Different, Not Better: How Latinx College Students Draw on Ethnoracial Factors to Construct Class Cultural Boundaries

• In Event: Latina/o Sociology Section Open Call Paper Session

Abstract

Stratification studies have long examined the attitudes upwardly-mobile college students develop towards their working-class communities of origin as they undergo transformative socially classed experiences. Though ethnoracialized minoritized students are often sampled in these analyses, less understood is how cultural practices sharing ethnoracial associations, coupled with university characteristics, shape upwardly-mobile first-generation and/or working class students’ perceptions of their communities. Drawing on a longitudinal interview-based study of 60 Latinx college students (a total of 110 interviews), this study examines how Mexican-origin college students draw boundaries that distinguish them from co-ethnics possessing lower levels of formal education in their working-class community of upbringing. I find that students draw on classed frames, which differ based on the ethnoracial and immigrant background characteristics of co-ethnics in their community, to justify their difference. I argue that ethnoracial distancing enables individuals to justify class cultural distinction. I further discuss the implications of these findings on how Latinx students are able to navigate socioeconomically and ethnoracially diverse communities.

Author

• Alma Nidia Garza, University of Texas-Arlington