Where the Skin Meets

Over the last half century, the analysis of homoerotic themes present in the author’s novels has been a particularly generative subset of Melville studies. Among this body of research, the relationship between Ishmael and Queequeg in Moby-Dick has proven to be a compelling avenue of research regarding modes of queer representation in an historical period wherein the open discussion of homosexuality was viewed as anywhere from taboo to illegal. This paper builds on the work of other Melville scholars, such as Caleb Crain and Kellen Bolt, in examining the ways in which 19th century ideas of race intersect with the representation of an eroticized male relationship between Ishmael and Queequeg. I suggest that the particular lens of racialized eroticism through which 19th century white observers viewed Polynesian men inherently denies the potential for disavowal of same-gender attraction to the non-White subject. This denial necessarily reifies racial hierarchy by giving a White male participant in a homoerotic relationship the ability to dictate its boundaries. I argue that even if, as Bolt suggests, Ishmael’s relationship with Queequeg represents a rejection of 19th century American nativist sentiment, Ishmael retains the ability to distance himself from accusations of homoeroticism in a way that is not possible for Queequeg and his exoticized body. I conclude with an exploration of how the Victorian freak-show archetype of the tattooed man connects with Ishmael’s decision to tattoo himself and thus voluntary take on racializing signifiers within his contemporary context.

The Social

The social is constituted by on-going communication and behavior patterns that influence participants perceptions, expectations and moral boundaries. For some, moral boundaries protect the racial hierarchy of American prosperity by calling natural what is actually social. Controversary about the meaning of sex, race, and ancestry can help us understand this difference, and thereby sharpen our awareness of our experiences of the social from social diversity to social amnesia. Social amnesia eliminates any awareness of the climate of injustice. In this context, a disturbing trend is our increasing reliance on private philanthropy to solve social problems, which moves us toward a new form of feudalism instead of a civic democracy. In a civic space that arises from the connections between our shared humanity and social differences, it is possible to listen to diverse voices and to make incoherent stories coherent.

Exploring mechanisms of whiteness: how counterterrorism practitioners disrupt anti-racist expertise

This article situates the subject of the academic–practitioner (AP) exchange within an International Relations-orientated critique of the imperial dynamics of counterterrorism practices and racial subjugation. It uses an analytical framework that upholds the significance of racial hierarchy to knowledge production. A key contribution of this article is to situate the AP nexus within the circumstances of liberal democratic counterterrorism regimes, to demonstrate how race becomes meaningful to the knowledge that is produced about Islamophobia. The main argument of this article is that in present policy debates concerning the existence of systemic racism, one of the mechanisms enabling counterterrorism practitioners to regulate the AP exchange is that of institutionalized whiteness. Exploring two scenarios of AP exchanges in the United Kingdom and Canada, where counterterrorism practitioners were challenged to reconcile with academic explanations of Islamophobia as a systemic issue, this article uses colour-line inspired critiques of white logic to identify instances where anti-racist knowledge was subjugated in the name of imperialism. The article finds that in each scenario discussed, practitioners demonstrate trajectories of white logic by contesting the suitability of anti-racist knowledge put forward by academics, on the basis of racial hierarchy and self-aggrandizement. It concludes by discussing how a lack of practitioner–academic consensus continues to affect the dissemination of knowledge concerning systemic racism, thus prompting considerations of what this means for an anti-racist future.

Dark skin, hourglass figure: The sexualisation of Black women in the Dutch sex industry

This article explores racial performance and the hypersexualisation of Black women in the Dutch sex industry. In the global sex trade, racialised women are constantly regarded as victims of sex trafficking without any agency, particularly migrant sex workers in European countries. While there is plenty of literature on how racial hierarchy affects Black women in the U.S. sex industry, such relevant research is lacking in Europe. In this explorative research, I deconstruct the images of Black women and set its narrative in the Netherlands. With semi-directive and in-depth interviews, I intend to highlight how Black sex workers perform images of Blackness and racial stereotypes when seducing male clients. My theoretical framework includes Patricia Hill Collins’s ‘controlling images’, Gloria Wekker’s ‘cultural archive’, Philomena Essed’s ‘everyday racism’, and Sunita Patel’s ‘racial performance’.

Race in International Relations: Beyond the “Norm Against Noticing”

The global movement for racial justice and the rise of anti-Asian hate at the height of the pandemic have called new attention to race and racism in international politics. Although critical theorists have decried the “norm against noticing,” other scholars of international relations have long sidestepped the possible role of race in shaping contemporary international affairs. New studies of hierarchy in international relations open the door for new understandings of race in world politics. We propose an analytic framework for the relationship between racial hierarchy, international law, and foreign policy, demonstrating that race can help explain patterns of interstate interactions that sustain an unequal global order. Positing two faces of racism in international relations, we examine how race biases international law in practice and affects the assessment of foreign threats and national interest. We discuss key methodological challenges in empirical research on race in international relations, focusing on issues of measurement, aggregation, and causation. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Political Science, Volume 25 is May 2022. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.

“The Model Man:” Shifting Perceptions of Asian American Masculinity and the Renegotiation of a Racial Hierarchy of Desire

Although Asian-descent men in the United States have been subjected to negative race-gender stereotyping and sexual racism, evidence suggests that mainstream perceptions and Asian American men’s self-definitions are in flux. Drawing on in-depth interviews of U.S.-born and -raised, middle-class, heterosexual Asian American men, supplemented by popular media textual analysis, we examine how these men are drawing upon a new form of alternative Asian American masculinity— one that we call “The Model Man”—in order to renegotiate their position within the present hierarchy of romantic preference. “The Model Man,” a hybrid masculinity construction that combines the elements of White hegemonic masculinity and model minority-based “Asian” masculinity, is co-opted and deployed by men as sexual/romantic capital—especially in relation to White women—because it enables the men to present themselves as desirable romantic partners. Although this masculinity strategy contains possibilities for further straitjacketing Asian American men via the model minority stereotype—and for re-inscribing heteronormativity and patriarchy/heterosexism—it may possess an unexpectedly subversive potential in allowing the men to contest their masculinity status and even remap hegemonic American manhood.

The Blessing of Whiteness in the Curse of Ham: Reading Gen 9:18–29 in the Antebellum South

This essay examines the antebellum history of interpretation surrounding the curse of Ham in Gen 9:18–29. It explores how modern notions of scientific racism were read into the story as a de facto justification for the transatlantic slave trade and the institution of slavery in the antebellum South. However, more than simply being used as a prooftext for racist agendas, the curse of Ham provided a biblical foil for circumscribing a racial hierarchy where whiteness was positioned as superior in the figure of Japheth. By considering key features of the racist antebellum interpretation, I argue that the proslavery rationalization of Christian antebellum writers is rooted in a deracialized whiteness that was biblically produced and blessed with divine authority.

Surveillance, race, and social sorting in the United Arab Emirates

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has made headlines for its use of mass surveillance technologies against UAE residents, as well as opponents externally. Under the guise of protecting national security, there has been a proliferation of state-led initiatives to monitor public spaces and online activity across the UAE, making the country an important laboratory for advanced surveillance tools. This article takes as a starting point that despite claims to being race-neutral and scientific, surveillance technologies have an embedded racial bias and operate according to context to (re)produce forms of state control and racial social relations. Reviewing the introduction of multiple surveillance technologies, this article traces the rationales used to racially order space and define deviance in the UAE context, emphasising questions of race, migration status and labour, to understand how the state defines, codifies, and regulates an ethno-racial hierarchy.

The Need for Shared Nomenclature on Racism and Related Terminology in Psychology

With the increased desire to engage in antiracist clinical research, there is a need for shared nomenclature on racism and related constructs to help move the science forward. This article breaks down the factors that contributed to the development and maintenance of racism (including racial microaggressions), provides examples of the many forms of racism, and describes the impact of racism for all. Specifically, in the United States, racism is based on race, a social construct that has been used to categorize people on the basis of shared physical and social features with the assumption of a racial hierarchy presumed to delineate inherent differences between groups. Racism is a system of beliefs, practices, and policies that operate to advantage those at the top of the racial hierarchy. Individual factors that contribute to racism include racial prejudices and racial discrimination. Racism can be manifested in multiple forms (e.g., cultural, scientific, social) and is both explicit and implicit. Because of the negative impact of racism on health, understanding racism informs effective approaches for eliminating racial health disparities, including a focus on the social determinants of health. Providing shared nomenclature on racism and related terminology will strengthen clinical research and practice and contribute to building a cumulative science.