Why Black People Move: Rationality and Narrative in Theories of Black Migration

• In Event: 452 - Section on Racial and Ethnic Minorities Refereed Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 11. Race and Migration

Abstract

Why do black people move? This question has been answered within two theoretically-driven empirical traditions, one organized around rational explanations of quantitative data and the other focused on narrative explanations of qualitative data. Rational explanations of migration generated specific research questions, analytic methods, and outcomes of interest that focused on individual forms of economic self-interest. The desire to embrace economic theories of migration produces correspondingly rational explanations for the black migration that tend to neglect experiential and cultural forms of evidence. In contrast, narrative approaches emphasize that black people move for more than just economic reasons. Black people also migrate as a form activism, means of reformulating identity, and building community. Variation in how causalities of black migration are theorized is at the heart of this analysis and leads us to two specific questions. First, have scholars of black migration substituted disciplinary convention (a focus on rational self-interest) and the widespread availability of secondary population data for case-specific theory development? Second, what are the implications of theorizing black migration in predominantly rational economic terms? To answer these questions, we detail a broad set of scholarship of black migration within the United States. We will describe how these approaches evolved over time and compare them with respect to the types of causal explanations that emerge from each. Finally, we will briefly discuss implications of theorizing black migration in historical and sociological context.

Authors

• Anthony Ryan Hatch, Wesleyan University

• Nia Reed, Georgia State University