White Identities

Steve Garner, Simon Clarke

Description

This book guides students as they explore how white identities are forged using both sociological and psycho-social ideas.



Whiteness has traditionally been seen as 'ethnically transparent' - the marker against which other ethnicities are measured. Only recently have scholars moved away from focusing on ethnic minorities and instead oriented their studies around the construction of white identities.



Including an excellent survey of the existing literature and original research from the UK, this book will be an invaluable guide for sociology students taking modules in race and ethnicity.
1. Researching 'Whiteness': An Introduction

2. Whiteness Studies in the Context of the USA

3. Empirical research into white racialised identities in Britain

4. Britishness

5. Whiteness and Post-Imperial Britain

6. Psycho-Social Interpretations of Cultural Identity: constructing the white 'we'

7. Media Representations: constructing the 'not white' Other

8. Whiteness, Home and Community

9. Researching Whiteness: Psycho-Social Methodologies

10. Conclusions

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Sujets

• Ethnic Studies
• Social Science
• Sociologie, société et politique
• Sociology
• General officer
• General

Informations

• Publié par: Pluto Press
• Date de parution: 06 novembre 2009
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781849643870
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

White Identities

White Identities A Critical Sociological Approach

SIMON CLARKE and STEVE GARNER

First published 2010 by Pluto Press 345 Archway Road, London N6 5AA and 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010

www.plutobooks.com

Distributed in the United States of America exclusively by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010

Copyright © Simon Clarke and Steve Garner 2010

The right of Simon Clarke and Steve Garner to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN ISBN

978 0 7453 2749 5 978 0 7453 2748 8

Hardback Paperback

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data applied for

This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental standards of the country of origin.

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Designed and produced for Pluto Press by Chase Publishing Services Ltd, 33 Livonia Road, Sidmouth, EX10 9JB England Typeset from disk by Stanford DTP Services, Northampton Printed and bound in the European Union by CPI Antony Rowe, Chippenham and Eastbourne

CONTENTS

Acknowledgements

 1 Researching ‘Whiteness’: An Introduction  2 Whiteness Studies in the Context of the USA  3 Empirical Research into White Racialised Identities in Britain  4 Britishness  5 Whiteness and PostImperial Britain  6 PsychoSocial Interpretations of Cultural Identity: Constructing the White ‘We’  7 Media Representations: Constructing the ‘Not White’ Other  8 Whiteness, Home and Community  9 Researching Whiteness: PsychoSocial Methodologies 10 Conclusion

Notes References Index

v

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1 15

37 60 85

110

133 153

176 200

212 218 237

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We would like to thank and acknowledge the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) for its support in funding the empirical research that this book is based on (Project: RES148 25003). We would also like to thank Professor Margie Wetherell, director of the ESRC ‘Identities and Social Action’ programme and the project administrator, Kerry Carter, at the Open University. Thanks to all the colleagues on that programme who encouraged us and shared insights, and to the people who have given us constructive feedback on the various presentations of our findings that we have made. Invaluable support was given by colleagues at the Centre for PsychoSocial Studies at the University of the West of England and in particular by Julia Long, and then Glynis Morrish, who kept us organised throughout the project. We would also like to thank everyone at Pluto Books for their time and patience. Rosie Gilmour played a huge role as research associate in this project, organising interviews and painstakingly transcribing them. Steve would also like to acknowledge the support his family has given throughout the project, and especially during the last few months of writing. Finally we would like to thank the most important set of people – the people who we interviewed, who shared their life stories with us and welcomed us into their homes. Throughout the book, the names of all our interviewees quoted or referred to have been changed.

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1 RESEARCHING ‘WHITENESS’: AN INTRODUCTION

This book is an exploration of sociological and psychosocial theories of the construction of whiteness visàvis perceptions and imaginings of otherness. It has three main aims. First, to introduce the reader to the history and theoretical unfolding of contemporary studies of whiteness in North America and Europe. Second, to explore the structural facilitating factors of these constructions, through such institutions as the state and the media. Finally, the book synthesises a psychosocial perspective to look at the underlying mechanisms which fuel social exclusion and inclusion in society. Theory is never separated from practice and the book makes full use of empirical examples from the authors’ own research and secondary examples. We also discuss the theoretical problems and methodological dilemmas in this field of research in a journey that takes the reader from the social construction of whiteness to the psychological othering of marginalised groups in society. This book aims to provide the reader with an indepth analysis of the construction of white identity, or ‘whiteness’, in the British context through the exploration of sociological and psychosocial ideas which the authors synthesise to provide a fuller picture of the social and psychological construction of identity. Whiteness, as a form of ethnicity, is rarely acknowledged by its bearers, yet it has significant ramifications in terms of the construction of ‘other’ identities; in the creation of community; in processes of exclusion and inclusion; and discourses around ‘race’ and nation. We start from the perspective that what we are researching is specific to a time and a place. The paradigm developed from

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