Race, Racism, and Resistance (410-0-20)
Topic
Theories of Race & Ethnicity
Instructors
Laura Nielsen
Legal Studies: 620 Lincoln St #204, Sociology: 1808 Chicago Ave # 209
Laura Beth Nielsen, JD, PhD is Professor of Sociology and Director of Legal Studies at Northwestern University as well as Research Professor at the American Bar Foundation. Her interests are in the study of law and inequality with a focus on race, gender, sexual orientation and other systems of unearned privilege. She studies legal consciousness – how ordinary people understand, invoke, and fail to invoke the law.
Meeting Info
Parkes Hall 222: Tues 2:00PM - 4:50PM
Overview of class
For years we have understood that race is, biologically speaking, an exceedingly complex matter and that preconceived biases much more than biology govern the way people think about race. In this course, we will discuss both the biological myth and social reality of race. Specifically, this course provides an overview of the prominent theories/theorists of race and ethnicity, and is concerned with: 1) Understanding the early science of race used to justify racial classification and thinking, 2) reviewing the theories regarding the nature and persistence of race and ethnicity as meaningful social groupings in society, and 3) explaining the social significance of these group identities (e.g., how they are related to social stratification, social-cultural relations, and the political and economic dynamics in society).
We will begin our review with the origins of the concept race, then move from early perspectives to the present in an aim to understand the influential theories and theorists. As we proceed in our investigation we will continuously ask: 1) What are the key assumptions, propositions and concepts of each theory?, 2) How is the theory located within the larger theoretical tradition? 3) Does this theory agree or disagree with other views in the field? 4) What is the level of empirical support for the theory? 5) To what extent does the theory help to explain contemporary patterns of race and ethnicity across time and space in the United States? and 6) How might one undermine systems of racial inequality if the respective theory is holds?"
Evaluation Method
Participation in Class Discussions; Leading 2-3 Class Discussions; Weekly Short Reaction Papers; and Final Paper worth 50% of grade.
Class Materials (Required)
This course will have required books/other materials.
Bashi, Vilna. 2013. The Ethnic Project: Transforming Racial Fiction into Ethnic Factions. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Bonilla-Silva, Eduardo. 2003. Racism Without Racists: Color-Blind Racism and the Persistence of Racial Inequality in the United States. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield.
DuBois, W.E.B. 1899 (reprint 1996). The Philadelphia Negro: A Social Study. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.
Graves, Jr., Joseph L. 2001. The Emperor's New Clothes: Biological Theories of Race at the Millennium. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
Harris, Angel L. 2011. Kids Don't Want to Fail: Oppositional Culture and the Black-White Achievement Gap. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Lieberson, Stanley. 1980. A Piece of the pie: Blacks and White Immigrants, 1880-1930. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.
Morning, Ann. 2011. The Nature of Race: How Scientists Think and Teach about Human Difference. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Oliver, Melvin and Thomas Shapiro. 1995. Black Wealth, White Wealth: A New Perspective on Racial Inequality. New York: Routledge
Omi, Michael and Howard Winant. 1994. Racial Formation in the United States: From the
1960s to the 1990s. 2nd edition. New York: Routledge.
Roberts, Dorothy. 2011. Fatal Invention: How Science, Politics and Big Business Re-Create Race in the Twenty -First Century. New York: The New Press.
Royster, Deirdre A. 2003. Race and The Invisible Hand: How White Networks Exclude Black Men from Blue-Collar Jobs. University of California Press.
Stewart, Quincy Thomas. 2023. Race in the Machine: A Novel Account. Stanford, CA: Redwood Press.
Wilson, W.J. 1978. The Declining Significance of Race: Blacks and Changing American
Institutions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Class Attributes
Permission of department
Enrollment Requirements
Enrollment Requirements: Sociology/MORS PhD Students
Add Consent: Department Consent Required