Journal article
Against Teleology in the Study of Race: Toward the Abolition of the Progress Paradigm
Sociological Theory, Vol.36(4), pp.315-342
12/19/2018
DOI: 10.1177/0735275118813614
Abstract
We argue that claims of racial progress rest upon untenable teleological assumptions founded in Enlightenment discourse. We examine the theoretical and methodological focus on progress and its historical roots. We argue research should examine the concrete mechanisms that produce racial stability and change, and we offer three alternative frameworks for interpreting longitudinal racial data and phenomena. The first sees racism as a " fundamental cause, " arguing that race remains a " master category " of social differentiation. The second builds on Glenn's " settler colonialism as structure " framework to describe race relations as a mutually constituted and place-based system of resource allocation. The third framework draws attention to racialized agency. Racism is like a Cadillac; they bring out a new model every year. —Malcolm X (quoted in Lipsitz 1998:183) We have not ended racial caste in America; we have merely redesigned it. —Alexander (2012:2) Many sociologists marvel at the ways in which the world changes. I marvel at how it stays the same. —Bourdieu (cited in Khan 2012:81)
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- Against Teleology in the Study of Race: Toward the Abolition of the Progress Paradigm
- Creators
- Louise Seamster - University of Tennessee at KnoxvilleVictor Ray - University of Tennessee at Knoxville
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Publication Details
- Sociological Theory, Vol.36(4), pp.315-342
- DOI
- 10.1177/0735275118813614
- ISSN
- 0735-2751
- eISSN
- 1467-9558
- Language
- English
- Date published
- 12/19/2018
- Academic Unit
- African American Studies; Sociology and Criminology; Law Faculty
- Record Identifier
- 9984196442902771
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