“Where the Danger Lies”: Race,Gender, and Chinese and Japanese Exclusion in the United States, 1870–19241

Race too often is used as the explanatory variable for understanding immigration exclusion, marginalizing the significance of race making, ethnic differentiation, and gender construction in particular. This article explores these processes by examining exclusionary policies implemented against Chinese and Japanese immigrants from the mid‐1870s to 1924, the year the National Origins Act was passed. Politicians, intellectuals, and moral reformers used a gendered logic—the construction of idealized gender norms, roles, and sexual propriety and the attachment of these meanings to male and female bodies—to distinguish Japanese immigrants from the Chinese immigrants they followed, allowing for ethnic differentiation and dissimilar policies. The convergence toward exclusion rested on a racialized logic—the construction and attachment of inferior status and meanings to immigrant groups through discourse, formal and informal categorization, or social closure—which claimed that the Japanese were unassimilable and racially undesirable like the Chinese. Exclusionists focused on the immigrant women, decrying their sexual and gender impropriety as evidence of the groups’ threats to the sanctity of white families, which imperiled the nation. Gender and race both mattered in these logics and their meanings were constructed as their salience interconnected.     

“The Mommy Deployment”: Military Spouses and Surrogacy in the United States

This article examines narratives of women who are surrogates and are married to members of the military in the United States. I show how this group of women invoke and transpose their structured military experiences and institutional understandings of sacrifice, duty, and responsibility when constructing their surrogate experience. Using semistructured interviews with 33 military spouses who have been surrogates,? I trace the parallels they narrate between their role as military spouse and their role as surrogate—with metaphors of deployment, relocation, and the “hurry up and wait” game, in addition to strict daily regimentation. Through this work, I highlight the often‐surprising transposition between militarized and surrogacy narratives invoked by surrogates and show how the practice of surrogacy allows them to tap into the narratives they have crafted through their experiences as a spouse to make a difference in the lives of others, contribute financially to their own families, and to gain a sense of importance outside of their everyday roles. The narratives provide for a better understanding of the commercially arranged surrogate experience in the United States and the state‐structured military spouse experience by exposing the skills, language, and habits utilized by this group of women.     

Designating Dependency: The “Socially Inadequate” in the United States, 1910–1940

This article examines the use of “socially inadequate” as a label for the dependent poor in the United States, 1910–40. It analyses the dense meanings that were given to this term and the political significance that the label “socially inadequate” gained in relation to sterilization and immigration policy. The article explores the role played by eugenicist, Harry Laughlin, as a label maker for the term and a moral entrepreneur in relation to the problem of dependency. It argues that “socially inadequate” was a stigmatising designation for members of perceived deficient groups, whom were seen as falling below the normal or acceptable standards of society and were, as such, viewed as undeserving of the status of citizen. Finally, it contends that the negative moral and emotional judgments encoded into definitions of the “socially inadequate” can be situated within the history of the derogation of dependency, understood as economic reliance on the state or charity, in the United States.     

Has Welfare Reform Created “Chilling Effects” for Refugees in the United States?

The welfare reform legislation of 1996 significantly reduced noncitizens' access to public benefits. Research has indicated that welfare reform has had unintended “chilling effects,” whereby even those noncitizens who remain eligible for benefits do not utilize them because of fear and confusion. Although refugees were exempted from the benefit restrictions for a certain period following arrival, recent research has suggested that they too may have experienced chilling effects. This study was conducted to more accurately determine whether this has occurred, through the use of time‐series data for a sample of refugees who remain eligible for public benefits. The findings did not provide strong evidence that welfare reform has created chilling effects for refugees, although the possibility cannot be ruled out.     

Representations of “the West,”“Japan,” and “the Periphery” in the Discourse of Lafcadio Hearn Studies

The purpose of this article is to analyze representations of “the West,”“Japan,” and “the Periphery” in the discourse of research on Lafcadio Hearn (“Hearn studies”) from pre‐war Japan. The nature and construction of nationality will be analyzed by examining where the representations of “the West,”“Japan,” and “the Periphery” intersected. During the 1900s, researchers in the field of Hearn studies recognized that “Japan” lacked—and thus sought—a universality similar to what existed in “the West.” The tone of the discourse shifted during the 1910s through 1920s however, and what came to be emphasized was “Japan's” peculiarity. By the 1930s through 1940s, “Japan” aimed to show to “the West” a new universality that was different from what existed in Europe and America. Yet simultaneously, in order to legitimize its representation of its self, “Japan” portrayed “the Periphery” as an object that was both excluded and absorbed or appropriated into that image. On the one hand, “Japan” received and internalized the Orientalist viewpoint of “the West.” In fact, “Japan” was always conscious of its self‐image as something to display to “the West.” On the other hand, in order to create that self‐portrayal, both a representation of “the Periphery” and a reflection from that same “Periphery” were essential. While representations of “Japan” were produced, reproduced, and reinforced through interactions with “the West” and “the Periphery,” the intersecting behavior of these three entities also points to a residual ambiguity in “Japan's” nationality. By analyzing the discourse in Hearn studies, this paper reveals how the interaction between “Japan” and the two others of “the West” and “the Periphery” helped construct and destabilize its nationality.     

The “Tiering” of Citizenship and Residency and the “Hierarchization” of Migrant Communities: The United Arab Emirates in Historical Context

The local population of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) constitutes less than 11.5 percent of the total population. In response to their growing numerical minority status, many Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states, including the UAE, have become more stringent about their citizenship, nationality, and employment policies. The natural questions to follow are: Why have UAE nationality and citizenship laws diverged from the anticipated “opening” of nationality and citizenship policies that some assumed would accompany globalization? In the specific context of the UAE, what factors have shaped and changed these policies over time?     

“Revenge” and “Rescue”: Workplace Deviance in the Taxicab Industry*

This study explores taxicab drivers’ acts of “revenge” and “rescue,” some of which are expressive acts, while others are more instrumental. This article builds on earlier theories of workplace deviance, demonstrating how deviance can serve different purposes and expanding the concept of “deviance admiration” ( Heckert and Heckert 2004 ). It examines deviance in a circumstance—the taxicab industry—which introduces a tension between mandated conformity and necessary deviance: employees must conform to the employers’ rules and yet, to accomplish their jobs well, they need to abandon those rules occasionally. In addition to its theoretical contributions, this work has important practical applications for managers.     

Gender Stereotyping in the Dutch Asylum Procedure: “Independent” Men versus “Dependent” Women1

Attention for discrimination against women in asylum law has grown considerably during the last few decades. Yet it is male claimants who have had smaller success Rates in the asylum procedures of different countries. Using administrative data from the Dutch INS, we show this difference is caused by the traditionally gendered migration pattern of asylum seekers. Men have a smaller success rate than women because they are less likely than women to have a spouse or children, are less likely to follow their spouse to the country of destination, and are more likely to come from countries considered to be safe. This suggests that men are less successful in their attempts to seek asylum because they better fit the image of “bogus” refugees, while women more clearly match the image of “victim of patriarchal domination.”     

Dangerous Machinery: “Conspiracy Theorist” as a Transpersonal Strategy of Exclusion

In a culture of fear, we should expect the rise of new mechanisms of social control to deflect distrust, anxiety, and threat. Relying on the analysis of popular and academic texts, we examine one such mechanism, the label conspiracy theory, and explore how it works in public discourse to “go meta” by sidestepping the examination of evidence. Our findings suggest that authors use the conspiracy theorist label as (1) a routinized strategy of exclusion; (2) a reframing mechanism that deflects questions or concerns about power, corruption, and motive; and (3) an attack upon the personhood and competence of the questioner. This label becomes dangerous machinery at the transpersonal levels of media and academic discourse, symbolically stripping the claimant of the status of reasonable interlocutor—often to avoid the need to account for one's own action or speech. We argue that this and similar mechanisms simultaneously control the flow of information and symbolically demobilize certain voices and issues in public discourse.     

“His” and “her” marriage expectations: Determinants and consequences

This article uses couple‐level data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (N= 2,263) to investigate factors associated with unmarried parents’ expectations about marriage and the association between their expectations and subsequent union transitions. In most couples, both partners expect to marry, and their shared expectations are the strongest predictor of marriage and separation following their child's birth. Although men's expectations are somewhat more consequential for union transitions, marriage and relationship stability are more likely when at least one parent expects to marry. Factors such as children from previous relationships, distrust, conflict, and shared activities are also associated with union transitions. Findings about how expectations and other factors relate to marriage and separation may inform new marriage promotion initiatives.     

The Inseparability of “Career” and “Personal” Counseling

In this article it is argued that “career” and “personal” counseling should not be viewed as different types of counseling because: (a) the holistic philosophy of counseling emphasizes helping “whole” persons whose lives contain many important and meaningful roles; (b) recent research on the implications of gender and race for career development further demonstrates the inseparability of our career and “personal” lives; and (c) there are numerous commonalities in the “career” and “personal” counseling process.     

The Turn from “What” to “How”: Garfinkel's Reach Beyond Description

John Heritage described Harold Garfinkel's central question as “how do social actors come to know, and know in common what they are doing and the circumstances in which they are doing it.” The case of Agnes illuminates the methods by which members produce intelligible actions and recognizable—even “natural”—gender orderliness. With this central interest as a starting point, this article offers some observations about transgender women in prison and their creative adaptation to life behind bars.     

Between “Families in Trouble” and “Children at Risk”: Historicising “Troubled Family” Policy in England since 1945

The launch of the Troubled Families Programme in 2011 has thrown into sharp relief how governments develop policies and practices to intervene in the lives of so‐called ‘troubled families’. Commentators were quick to make comparisons with historic efforts to rehabilitate ‘problem families’ in the post‐war period. However, beyond discursive similarities, there are also marked continuities in how family policies have been developed and implemented. This review narrates the rise, fall and rise of concern about ‘problem’ and ‘troubled’ families in England in the context of anxieties about child and family welfare, and the appropriate response of the state.     

“Whistleblower” or “Renegade”: Definitional Contests in an Official Inquiry

This paper addresses the interpretive dynamics of official inquiries. Beginning with an ideal-typical sketch of congressional investigations, the discussion traces a portrayal of public problems by a committee of the House of Representatives. This leads to the analysis of a hearing in which committee factions struggled to define an Air Force administrator as a “whistleblower” or a “renegade.” The hearing is understood as a “certification ceremony” that rhetorically transformed staff discoveries into allegedly definitive evidence. It is concluded that the paper's conceptual approach can be applied to diverse inquiries that combine documentary research with interrogation of witnesses to generate authoritative findings.     

Does the “New” Immigration Require a “New” Theory of Intergenerational Integration?1

Starting from discussions on the validity of the classical assimilation concept, a general model for the explanation of different structural outcomes of interethnic relations is developed. The core of the model builds on the assumption that different outcomes are the often unintended and situation‐logic results of (mis‐)investments in and with ethnic and non‐ethnic capital. Central initial conditions of the model are group size, social and cultural distances and the availability of social capital. The model specifies the mutual relations between these three constructs. Different variants of intergenerational integration of immigrants can thus be reconstructed as special cases of a general mechanism.     

Narrating Nursing Jurisdiction: “Atrocity Stories” and “Boundary‐Work”

Sociologists have long recognized that the division of labor is, at its root, a process of social interaction. Although “negotiations” figure centrally in symbolic interactionist studies of work, relatively little attention has been given to the ways in which the structure of workplace talk contributes to the social constitution of occupations. Drawing on the insights of discourse and conversation analysis, this article examines occupational atrocity stories and considers how they accomplish boundary‐work in the hospital setting. I focus on the stories British nurses told about doctors and use data generated in ethnographic research into the routine accomplishment of nursing jurisdiction. I conclude with some general observations about how the detailed analysis of stories and storytelling can contribute to the wider study of social group formation.