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Intersectionality as Critical Social Theory

depends on skin tone, such that darkerskinned Black immigrants are more likely to be seen as Black, and this exemplifies how the white racial frame shapes the experiences of Black immigrants. Still, the authors over-rely on the racial frame to the exclusion of other models, such as Treitler’s (2013) concept of ethnic projects—this despite having provided a thorough overview of contemporary models for thinking about race in the previous chapter. Treitler (2013) argues that racialized ethnic groups, including Black immigrants, pursue ethnic projects to distance themselves from the negative consequences of racialization by distancing themselves from native-born Blacks. The ethnic project model shows how racial inequality is perpetuated within groups, not just imposed by the dominant group. The rest of the book is more assured in its discussion of institutions that perpetuate Black racial oppression in the United States. Highlights include Chapter Five, which examines the experiences of Black Americans in the labor market, and Chapter Six, on the criminal justice system. Like earlier chapters, Chapter Five puts research on the Black labor market in historical perspective. It starts with the coerced labor of enslaved Africans in the supposed free market system of the United States, then moves into Black labor struggles during the World Wars, when northern whites treated Black migrants from the South as a threat to their monopoly on well-paying industrial jobs. The chapter’s review of how support for welfare in the United States changed once it became associated with Black women is especially enlightening. It shows that Moynihan’s infamous report blaming single Black mothers for Black poverty culminated in years of governmental policy that cast Black women as undeserving recipients of government assistance, a far cry from the deserving (white) widows who were the intended beneficiaries of welfare when it was established. The discussion shows the book’s sustained engagement with intersectionality. Likewise, Chapter Six links the overpolicing of Black Americans to racial capitalism. It talks about how, in the post-slavery era, white people introduced the Black Codes in the South to imprison formerly enslaved Africans and force them to work. These codes criminalized Black people as vagrants for the crime of gathering in public, thereby reinstating a regime of forced labor despite the official end of slavery. The Black Codes mutated in the later part of the twentieth century into mass incarceration of Black Americans largely for nonviolent drug offenses. Unlike the Black Codes, the drug policies that led to mass incarceration have been harder to combat since the policies seem race-neutral. The chapter also explores how mass incarceration destabilizes Black communities, making it harder for Black people with a criminal record to get a job, find housing, and participate in family life. Again, the chapter uses intersectionality, noting that despite the typical focus on Black men’s incarceration, formerly incarcerated Black women have the hardest time maintaining employment once they get out of prison (p. 141). Overall, Black in America more than proves its point that America’s post-racial dream is still a dream, not a reality. Though packed with information, the authors never lose sight of their main argument. The book would be a great starting point for anyone trying to understand the plight of Black Americans in contemporary society.