Exploring the nuances of race and racialization in the United States

This week in North Philly Notes, Diana Pan, author of Incidental Racialization writes about race, inequality, and professional socialization of Asian Americans and Latinos in law school.

Mention “race” in a conversation, and two things often come to mind: the history and current social experiences of black Americans, and the image of poor, urban communities. With regard to the first imagery, common topics might include the black Civil Rights Movement (there were in fact, other race-based civil rights movements as well), residential segregation, Black Lives Matter, and a host of topics perhaps learned in high school classrooms, or gleaned from mainstream media. Rarely do we consider how race matters for nonwhite racialized groups whose histories are not represented in standard curricula, and who are rendered invisible in conversations about race in America. Further, many Americans assume that if nonwhite individuals enter mainstream professions and interact with more white Americans, race would no longer be a heightened concern. The experiences of nonwhite Americans, across the socioeconomic spectrum, do not support this assumption.

Incidental Racialization engages the nuances of race and racialization in the United States. The purpose of this book is to:

• explore how race matters in professional socialization
• give voice to those racialized groups – Asian Americans and Latinos – who are often underrepresented in discourse on racial inequality
• complicate understandings of inequalities that are sustained among elites.

I contend that we, as a society, cannot truly understand inequalities if we do not interrogate how they differ within and between social strata. Studying “up” (i.e. elites) then provides an opportunity to disrupt the “one size fits all” trope of economic success diminishing racial inequality. It also permits a lens to understand the various ways that racialization happens alongside professional socialization.

Perhaps not surprising, but certainly revealing, law school rank appears to influence how students talk about their racialized experiences. While students at the two law schools studied shared stories of race-based discrimination, or race-based interactions, the rhetoric used was different. For example, students from the lower-ranked law school frequently recount particular discrete treatment that made them feel like second class citizens or racial “others.” Yet, these lower-tier law students provide excuses for this same treatment. In a way, they appeared to rationalize race-based experiences in law school. This differed from the narrative provided by students at the elite law school. They were more affirmative about race-based discrimination, and recounted their experiences in the context of institutionalized cultures and norms. Privilege, in the relative prestige of the law school attended, seems to equip nonwhite law students with stratified language to convey and navigate their own racialization.

Studying social inequalities can take many forms, and Incidental Racialization demonstrates just one axis of intersection. The next step is to understand how racialization translates into the world of work. In other words, how does race matter for lawyers? In what ways is racialization sustained? And, what are the implications? Perhaps of note are the findings in a recently released report, A Portrait of Asian Americans in the Law, that while Asian Americans are the largest nonwhite group in major law firms, they have the highest attrition rates, and attain partnership at the lowest rate. There is a clear leak in the pipeline, and the question begs: how might racialization be a part of the problem?

Tricia Wachtendorf at Resilient Calgary

This week in North Philly Notes, as the film Dunkirk opens, we post a video presentation by American Dunkirk coauthor Tricia Wachtendorf.

On May 16, American Dunkirk coauthor Tricia Wachtendorf, participated in Resilient Calgary, a public event to showcase cutting edge research on disasters and community resilience. Invited by the Center for Community Disaster Research at Canada’s Mount Royal University, Wachtendorf’s presentation took the audience through consideration of the importance of improvisation alongside disaster planning, highlighting the tremendous success of the 9/11 boat evacuation of almost a half million people.

 

Reflections on the 2016 Library Publishing Forum

This week in North Philly Notes,  we re-post an article from the Journal of Librarianship and Scholarly Communication by Temple University Press’ editorial assistant and rights and contracts coordinator,  Nikki Miller.

As one of two recipients of the first annual AAUP-LPC Cross Pollination Grant, I had the
opportunity to attend the 2016 Library Publishing Forum and the OER Pre-Conference
in Denton, TX. As this was my first time interacting with library voices on the subject of
library publishing, and as I am a relative newcomer to the publishing industry, I was worried that my inexperience in library publishing and library and press collaboration would hinder my experience—and my impact—at the Forum. I was afraid I would appear an amateur and feel that I did not belong. However, I quickly learned that the LPC’s goal isn’t all that different from ours at Temple University Press, and that of other academic publishers. The LPC’s mission statement reads:

The Library Publishing Coalition promotes the development of innovative, sustainable publishing services in academic and research libraries to support scholars as they create, advance, and disseminate knowledge.

The similarities appear in the support for scholars to create, advance, and disseminate
knowledge, and this goal was a constant refrain throughout the conference. My fears
proved baseless. Even as someone with very little previous knowledge about open access, I never felt like an outsider; I was welcomed and included into the group, and so many were eager to explain the goals of the Library Publishing Coalition and their respective institutions’ open access platforms and goals. By the time I left Texas, I collected an array of knowledge about library publishing, open access, the relationship between the two, and the relationship between them and university presses. I also gathered general takeaways that perhaps impacted me more. Those takeaways are shared below.

INCLUSIVITY

Not surprisingly, an intense sense of community and collaboration was prevalent
throughout the weekend. Panels were preceded with chatter among the audience members and followed with discussion between panelists and attendees. In fact, one of the plenary sessions, “Librarian Engagement and Social Justice in Publishing”, focused on the diversity of the field and what we can do to have a wider and more diverse community.

Not only was community discussed within library publishing, but it was also apparent
that community is encouraged between librarians and publishers. As we checked in
to registration, we were given an option of choosing one of two tote bags: one labeled
“pubrarian,” and the other labeled “liblisher”. I welcomed this as a strong symbol of
community and collaboration between university press publishers and library publishers, as it suggests that there is already unity between the two. Right from the beginning, I felt included as an outsider to library publishing. Many times throughout the conference, LPC members approached me for discussion and the social events were packed with conversation. I felt included in every aspect of the experience and was pleasantly surprised by how many people I met and with whom I developed working relationships.

SUSPENSE

A lot of discussion surrounded the topic of sustainability and how to ensure open access
products will remain self-sustaining. Not only is there a question of how to make publishing platforms financially self-sustaining, but also how to ensure the longevity of the scholarship published. The latter, I think, is the reason for an unknown future in open access. No one at the conference had an answer as to the future of open access, which left us in a state of suspense—just like any movie, this suspense is exciting. Publishing is in a state of transformation, and the effect open access will have in the future is not certain. Academia is going to experience the effects of open access as it continues to increase in popularity and gains credibility. This state of growth allows for collaboration and experimentation by a wide range of participants. It was reassuring to learn that I was not alone in being unsure of the future of open access and the effect it will—or will not—have on academia and traditional academic publishers. Many conversations are happening within the field and I am excited to participate in them, specifically between an institution’s library and its home press.

OVERALL

Not only did I leave Texas with a much better understanding of open access, but I also left with validation that I belonged at the conference as a voice from a university press. I felt that I had gained the network and tools that would allow me to facilitate further collaboration between the LPC and AAUP, which is a goal of the Cross-Pollination Grant. I believe that it has made me much better equipped to collaborate with our own library, and it affirmed my choice of a career. Overall, my attendance at the LPC taught me much more than the ins-and-outs of open access. With it, I gained confidence, validation, and affirmation that will continue to resonate with me as I continue my career in academic publishing.

On the Future of Animals

This week in North Philly Notes, Wayne Gabardi, author of The Next Social Contract, argues that we need to adopt a more post-humanist and co-evolutionary outlook and relate to animals on more equal terms.

Like many people, I’ve been an animal lover my entire life. Yet it’s one thing to be involved with animals in a conventional sense and another to systematically research and reflect on how we understand other species of life, relate to them, and treat them. The academic field of animal studies and the animal advocacy movement have grown dramatically in the past few decades. This is due to the tragic plight of so many animals around the world today as well as to major advances in animal research and our knowledge of animals.

When I set out to write The Next Social Contract my goals were ambitious:

• To develop a big picture approach to understanding animals;
• To expand the scope of animal studies and focus on a broader range of human-animal relationships;
• To devel
  op an ethical framework and political theory of how we should relate to and treat animals that goes beyond the animal welfare-animal rights debate; and
• To explore some practical, community-level applications of what I refer to as a posthumanist and coevolutionary ethical-political philosophy.

I believe we have entered a new era in the history of planet Earth and humanity – the Anthropocene, or new human age – where modern civilization is radically altering the biosphere to such an extent that many animals are in big trouble. I identify four major battlegrounds that I believe are defining and will continue to define animal ethics and politics in this century and beyond:

• Wild animals on the fast track to extinction;
• Industrialized farm animals and the future of animal agriculture;
• The crisis of our oceans and ocean life; and
• The status of contact zone animals increasingly moving into human-occupied habitats.

One trend I discovered in my research is that most people relate to and evaluate animals through an anthropocentric mindset, even strong animal welfare and animal rights advocates. The worthiness of animals are measured in human terms in relation to our attributes and capacities. The more human-like animals behave the more we value them. This is a major flaw in my view. We need to adopt a more posthumanist and coevolutionary outlook and relate to animals on more equal terms. Although they are different from us in many ways, they are also the same as us in many ways, and deserving of equal consideration as integral members of our community. We therefore need to negotiate a new social contract in human-animal relations. At the heart of this new compact is a rejection of the outdated belief that humans are categorically different from and superior to all other species of life and that this entitles us to use animals as instrumental means for our ends. We need to think of animals as members of our communities who we need to coexist with, not as fashionable accessories, alien invaders, objects of consumption, or less-than-human impediments to our unending colonial expansion.

As for the future of animals, I unfortunately am as pessimistic as I am hopeful. The modernization and human colonization of the planet will only intensify in the twenty-first century. As I conclude in the book, “the task before us is nothing less than a labor of Sisyphus.”