Perceptions of African American College Applicants: The Roles of Race, Criminal History, and Qualifications

African Americans are under-represented in higher education and disproportionately represented among offender populations, with poor educational obtainment a risk factor for criminal behavior. While African American students report low acceptance from Caucasian peers that can influence their educational persistence, few studies have examined Caucasian students’ perceptions of African American students, while examining the influence of race and criminal history. This study endeavored to begin to fill this gap. Students evaluated 1 of 24 hypothetical college applicants, manipulated by race, arrest record, and academic qualifications. Results showed that hypothetical Caucasian applicants benefited from no criminal record when evaluated by Caucasian students, and received higher ratings than Caucasian applicants with a drug arrest record and African American applicants with any criminal record. When evaluated by Caucasian students, African American applicants with no criminal record were no more likely to be accepted than Caucasian or African American applicants with a criminal record. In addition, Caucasian students felt more comfortable around the Caucasian applicant with a DWI arrest over the African American applicant with the same arrest. Racial preference for Caucasian applicants by Caucasian participants also emerged when qualifications were mixed (e.g., low GPA/high ACT). These racial differences did not emerge when ethnic minority students rated these same applicants. Yet, when Caucasian students were asked why they chose their ratings, race was never mentioned. These results support research that African American students can experience race-based barriers in higher education by Caucasian peers, but in a form that is less overt and not readily acknowledged.     

Latino Crime and Latinos in the Criminal Justice System: Trends,Policy Implications,and Future Research Initiatives

With exponential growth in the Latino population over the past decade, both social scientists and politicians have directed their attention toward understanding Latino behavior(s) ranging from purchasing power and marketing to voting. Less is known, however, about the extent to which Latino population growth might be associated with patterns of criminal justice or violent criminal outcomes. One objective of this research is to provide a contemporary overview of the Latino experiences with the criminal justice system by highlighting racial/ethnic disparities in incarceration and sentencing. Using racial-/ethnic-specific homicide victimization data provided by the Centers for Disease Control, we also examine the impact of Latino concentration on levels of group-specific homicide, both regionally and nationally. Results from our negative binomial multivariate analyses indicate that the concentration of Latinos tends to be associated with lower levels of homicide victimization, a finding that holds across racial/ethnic groups and geographic specification. We conclude with a discussion of the implications of these findings with an eye toward future research in this area.     

The Role of Racial Microaggressions,Stress, and Acculturation in Understanding Latino Health Outcomes in the USA

A growing body of literature demonstrates important negative health effects from racial microaggressions for racial/ethnic minorities. However, at present, the bulk of the literature is focused on the case of black Americans with relatively little attention as to how this may play out for other racial/ethnic groups. Here, we examine the association of health and racial microaggressions in the case of Latinos. Furthermore, we disaggregate Latinos by language preference in order to see how acculturation to the USA may moderate the effect of racial microaggressions on health outcomes for the group. In a statistical analysis of the 2004 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, we examine the association between stress from racial microaggressions and self-rated health for Latinos of different levels of linguistic acculturation. We find that more acculturated Latinos (measured in terms of language preference) are more likely to experience physical stress from perceived racial microaggressions after accounting for social and demographic factors. Further, this stress is linked to overall poorer self-rated health for the group. However, we find no such association for less acculturated, Spanish-preference Latinos.     

中国族群研究:缘起、成就及问题

本文从缘起、成就及问题三方面对中国族群研究进行了学术梳理和论述.首先,作者回顾了1990年代"族群"(ethnic group)概念及相关理论进入中国内地学术界的背景及历程;其次,对中国族群研究取得的成就进行了评述;曩后,对中国族群研究存在的问题进行了探讨.     

Race,ethnicity, young people and offending: the elephant in the room

ABSTRACT

Can we start to say Race again when discussing youth and justice? This demand emerges from the findings of the participatory action research reported in this article. Fifty young people, in custody or in contact with youth offending teams (YOT), discussed the support that would enable them to desist from offending behaviour. Race was a prism through which they saw their experience. Rather than naming racism, family appeared to be a covert, legitimate, way of talking about identity, solidarity and difference. Family ties, overlaid with experiences of race and racism, could be reasons for engaging in behaviour that was seen as criminal. Family, overlaid with ethnicity, could become a source of support to enable young people to cope with the challenges of being involved in and desisting from offending behaviour. At a time where policy and political language has shifted from rac(ism) to a culturalist discourse focused on ethnicity or religion, naming Race and racism remains vital. Only by acknowledging the differentiating power of Racism can the experience of young people in contact with YOT be understood. Only by appreciating the value of shared experience of race (within families and communities) can appropriate pathways towards alternative futures be offered.     

Residential Segregation,Health, and Health Care: Answering the Latino Question

The literature on the relationship between residential segregation and health outcomes for African Americans is well developed, but less is known about this association for Latinos in the USA. The literature for Latinos is limited, demonstrates mixed results, and suffers from data limitations. Using geographic concentration of poverty theory, we analyze the impact of Latino segregation on a series of health and health-care outcomes in order to better establish this relationship. This study uses data from the 2011 to 2012 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System nested within metropolitan area-level data in a set of partial proportional odds and binary logistic multilevel regression models. We examine the relationship between Latino segregation and three health and health-care outcomes for 164 metropolitan areas in the USA. Overall, we find that Latino segregation is negatively related to good self-rated health, having a personal physician, and having health insurance for Latino respondents. Furthermore, for White respondents, no such association exists. As a result, residential segregation for Latinos contributes to the Latino–White health gap.     

Conflict, Consensus, and Coalition: Economic and Workforce Development Strategies for African Americans and Latinos

Any work toward racial equity in America will need to include strengthening the black–Latino coalition. While there are political and social tensions between these groups, much of the underlying issue involves real and perceived perceptions of economic competition, particularly the notion that immigrant Latinos undercut African American wages. We note that there is some evidence that immigrants pull down incomes of US-born unskilled workers—both black and Latino. We argue, however, that highly restrictive immigration policy will have minimal effects and erode collective political power; a superior alternative is working together to reduce high school dropout rates, raise the minimum wage, reintegrate ex-offenders, rigorously enforce antidiscrimination law, promote comprehensive immigration reform, and pursue community development. Such an analysis is gaining ground in grassroots efforts to build trust and forge policy coalitions between Latinos and African Americans.     

Measurement of Race and Ethnicity in a Changing, Multicultural America

It is well accepted that concepts of race, ethnicity, and ancestry are changing constructs that reflect the social, economic, and political climate of the times. Studying the history of the collection of data on race, place of birth, Hispanic origin, and ancestry in US decennial censuses provides a better understanding of the race and ethnic concepts currently in use for official federal statistics. This history can help guide the evolution of these concepts for research on alternative measurement approaches, future censuses, and future statistics. The purpose of this paper is threefold. The first objective is to provide a historical overview of race and ethnic measurement in US decennial censuses. The second and third objectives are to present Census Bureau plans to experiment with alternative approaches to measuring race and ethnicity in the 2010 Census and to discuss race and ethnic measurement issues for future decennial censuses.     

Phenotypic Variations in Violence Involvement: Results from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health

Numerous studies suggest that our society is stratified not only by race and class, but also by phenotypic characteristics. The main objective of the present investigation was, using the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, to elucidate the link between phenotype and violence involvement. Two outcomes were examined: being a perpetrator of violence and criminal justice system contact. Cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses were conducted on Asian, black and Hispanic respondents and as well as on the subsample of siblings. Independent variables included phenotype, socioeconomic status, other family, peer and neighborhood effects. Notwithstanding a certain degree of heterogeneity of outcomes across race–ethnicity, the results indicate a negative relationship between proximity to the European phenotype and the likelihood of violence involvement. In other words, the darker one’s complexion, eye and hair color, the higher the likelihood of violence involvement.     

"台湾村":一个移民村落的想像、构建与认同--河南邓州高山族村落田野调查报告

根据第五次全国人口普查资料,18.61%的大陆高山族人口聚居在河南省邓州市。作为一个移民群体,邓州的高山族在近三百年的落籍垦邓期间经历了一个“闽营化”、“邓州化”乃至“大陆化”的多重本地化过程。这样一个深具涵化意义的历史过程使得邓州高山族在风俗习惯、宗教信仰等诸多方面日渐迷失民族的文化表征。它在1983年以来的族群性重建,又验证了一个弱势移民群体经由想像、认同而得以重新构建的图式。     

Gendered Black Exclusion: The Persistence of Racial Stereotypes Among Daters

Employing questionnaires of 381 college students, this study examines the reasons why Latinos, Asians, and whites choose to include or exclude blacks as potential dates. First, we find that past structural explanations for low rates of interracial intimacy explain current disparities less among young people today. Only 10 % of respondents cited a structural explanation, lack of familiarity, or contact, as the reason they excluded blacks as possible dates. Second, the reasons for black exclusion vary across racial–ethnic–gender groups. Among non-blacks, whites were the most open to dating blacks, followed by Latinos and Asians. Asians and Latinos were more likely to exclude blacks because of social disapproval, and whites were more likely to exclude blacks because of physical attraction. Black women were more highly excluded than black men and more excluded because of their perceived aggressive personalities or behavior and physical attraction. Black men were more excluded because of social disapproval. Thus, persistent racial ideology continues to drive the social distance between blacks and non-blacks, particularly toward black females.     

The Joint Effects of Offender Race/Ethnicity and Sex on Sentence Length Decisions in Federal Courts

The current study examined the main and interactive effects of offender race/ethnicity and sex on sentence length decisions for drug offenders convicted in three federal courts located in Iowa, Minnesota, and Nebraska. The additive model showed that females received shorter prison sentences than similarly situated male offenders, but there were no differences between white offenders and minority offenders. However, when the data were partitioned by sex, black males were found to receive lengthier prison terms than white males. There were no differences between white males and Hispanic males, and white females were treated no differently than either black or Hispanic females. Moreover, when the data were partitioned by race/ethnicity, white females were treated no differently than white males. However, black females received shorter sentences than black males and Hispanic females received shorter sentences than Hispanic males. Further analyses showed that black and Hispanic males also received longer sentences than white females and that black males received longer sentences than all other offenders (with the exception of Hispanic male offenders). These findings mesh with those gleaned from other sentencing studies, although they are at odds with theoretical notions that leniency at the sentencing stage is reserved only for white women.     

Ethnicity as skill: immigrant employment hierarchies in Norwegian low-wage labour markets

Immigrants are often concentrated in particular, often low-waged, segments of the labour market and employers tend to assume that immigrants posit (soft) skills which make them particularly suited for specific tasks. Less scholarly attention has been given to the real and perceived content of these skills and how employers may shift their view over time. We contribute to the literature by examining changing ethnic employment hierarchies in two immigrant-intensive labour markets in Norway. Drawing on qualitative data from the hotel and fish processing industries, we describe, first, how different ethnic groups are allocated into specific jobs forming a clear hierarchy in the eyes of employers, and, second, how employers’ preferences for particular groups change as new immigrants enter the labour market. Theoretically, we develop the concept of ‘ethnicity as skill’, which points to the tendency among employers to equate ethnic group membership with a set of informal qualifications.     

Nativity and citizenship status affect Latinos’ health insurance coverage under the ACA

ABSTRACT

The 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) aimed to increase health insurance access for the over 47 million uninsured people in the U.S.A., among whom ethnoracial minorities had the highest uninsured rates before the ACA. Studies have shown that Latinos have had the greatest improvements in health coverage under the ACA, but many may be at a significant disadvantage, specifically due to their nativity and immigration status, as the ACA explicitly excludes unauthorised immigrants from most of its provisions. Using the 2015 Latino National Health and Immigration Survey, a nationally representative sample of Latinos (n?=?1493), we find that variation in health insurance access among Latinos can be traced to immigration status. This study finds no differences among U.S.-born versus foreign-born Latinos in the likelihood of being uninsured in 2015. However, among foreign-born Latinos, unauthorised immigrants are five times more likely than naturalised citizens to be uninsured and less likely to visit a primary care provider or clinic, even after controlling for other factors including language, income and education.     

The Impact of Perceived Discrimination and Immigration Policies Upon Perceptions of Quality of Life Among Latinos in the United States

This study examined the impact of enforcement of US immigration policies and perceived discrimination on perceptions of quality of life for Latinos in the US. Data for this study were drawn from the 2007 Pew Hispanic Center survey of 2,000 Latino adults living in the US. Multinomial logistic regressions indicated that participants who had higher levels of perceived discrimination and who were personally affected by US immigration enforcement also perceived the following: (1) life was more difficult now for Latinos than in the past; (2) higher levels of fear of deportation for themselves or a loved one; (3) the lives of Latino children will be worse in the future; and (4) a lower quality of life for themselves. Female participants and participants with more years in the United States, and higher levels of linguistic acculturation generally had fewer issues regarding immigration policies or had a more positive outlook for Latinos in the United States.     

Uncertain aspirations: Latino students and dropout in the United States

ABSTRACT

Latinos are one of the fastest growing and most racially diverse students in American schools. Driven by immigration, they account for more than 24% of the kindergarten to high school population. Despite their numbers, the achievement gap between Latinos and their non-Latino peers remains wide since they have the highest rate of dropout. Using data from the High School Longitudinal Study of 2009, we find that Latino students who attend more than one school during their academic career are more likely to dropout than those who do not. We also find lower rates of dropout among children of parents who stated that they did not have difficulties interacting with school administrators due to language barriers. With regards to migration, we do not find immigrant status to be significant in dropout – a noteworthy effect given the increases in raids and deportation by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement.     

Who has Housing Affordability Problems? Disparities in Housing Cost Burden by Race, Nativity, and Legal Status in Los Angeles

Housing costs are a substantial component of US household expenditures. Those who allocate a large proportion of their income to housing often have to make difficult financial decisions with significant short-term and long-term implications for adults and children. This study employs cross-sectional data from the first wave of the Los Angeles Family and Neighborhood Survey collected between 2000 and 2002 to examine the most common US standard of housing affordability, the likelihood of spending 30 % or more of income on shelter costs. Multivariate analyses of a low-income sample of US-born Latinos, whites, African Americans, authorized Latino immigrants, and unauthorized Latino immigrants focus on baseline and persistent differences in the likelihood of being cost burdened by race, nativity, and legal status. Nearly half or more of each group of low-income respondents experience housing affordability problems. The results suggest that immigrants’ legal status is the primary source of disparities among those examined, with the multivariate analyses revealing large and persistent disparities for unauthorized Latino immigrants relative to most other groups. Moreover, the higher odds of housing cost burden observed for unauthorized immigrants compared with their authorized immigrant counterparts remains substantial, accounting for traditional indicators of immigrant assimilation. These results are consistent with emerging scholarship regarding the role of legal status in shaping immigrant outcomes in the United States.     

How Measurement of Inequalities in Wealth by Race/Ethnicity Impacts Narrative and Policy: Investigating the Full Distribution

In recent decades, analysts and researchers have expanded understanding of economic security by adding wealth to traditional income measures of economic security, documenting substantial and growing inequalities in wealth in the USA that exceed notable income inequalities. Racial disparities in wealth have been well-documented and represent a major barrier to economic equality for communities of color. However, while the racial wealth gap is typically measured at the median due to the substantial skew of the wealth distribution, much remains unknown about racial disparities across the wealth distribution. This study aims to advance analytic discussions about measurement of racial wealth disparities examining recent trends in wealth by race/ethnicity using a more complete view of the wealth distribution. Using the Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF) from 2001 to 2013, results reveal that racial wealth disparities across the distribution are even more widespread than an examination of central tendencies alone can observe. Also, while all households experienced notable wealth declines in recent years during the Great Recession, African American and Latino households across the distribution of wealth were particularly affected. From 2007 to 2013, the 75th percentile of wealth for African Americans and Latinos fell by approximately 50%, while losses for whites at the third quartile were just 15%. Similar differences in impacts of the economic downturn are seen across the distribution. Examination of net worth trends over the period reveals that losses were disproportionally experienced by households of color across the wealth distribution.     

Beyond the ballot box: age-at-arrival,civic institutions and political participation among Latinos

Sociologists mostly treat age-at-arrival as a dichotomous variable whereas economists often approach it as a continuous variable. This article extends this debate by addressing a set of political behaviours that has mostly been the purview of political scientists. Analysing restricted, geocoded data from the National Survey of Latinos on Politics and Civic Participation, this article examines how age-at-arrival and civic institutions shape political participation among Latino immigrants. Logistic regression and random effects models suggest three key findings. First, age-at-arrival has a strong impact on participation, with child arrivals showing the highest level of participation and midlife arrivals reporting the lowest level of participation. Second, there are no ethnic differences in the likelihood of participating in non-electoral politics among Latinos. Third, involvements with civic institutions significantly shape political participation, confirming these institutions’ potential role in cultivating political efficacy and participatory skills. At the same time, the impact of civic organisations on political participation is contingent on both the type of organisation and the immigrant’s age-at-arrival, with ethnic organisations playing an important role in the political resocialisation process. Finally, ethnic concentration at the county has limited positive impact on political participation.