Race-Shifting in the United States: Latinxs, Skin Tone, and Ethnoracial Alignments

• In Event: 1470 - DuBoisian Sociology: Critical Insights for Theorizing Race and Ethnicity

Abstract

Building on prior research, the present study draws on data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health to examine the role of perceived skin tone in shaping changes in racial self-identification among Latinxs as they transition from adolescence to adulthood. Consistent with the social whitening hypothesis, we hypothesize that darker skinned Latinxs will be more likely to identify as non-white and less likely to identify as White relative to their lighter skinned counterparts. Findings from our study suggest that while darker skin tone is associated with racial change among Latinxs, these changes are not consistently linear.

Authors

• Ryon J. Cobb, University of Southern California

• Yasmiyn Irizarry, University of Texas-Austin

• Ellis Prentis Monk, Harvard University