Abstract
This research examines three questions. First and most broadly, how are professional Mexican Americans received in white-collar workplaces? Second, do their professional accomplishments buffer them from subtle racism? If not, what are the strategies they employ to manage subtle racism while at work? Finally, do experiences of subtle racism vary depending on whether one grows up poor or middle class? Based on 59 in-depth interviews with 1.5 and second-generation Mexican American professionals, results show those from poor backgrounds report more persistent experiences with subtle racism and they employ specific strategies to manage. This research adds to the literature by examining whether and to what extent class background heightens or minimizes Mexican Americans’ experiences of interpersonal racism in the white-collar workplace. This research also addresses larger debates and theories about whether boundaries between Mexican Americans and whites remain salient once Mexican Americans enter the middle class.
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Notes
Racial categories are socially constructed and the classification of the Mexican-origin population has changed over time (Barth, 1969; Nagel, 1994). To illustrate, Mexicans were counted as white in the US Census until 1920, when widespread nativist pressure stemming from the economic downturn of the Great Depression led to their reclassification as a separate race in the 1930 Census. However, like Southern and Eastern European immigrants, Mexicans understood the stigma of being federally defined as a non-white racial group. The Mexican American community protested this separate racial classification leading the federal government to drop the practice (Hirschman et al, 1999).
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Acknowledgements
This research was funded by the National Science Foundation, UC MEXUS, and The John and Dora Haynes Foundation. Please direct all correspondence to Jody Agius Vallejo, Department of Sociology, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089-2539.
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Vallejo, J. How class background affects Mexican Americans’ experiences of subtle racism in the white-collar workplace. Lat Stud 13, 69–87 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1057/lst.2014.70
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/lst.2014.70