Erratic Exemption: A theoretical intervention for racialized organization studies in medical sociology

• In Event: 50462 - Section on Science, Knowledge, and Technology Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 14: Medical Experiences

Abstract

In this paper, I extend the explanatory reach of a theory of racialized organizations to improve the framework’s use in medical sociology. I draw on studies from medical sociology, race and ethnicity, and cultural capital theories to propose a new concept called erratic exemption. Erratic exemption describes how cultural intermediaries in scientific and medical organizations seek to remedy resource scarcity through an altered application of decoupling. I demonstrate how resource scarcity in tandem with the multi-ethnoracial body challenges the mainstream applications of a theory of racialized organizations in scientific and medical organizations. By problematizing and adapting its foundational tenant of decoupling, I argue that sociologists can better identify racial structures, mechanisms, and attitudes mediating resource scarcity narratives. The intervention will illuminate the organizational apparatus that maintains scarcity and how cultural intermediaries attempt to remedy inequalities. This intervention provides medical sociologists the tools to critically imagine future studies of bodily commensuration, agency, the influence of racial bias on medicine, and demonstrate how sociology might make powerful contributions to medical organizations that advocate for effective systems change.

Author

• Alex Kailani Torrez, University of California, Berkeley