Racialized Burdens: Applying Racialized Organization Theory to the Administrative State

When Mar 02, 2022
from 06:00 PM to 08:00 PM
Where Belknap Academic Building 218 or via Zoom
Contact Name Dr. Karen Christopher
Contact Phone 852-8022
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 The Department of Sociology's 2022 John H. Rieger Speaker Series will host Dr. Victor Ray, Associate Professor of Sociology and Criminology and African American Studies at the University of Iowa and a nonresident Fellow at The Brookings Institute.

His research applies critical race theory to classic sociological questions. In his talk, Dr. Ray will develop the concept of racialized burdens as a means of examining the role of race in administrative practice.

Racialized burdens are the experience of learning, compliance and psychological costs, which serve as inequality reproducing mechanisms.

To develop this concept, he examines the role of administrative burdens in the US state from the theoretical perspective of racialized organizations. Using examples from attempts to access citizenship rights – via immigration, voting and the social safety net – he illustrates some key points. First, racialized burdens combine access to resources and ideas about racial groups in ways that typically disadvantage racially marginalized groups. Second, while still promising fair and equal treatment, racially disproportionate burdens can be laundered through facially neutral rules and via claims that burdens are necessary for unrelated reasons. Third, racialized burdens emerge when more explicit forms of racial bias in policies or administrative practices become illegal, politically untenable or culturally unacceptable. Racialized burdens neatly carry out the “how” in the production of racial inequality while concealing, or providing an alibi for, the “why.”

This event is free and open to the University community, but registration is required. For those wishing to attend via Zoom, please register here. If you wish to attend in person, please email Nancy Price to register.

More information online here, or contact Dr. Karen Christopher, 852-8022.

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