Doctoral Dissertation Research: Minority Identity, Resistance, and the Opportunity Structure: The Interplay of Race, Ethnicity, Gender and Social Networks

一些学者认为，少数族裔青年拒绝某些被认为属于白人中产阶级社会的想法和行为。此外，他们的研究表明，接受白人的语言和行为会给种族和少数民族的生活带来两难境地，具有严重的社会和经济影响。然而，研究人员还没有解决为什么许多少数族裔青少年在美国社会中拥有相同或相似的社会经济和社会政治阶层，他们对“表现白人”的行为和态度不同。这项拟议的论文项目将分析(1)少数族裔青少年女孩和男孩对“适当”种族行为的态度和行为有何不同；(2)在抵制“表现白人”方面是否存在种族差异；(3)社会联系或网络的差异如何解释个人和群体对“表现白人”的反应。这项研究将使用从混合性别、不同种族的低收入非洲裔美国人和拉美裔青少年受访者中获得的定性和定量数据，这些受访者年龄在13岁到18岁之间，都是政府补贴住房的居民。数据收集将包括深入访谈和焦点小组，一项更大的纵向研究包括一部分年轻人：哥伦比亚大学的Yonkers家庭和社区项目(YF&Amp；CP)。这项研究不仅应该引起许多社会科学家的注意，也应该引起对种族和民族关系、性别、教育以及社会和经济流动性感兴趣的社会政策制定者的关注。

Some scholars have argued that minority youth reject certain ideas and actions perceived to be in the province of white middle class society. Further, their research suggests that an acceptance of "white" language and behaviors creates dilemmas in the lives of racial and ethnic minorities, with serious social and economic implications. However, researchers have not addressed the question of why many minority adolescents who occupy the same or similar socioeconomic and sociopolitical stratum in U.S. society differ in their behaviors and attitudes about "acting white." The proposed dissertation project will analyze (1) how minority adolescent girls and boys differ in their attitudes and behaviors about "appropriate" ethnic behavior; (2) whether there exist inter-ethnic differences in resistance to "acting white"; and (3) how differences in social contacts or networks account for individual and group responses to "acting white." The study will employ both qualitative and quantitative data obtained from a mixed-gender, inter-ethnic sample of low-income African American and Latino adolescent respondents ages 13 to 18, all residents of government-subsidized housing. Data collection will include in-depth interviews and focus groups, with a subset of youth included in a larger longitudinal study: the Yonkers Family and Community Project (YF&CP) based at Columbia University. This research not only should attract the attention of many social scientists, but also social policy makers interested in racial and ethnic relations, gender, education, and social and economic mobility.