"Our Constitution is Colorblind." -- Justice Marshall Harlan. This declaration from Justice Harlan's dissent in Plessy v. Ferguson has become the touchstone of the Court's jurisprudence on race. But how does the Court actually conceive of race? Is it with a colorblind lens, as Harlan's statement seems to suggest? Moreover, how does the Court's conception of race affect their analysis of affirmative action policies---programs which are, ostensibly, race conscious? In what follows, I argue that the Court's predominant conception of race tends to de-emphasize historical and contextual analysis, characterized by a colorblind reading of the Constitution. As a solution to many of the associated difficulties identified within the paper, I advocate for a more substantive reading of race---a reading that takes account of the historical, political, and social aspects of racial classifications. I also argue that Justice Benjamin Cardozo's "sociological jurisprudence" may help to engender a more honest discussion of affirmative action policies that come before the Court. / text

Master of Arts / Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Social Work / Kevin Steinmetz / At year end 2016 over 3.7 million Americans were under probationary supervision. In response to institutional overcrowding, the U.S. has been increasingly reliant on community corrections. Though there has been extensive research into various aspects of the criminal justice system, the area of community corrections, specifically probation, has seen relatively little scrutiny. Through quantitative analysis of probationary data, this study examined a Midwestern population of closed probationary cases. Through a framework of intersectionality, various intersectional identities are examined for likelihood of failure. Focusing on the prevalence of negative outcomes for not only racial and ethnic minorities, but also intersections of race, ethnicity, and gender. Utilizing logistic regression analysis, each model examines race, ethnicity, and sex against probation failure. After an initial baseline model, intersections of race/ethnicity were run. Using probation success as a control outcome in each of the models. Across all models, race and ethnicity were found to be significantly and positively associated with probation failure. Additionally, standardized coefficients indicate Black and Black/Hispanic categories to represent strong effect on negative probation outcome. Of note, sex though unreliable in numerous models, was found only to be a significant and strong predictor in the model examining Black probationers. Possible explanations, study limitation, future research, and policy implication are offered in the discussion and conclusion section.

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Since the inclusion of affirmative action programs in numerous places of opportunity in our society there have been objections to these programs. This study will focus on the "colorblind" objection which relies on the belief that our Constitution mandates that all laws must not take race into account. With the analysis of court cases from the past century it is evident that this belief in colorblindness did not exist nor was it claimed to exist in the numerous cases dealing with segregation and racial subordination. It is concluded that this reliance on a principle of colorblindness in opposition of affirmative action is not well-founded, and coming at this juncture in society it does more hurt than help. There is a case analysis from four important cases from the Reconstruction and Jim Crow era which were heard by state and federal courts. A history of the colorblind principle is given and affirmative action cases are also summarized and discussed to give the reader a sense of the current judicial stance on the programs. Literature in favor of a colorblind principle is critiqued and support from other scholars is given.

Out in the world, there are over a million colorblind developers and a lot more that are aspiring developers. Amongst them are colorblind developers that are hindered by their color blindness. Hindered in such ways as they do not have the confidence to design an application, due to them not being able to interpret colors in a similar way as other developers. There is also a fear of “can I be colorblind and be a programmer/web designer?”. With these walls stopping potential developers from advancing or doing certain things, we could lose out on some great developers for the future. In order to tackle this, I am creating a tool for colorblind developers to generate color schemes and mock color schemes in applications. As well as giving them a tool to look up RGB/HEX-values and receive the name of the color matching.

Amas Repertory Theatre was founded in 1969 by Rosetta LeNoire, an African American actress who pursued a mission of developing original musicals while practicing interracial casting. The company's most successful show was Bubbling Brown Sugar (1975). Throughout Amas's history LeNoire's complicated perspective on what constituted discrimination sometimes caused her casting choices to be questioned. LeNoire believed in a colorblind theatre and society, however, as the decades passed, her colorblind perspective was challenged by neo-conservative philosophy which states that in a colorblind society no particular group should receive any more privilege than another. This definition of colorblind is used to justify conservative efforts to eliminate affirmative action and undermine race conscious legislation. In the late 1990s, at her retirement, LeNoire, who always believed that color did not matter, turned her theatre over to white leadership, who still operate Amas today. At that point, Amas changed from a company that had, from its founding, been considered to be a black theatre to one that is now white. As the history of Amas unfolds, my study examines the complex politics surrounding the concept of colorblindness. Efforts by Actors' Equity to promote interracial or, as it is often called, nontraditional casting are also investigated as well as the conservative backlash against race conscious policies, particularly during and after the administration of Ronald Reagan. In the present day Amas practices a multicultural mission, however, as my dissertation examines the company's programming decisions as well as its perspective on race, Amas is revealed to be an example of how white operated theatres, even if unintentionally, through the agency of white power and privilege, are affected by the same institutional racism that permeates American society. My dissertation then challenges Amas and other theatres to take responsibility for staying fully aware of the racially charged issues and tensions that exist in America today. When theatre professionals seek out and are committed to engaging in open dialogue on race they are in a stronger position to make knowledgeable decisions regarding the representation of race on stage.

The presidency of Barack Obama has given racial framing in the news media a new salience particularly because of the role that media coverage plays in shaping ideas about race. The racial framing that unfolds through the news media reflects new forms of racism that work to justify and explain racial inequalities without explicit references to race. In this study, I analyze the media discussion of welfare reform following a 2012 Mitt Romney attack advertisement that claimed that President Obama “gutted” welfare reform. I use discourse analysis to analyze the prevalence of controlling imagery, colorblind racist rhetoric, and the white racial frame in 91 prominent newspaper articles and political blogs that discussed this controversial advertisement. This study aims to contribute to sociological knowledge about specific language and strategies used by the media to perpetuate racism, and to demonstrate the relationship between political and social welfare discourse and racial ideologies.

This work is inspired by Lipsitz (1998) and Allport (1954) because both authors connect micro level processes to social macro level patterns. Allport’s Nature of Prejudice sought to understand patterns of anti-Semitism as connected to a larger social context. From this work, Allport developed the contact hypothesis which is premised on the idea that diversity helps alleviate racial tensions. Lipsitz’ Possessive Investment in Whiteness connects White racial privilege to a history of racial social inequality. In conintuum, I develop the nuances on prejudice formation as it leads to the denial of racial privilege or to the conflation of privileges as oppression. While I focus on White racial privilege, the theoretical contribution of my research develops the framework for individual privilege formation. I then draw upon Bonilla-Silva’s (2013) racial colorblind theory to emphasize the connection between privilege and larger patterns of racial attitudes. The macro level contribution of this dissertation focuses on patterns of overt and colorblind attitudes as affected by racial segregation, social inequality, and respondent characteristics. Data was gathered from the 2000 General Social Survey, 2010 GSS, and U.S. Census county data and applied to a hierarchical linear model. Due to sample selection, this research focuses on racial Whites’ attitudes about the racial Black population. I use measures of racial segregation as proxies for racial contact. I find patterns of racial tolerance through a ‘separate but equal’ storyline among White-Black segregation. When using, social demographics with all minorities included, I find that Whites’ attitudes about racial Blacks are attenuated. This finding supports the literature that non-Black racial minorities act as buffers for White-Black racial relations. Racial diversity is one element in helping alleviate negative racial sentiments, but patterns of segregation and social inequality impact the benefits of this racial diversity.

Thesis advisor: Sara Moorman / Thesis advisor: Eve Spangler / This research project explores the narratives of how and when young Black people came to understand their race, as well as the implications of it. In order to expand upon the existing studies regarding racial realization and provide specific stories of such instances, qualitative interviews with nine Black people (ages 18-22) were conducted. The upbringings of these young Black people were analyzed in depth in order to provide insight to different types of racial socialization. It was found that both colorblind upbringings and non-colorblind upbringings that center individuals rather than systems of oppression are not helpful in the racial identity formation of young Black people. They both result in the perpetuation of the idea that racially marginalized people should modify their behavior. Additionally, this project exposes some of the reasons why racial realization is often a jarring experience for Black people in America, and in turn, expose some of the ways it can be less so. / Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2021. / Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Departmental Honors. / Discipline: Sociology.

Following the demise of apartheid, legislative, political and social practices were dramatically changed to promote equality and shared access for all South Africans. Newspapers and other mass media texts give insight to the co-construction of ethnic identity post-apartheid and evidence the emergence of a new dominant cultural narrative. In this new dominant cultural narrative, the trope of a colorblind national identity is frequently referenced. Another key component in this narrative construction is the memorialization of past traumatic events. This dissertation examines the news coverage of the 30th anniversary of the Soweto Uprisings, which occurred on June 16, 2006. The Soweto Uprisings will be framed as a "cultural trauma" (Alexander et al., 2004) and methods of critical discourse analysis will be used to examine the public construction of national identity in the post-apartheid era.The following questions guide the analysis of news media discourse: What changes to the South African national identity are evidenced in news stories covering the anniversary of the Soweto Uprisings? Do racially distinctive communities participate equally in the creation of this media discourse? In what ways are South African ethnic minorities "othered" in news features? How did/does the dominant cultural narrative evidenced in the media discourse influence the construction and management of racial identities in the larger context of South African society? The examination of the co-construction of national and racial identities in these news features draws upon an amalgamation of CDA methodologies outlined in Fairclough (1995, 1999), van Dijk (1988, 1991), and Wodak (Wodak & Weiss, Eds., 2003). The creation and re-creation of a shared history from the collective trauma of forcefully imposed, restrictive racialized communities is a dimension of national identity construction saliently evidenced by changes in the public discourse or dominant/counter narratives. Media discourse illustrates the emergence of colorblind national identity as the desirable, or default, national identity in post-apartheid South Africa and highlights the journalistic role in the creation and management of racial and national identities, liberation narratives, and reconciliatory discourses.