology/Sociology Undergraduate Research Conference atContinueContinue reading “Poverty and Racial Attitudes”

Implications of Initial Foray into the Guns and Crime Research

Although part of me thinks it is hopeless to think that either side in the debate over whether more guns leads to more crime or less crime will yield any ground to the other, as an outsider I see some possible common ground in the scholarship. If I had to come to a conclusion basedContinueContinue reading “Implications of Initial Foray into the Guns and Crime Research”

What White People DON’T Like

I blogged earlier about the ever-more famous “What White People Like” blog. The popularity of the blog (and the impending book based on the same idea) has created considerable discussion/debate. Is the site a critique of Whiteness or a veiled celebration of it? Among the more entertaining (to me) and pointed comments is from theContinueContinue reading “What White People DON’T Like”

Stuff White People Like

I came across this site recently: Stuff White People Like. It is HILARIOUS. Just as an example, here is an excerpt from #91 San Francisco (close to my heart being from the Bay Area): Much in the way that white people in Brooklyn feel a strong and unfounded connection with The Notorious BIG, white peopleContinueContinue reading “Stuff White People Like”