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#sorrynotsorry: Racialized Forgiveness in Police Shootings of Blacks in the US

Mon, May 28, 11:00 to 12:15, Hilton Old Town, Floor: M, Liszt

Abstract

Forgiveness makes good television. Drawing on cases of police shootings of African-Americans, in this essay, I look at interviews with surviving family members to explore the ritual of third-party forgiveness requests as a way to excuse state-sponsored racial violence and structural oppression. I argue that while the police stand as a proxy for the state, individual officers are framed by the media as problematic exceptions. Racialized requests situate families as the fantasy “middle ground” of non-violence and polite protest, asking them to publicly perform their absolution of whiteness and white oppression. I show that families of survivors insist on their right to anger by strategically refusing calls to forgive, but do so in a carefully controlled way to minimize being read as threatening and violent. Both the police and the media construct community and control the status quo; through analyzing racialized forgiveness, I consider the particular pressure placed on marginalized groups to forgive structural violence as a way to maintain order and restore social balance. In the conclusion, I consider how politeness and demeanor are used to discipline black bodies in instances of justified anger and resistance.

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