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Racial Mismatch: The Divergence Between Form and Function in Data for Monitoring Racial Discrimination of Hispanics

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  • Wendy D. Roth

Abstract

Objectives. A primary justification for collecting U.S. racial statistics is the need to monitor racial discrimination. This article aims to show how analyses of Hispanics—who may officially be of any race—tend to miss discrimination based on racial appearance by relying on data that instead capture racial self‐identification, a different aspect of race that often does not correspond. Methods. The study analyzes 60 qualitative interviews with Dominican and Puerto Rican migrants in the New York metropolitan area. It employs multiple measures to represent theoretically distinct aspects of the lived experience of race. Results. Respondents interpret the Census race question in different ways corresponding to different aspects of race, which often do not match one another. Although respondents experience discrimination on the basis of phenotype, their racial self‐identification is a poor proxy for measuring their racial appearance. Conclusions. Scholars need to develop a language of race that communicates the multiplicity of social processes involved. Social surveys must provide measures of these multiple components, including interviewer observations of racial appearance, to monitor discrimination on the basis of phenotype within Hispanic groups.

Suggested Citation

  • Wendy D. Roth, 2010. "Racial Mismatch: The Divergence Between Form and Function in Data for Monitoring Racial Discrimination of Hispanics," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 91(5), pages 1288-1311, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:socsci:v:91:y:2010:i:5:p:1288-1311
    DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-6237.2010.00732.x
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    Cited by:

    1. Aliya Saperstein & Aaron Gullickson, 2013. "A “Mulatto Escape Hatch” in the United States? Examining Evidence of Racial and Social Mobility During the Jim Crow Era," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 50(5), pages 1921-1942, October.
    2. Reuben Allen, 2015. "Alternative Methods to Enumerate Data on Race in Puerto Rico," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 96(2), pages 608-628, June.
    3. Donna M Cormack & Ricci B Harris & James Stanley, 2013. "Investigating the Relationship between Socially-Assigned Ethnicity, Racial Discrimination and Health Advantage in New Zealand," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 8(12), pages 1-10, December.
    4. Wendy D. Roth, 2018. "Establishing the Denominator: The Challenges of Measuring Multiracial, Hispanic, and Native American Populations," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 677(1), pages 48-56, May.
    5. JooHee Han, 2020. "Does Skin Tone Matter? Immigrant Mobility in the U.S. Labor Market," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 57(2), pages 705-726, April.
    6. Stanley R. Bailey & Aliya Saperstein & Andrew Penner, 2014. "Race, color, and income inequality across the Americas," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 31(24), pages 735-756.
    7. Andrew Penner & Aliya Saperstein, 2015. "Disentangling the Effects of Racial Self-identification and Classification by Others: The Case of Arrest," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 52(3), pages 1017-1024, June.
    8. Veenstra, Gerry, 2011. "Mismatched racial identities, colourism, and health in Toronto and Vancouver," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 73(8), pages 1152-1162.
    9. Rademakers, Robbert & van Hoorn, Andre, 2020. "Choosing Your Ethnicity: A Longitudinal Analysis of Ethnic Identity Choice and Intra-Individual Ethnicity Change," MPRA Paper 99184, University Library of Munich, Germany.

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