Introductory Chapter to Sociology's Past is Present: The Failure of a Race Perspective, Again?

• In Event: Schooling Race

Abstract

This is the introductory chapter to my book project, Sociology's Past is Present: The Failure of a Race Perspective, Again? It is a historical and critical review of the discipline of sociology in the contemporary era focused on assessing its proclaimed scientific ability to track and predict major societal patterns, yet inability to do so with respect to race. The classic book by James McKee, Sociology and the Race Problem: The Failure of a Perspective (University of Illinois Press, 1993), serves as model and parallel. Drawing on his frame of argument, I contend that sociology failed to track and predict the rise of Trumpian white racist nationalism owing to a similar racism-free or -light analysis and by speaking for Latin@/e/x, Asian ethnic, and Middle Eastern/Muslim American populations; as such, the mainstream of the discipline has not seemed to learn the lesson of over fifty years ago despite signs of an impending watershed societal shift at both points in time. . More specifically, the findings of this study are based on an assessment of four intellectual trends in the ten years leading up to the meteoric rise of Donald Trump as a serious and leading POTUS contender for the White House. Analyzing any relevant articles from the top seven generalist and race- or immigration-specific sociology journals (e.g., American Sociological Review; Ethnic & Racial Studies) and eight top book presses (e.g., University of California Press; Princeton University Press), I will assess any and all works related to the the rise of what would be a white supremacist regime rooted in nativist racism, particularly against Latin@/e/x and Muslim (and Chinese-descent) populations, and based in white nationalist authoritarian populism (and neo-fascism), as well as works that argued antithetical or contradictory phenomena was occurring. Based on a literature review of hundreds of sociological journals, books, and chapters, this study found that the sociological mainstream had not clearly predicted the Trumpian era. It thereby concludes with a critical assessment of sociology’s intellectual trajectory to account for why 50 years after failing to make proper predictions of the US racial landscape that the mainstream discipline did so again.

Author

• Nadia Y. Kim, Texas A&M University-College Station