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Journal Article 1: Byng, M. (2008). Complex inequalities: The case of Muslim Americans after 9/11. American Behavioral Scientist, 51, 659–674.

Abstract: This article discusses the redefining of religious minority identity for Muslim Americans after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, arguing that when religious identities become a central focus in American political conflict, they shift from supporting incorporation into society to facilitating inequality. The article analyzes the ways in which Muslim religious identity has come to mimic the inequality of race identity, supporting her broader argument that any identity that designates a group boundary has come to be the ground upon which social inequality is organized.

Journal Article 2: Bell, J., & Hartman, D. (2007). Diversity in everyday discourse: The cultural ambiguities and consequences of “happy talk”. American Sociological Review, 72, 895–914.

Abstract: The authors conduct interviews in four major metropolitan areas to explore popular conceptions of diversity, detailing how their research revealed understandings that were undeveloped and often contradictory. On critical point they address is the conflict generated by the group oriented nature of most rhetorics of diversity, and the deeply embedded notions of individualism that ground American core values, allowing diversity to be an abstract concept that is not actualized in individual interactions, particularly with racialized others. The authors deconstruct the whiteness rubric in order to understand their findings relative to the intersections of racism and colorblindness in the contemporary moment.

Journal Article 3: MacLean, V., & Williams, J. (2008). Shifting paradigms: Sociological presentations of race. American Behavioral Scientist, 51, 599–624.

Abstract: This article provides a brief history of theories of race and race relations in the United States, arguing that the “new” racial paradigms in sociology have been repackaged around the same background assumptions that grounded the “old.”

Journal Article 4: Thomas, J. (2014). Affect and the sociology of race: A program for critical inquiry. Ethnicities, 14, 72–90.

Abstract: This article details the idea that race remains a centrally important issue within the social sciences. However, there are two key problems that continue to surface, particularly in the US context: a reductivist account of the role of culture in the production of race and racism and the essentializing of the political identity of racial others. The author proposes an affective program in order to correct these key problems.

Journal Article 5: Lee, E., Edwards, S., & La Ferlee, C. (2014). Dual attitudes toward the model’s race in advertising. Journal of Black Studies, 45, 479–506.

Abstract: This article looks at the way a model’s race can affect the way that advertising is viewed and internalized. The authors compared responses to both African American and Caucasian American models and the responses of both African American and Caucasian participants. They found that the amount of time the participants were given to view the advertisements directly affected the attitudes they reported towards the ads.