Suchergebnisse

Examines whites' "possessive investment in whiteness" by exploring how it is created, maintained, & reproduced, discursive practices termed "racing for innocence," which is linked to a broader US cultural discourse on liberal individualism. Specifically, 1988/89 & 1999 ethnographic & interview data on the lawyers working (or formerly working) in a San Francisco Bay Area firm are drawn on to explore the ramifications of these practices, contending that this race for innocence is one dimension of affirmative action backlash. The literature on whiteness studies & affirmative action is briefly reviewed before comparing the narratives of white male lawyers who remained with their firm to those of a particular African American male lawyer who left. Revealed are very different narratives surrounding the African American's departure from the firm, exposing how the white lawyers, by virtue of their social position, unwittingly contributed to the working climate that pushed the African American out. Theorizing that whiteness is a set of unequal social relations & practices, it is asserted that these white lawyers' "race for innocence" reproduced the structural inequality of the workplace, denying accountability for racism while partaking in it. 1 Table. J. Zendejas

Despite the invisibility of emotional labor among paralegals, this dimension of work has significant consequences for the reproduction of the labor process in the large bureaucratic firm & for the psychological well-being of paralegals. These legal workers function to support & maintain the emotional stability of the lawyers for whom they work through deferential treatment & caretaking. By affirming the status of lawyers, paralegals also reproduce gender relations in the law firm. Most attorneys who receive caretaking & support are men, & the majority of the legal assistants who provide these emotional services are women. In this way, the emotional labor required of paralegals serves to reproduce the sex-segregated structure of law firms. 26 References. Adapted from the source document.

Researcher ethnographic power & authority are examined through discussion of fieldwork experiences in two San Francisco, CA, law firms. The classic conception of ethnographic authority suggests that ethnographers have textual & social authority over their Ss. Such a conceptualization does not allow for the situational & relational factors that impact ethnographic authority. In one case, the female researcher's status in a male-dominated law firm represented a challenge to authority & required renegotiation of interactions with male elites. In another case, the researcher's covert status as a fieldworker prompted ethnical concerns & created tension between deceiving & exploiting people in the organization under study & achieving the goals of the ethnographic inquiry. Formation of researcher identity was vital to the ethnographic process & to unearthing the relationship between gender & power manifested in the organizations under study. 26 References. D. Generoli

This article considers how race and gender shape latina and Latino paths to school success in college. A purposive sample of successful high school and college students was selected. Through interviews, fieldwork, and school records, the researchers find that Latinas navigate successfully through negative stereotypes by maintaining positive definitions of themselves and by emphasizing their group membership as Latina. Young Latino men also see themselves as part of a larger cultural group but tend to have less positive racial and ethnic identities than women do. Typically, they are supported by mentors, such as white athletic coaches, and tend to draw from the meritocratic ethos of sports, regarding their success in individualistic terms. While successful Latinas do not assimilate in the ways predicted by the literature, the young men in this study accept the individualistic and meritocratic ethos of the dominant culture, but with a psychological price.

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Preface -- Introduction: The Use of Personal Narratives in the Social Sciences and History -- 1. Agency, Subjectivity, and Narratives of the Self -- 2. Intersecting Stories: Personal Narratives in Historical Context -- 3. The Forms of Telling and Retelling Lives -- 4. Personal Narrative Research as Intersubjective Encounter -- 5. Making Arguments Based on Personal Narrative Sources -- Notes -- Index