Ethnic and Racial Studies

ISSN: 0141-9870 (Print) 1466-4356 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rers20

Theories of race and ethnicity: contemporary

debates and perspectives

Mengxi Pang

To cite this article: Mengxi Pang (2016): Theories of race and ethnicity: contemporary debates
and perspectives, Ethnic and Racial Studies, DOI: 10.1080/01419870.2016.1161809

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01419870.2016.1161809

Published online: 30 Mar 2016.

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 ETHNIC AND RACIAL STUDIES, 2016

BOOK REVIEW

Theories of race and ethnicity: contemporary debates and

perspectives, edited by Karim Murji and John Solomos, Cambridge,
Cambridge University Press, 2015, xiii + 292 pp., 19.99 (paperback), ISBN
978-0-521-15426-0

Set out to capture the latest theoretical and empirical research in the eld of race
and ethnicity, the book provides an excellent summary of theoretical transform-
ations and developments over past three decades. The editors, Murji and
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Solomos, characterize the book as a follow-up to Rex and Masons ground-break-

ing work Theories of Race and Ethnic Relations published in the 1980s. While Rex
and Masons volume came in as a timely intervention at an era when British soci-
ology of race, ethnicity and racism started to establish and thrive, the current col-
lection distinguishes itself by showcasing the scope of theoretical debates and
interdisciplinary potentials of the eld.
Two distinct yet interrelated parts constitute the collection. Part I Debates
focuses on the evolving nature of the theory development. It uses seven chapters
to reect important transformations in research agendas in order to capture ever-
changing racial phenomena on both sides of the Atlantic. Broadly speaking, these
chapters are thematically organized around two salient topics of the contempor-
ary race debate: post-raciality and colour-blindness, around which authors relate
to their eld of expertise to discuss the potential of envisioning a post-racial
society. Starting with the colour-blind narratives prevalent in American society,
Lee in Chapter 1 explains why race is still held by many as an important category
of analysis to study population differences in natural science research. She argues
that the reductionist nature of research encourages an application of racial
assumptions in identifying population differences, which negatively implicates
the research practices. In Chapters 2 and 3, Gallagher and Bonilla-Silva [with
Ray] respectively examine the ways in which discourse of colour-blind egalitarian-
ism becomes a racial norm in America. Gallagher contends that being sustained
and mediated by the media and political elites, the colour-blindness discourse
has a political purchase in erasing racial injustice and inequalities so as to
sustain privileges of the ruling class. Following this argument, Bonilla-Silva [With
Ray] further debunks the post-race imaginary by revealing practices of new
racism. He uses the example of Obama phenomenon to argue that instead of sig-
nifying the end of racism Obamas election brought to the fore a more powerful
type of racial domination (66), which is covert, subtle and seemingly non-racial.
The post-racial problematic is echoed and further elaborated by St. Louis in
Chapter 7 which unpacks the term alongside the racial eliminativism ideal to
assess the use of post-racialism. A shared theme across these four chapters is a
rejection of the seemingly declining signicance of race by highlighting the
structural constraints underlying the American society. The focus of debate is
 2 BOOK REVIEW

shifted back to the Europe in Chapters 5 and 6. Song uses British mixed-race as an
example to argue that recognizing this group has social and political implications
but does not necessarily signify a more progressive social milieu: depending on
ways of interpretations, it can be read either as a sign of progression towards a
post-race scenario or as re-inscriptions of race and racial differences. Applying
identity politics to the political mobilization of undocumented women in
France, in Chapter 6 Bassel quotes Collins and Ranciere to conceptualize the
role of race and racial identity in the course of political mobilization: as a site
of challenge or as a site of resource respectively.
While most arguments produced in Part I are still adhere to a classical sociologi-
cal agenda, chapters in Part II Perspectives shows alternative approaches to study
race and ethnicity. Authors in this part move beyond sociology to explore the
linkage between contemporary manifestations of race and theoretical frame-
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works in social sciences and humanities, ranging from critical rationalism

(Chapter 8 by Banton) to critical race feminism (Chapter 9 by Wing), performativity
(Chapter 10 by Tate), psychoanalysis (Chapter 11 by Clarke) and critical whiteness
studies (Chapter 12 by Hughey and Chapter 13 by Fassin). To theorize the cross-
disciplinary connectivity, some authors that is, Wing, Tate, Hughey and Fassin con-
textualize the theoretical debates with empirical ndings, while the other that is,
Banton and Clarke draw more heavily on theories to accomplish their arguments.
In spite of the divergent arguments, all chapters in Part II demonstrate attention to
the emergence of post-structuralist theories concerning language, identities, sub-
jectivities, embodiments and the politics of differences. These anti-fundamental
approaches challenge the kind of perspectives that featured in the Rex and
Mason volume (140) and offer new interpretive devices to make sense of racial
phenomena.
In review of Parts I and II, articles in both sections demonstrate interests in
pursing topics such as mixed-race, racial identity politics and post-raciality. The
shared awareness of contemporary racial congurations demonstrates common-
alities across disciplines and geographical locations, resonating with what Gold-
berg argues in Chapter 14 that in researching ethnicity, race and racism, one
should recognize the relational nature of racial conception and racist practice
(253). The contention foregrounds the inter-connectivity of racial phenomena
and ideologies across time and space and calls for a methodological attention
to a more complexly nuanced relationality (261).
With its in-depth analyses of a broad range of topics, the book offers a timely
summary of latest theoretical developments of the eld and reects an evolving
understanding of race and ethnicity. The chapters can be either read as a whole
to gain an insight into race and ethnicity or treated individually by those who
wish to pursue the topic in question in more details. The editors, albeit both
UK-based, demonstrated an international awareness by encompassing contem-
porary racial landscapes within and beyond the UK. Overall, this collection is suit-
able for sociology readers but also those from general social sciences and
humanities disciplines.
 ETHNIC AND RACIAL STUDIES 3

Mengxi Pang
Department of Sociology, University of Glasgow
m.pang.1@research.gla.ac.uk
2016 Mengxi Pang
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01419870.2016.1161809
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