Racial Assimilation

This article argues that blacks should reject integration on self-protective and solidarity grounds. It distinguishes two aspects of black devaluation: a ‘stigmatization’ aspect that has to do with the fact that blacks are subject to various forms of discrimination, and an aesthetic aspect (‘phenotypic devaluation’) that concerns the aesthetic devaluation of characteristically black phenotypic traits. It identifies four self-worth harms that integration may inflict, and suggests that these may outweigh the benefits of integration. Further, it argues that, while the integrating (...) process may reduce stigmatization, there is less reason to think that it can do the same for phenotypic devaluation. (shrink)

In “Racial Integration and the Problem of Relational Devaluation,” I argue that blacks should reject racial integration on self-protective and solidarity grounds. Integration will intensify the self-worth harms of stigmatization and phenotypic devaluation by leading blacks to more fully internalize their devaluation, and while the integrating process itself might reduce the former, it may well leave in place the latter. In this paper, I reply to the challenges to these arguments presented by Sharon Stanley, Andrew Valls, Elvira Basevich, Michael Merry, (...) and Ronald Sundstrom. (shrink)

I am broadly sympathetic to Dale Matthew’s analysis concerning phenotypic devaluation and disadvantage. However, in what follows, I restrict my remarks to a few areas where I think he either lacks empirical precision, or overstates his case.

Brexit and the COVID-19 pandemic are two recent crises whose combined effects exacerbated the exclusion of irregular migrants in Europe. In this thesis, I will explore the structure-agency linkages that shaped the everyday survival strategies of irregular Filipino migrants (IFMs) in navigating a post-Brexit, mid-pandemic UK. Using Sandro Mezzadra and Brett Neilson’s frameworks of political-civil society, differential inclusion, and internal borders, I examine how IFMs exercised their agency against the “formal” rules of the state as well as the “informal” rules (...) set by fellow social actors. The themes that emerged from the analysis underscored the long-debated sociological tensions between structure and agency. Among these, the most recurring one is that IFMs’ agency were expanded or delimited by their positionality vis-à-vis various social actors such as employers, landlords, co-tenants, “benevolent” individuals, and immigration middlemen. This necessitates further studies that could link these micro-level structurations to the broader epistemic shifts within Europe’s migration governance framework. (shrink)

"What are you?" This question, whether explicitly raised by another or implied in his gaze, is one with which many persons perceived to be racially ambiguous struggle. This article centers on encounters with this question. Its aim is twofold: first, to describe the phenomenology of a particular type of racializing encounter, one in which one of the parties is perceived to be racially ambiguous; second, to investigate how these often alienating encounters can be better negotiated. In the course of this (...) investigation, this article examines the addressee's point of view and consider possible responses to the other's question. In addition, it discusses the addresser's perspective, both to probe the curiosity underlying the "What are you?" question and to explore alternatives to it. By describing the phenomenology of these encounters, this article hopes to show that racial ambiguity, as distinct from mixed-race, is a category of lived experience that calls for deeper philosophical scrutiny. (shrink)