3. Program 2.3. Ethnic and racial group formation, discriminatory processes

Researchers: A. Rabaud, Y. Gastaut, M. Cognet, P. Cuturello, J.-L. Primon, C. Poiret

 Associated researchers: V. De Rudder, M. Eberhard, M. Manier

 Doctoral students: E. Adam Vesina, R. Braud, M. Duclos, C. Gabarro, J.-M. Huctin, N. Puvilland, J. Scheepers, Y. Tahata, D. Trawale

Racism is considered one of the forms that interethnic social relations can take. The research projects in this program question the practical modalities of racism through processes of discrimination and segregation. They shed light on an on-going dynamic- the construction, crystallization, weakening, and displacement- of the borders between Us/Them, and, furthermore, the variable and multiple variables of the articulation between difference/inequality, which is at the very heart of racist ideologies and practices.

The question of discrimination is central to this research program. It can be the point of entry for a number of analyses- the differential treatment of individuals in the fields of education, work, housing, or health, sense of injustice experienced by individuals… Specific attention will be paid to daily forms of resistance among populations of minority status, and to the strategies of actors confronted with discrimination : how do they interpret these processes, adapt to them, and seek to resist them? What responses do they develop in order to denounce discriminatory situations?

Research on these questions is centered on empirical analysis of the lived experience and perception of discriminations on the basis of origin, whether this origin is real or presumed. It examines individual and collective processes of realization of discrimination as well as the consequences of this awareness on individual life paths and on the strategies developed by social actors confronted with this reality.

In addition, other research projects will study the articulation of social relationships of domination. The analysis of power relations based on ” race “ and on gender has helped to shed light on the uniqueness of the social processes of construction and naturalization of “difference”. This research is now confronted with the necessity of reflecting on this intersectionality of diverses modes of unequal social classifications, in particular those which are constructed, ideologically and in practice, in terms of class, gender, and “race”, without taking into consideration age, generation, or sexual orientation.

Finally, even if the development of research on “majority” social groups is still in its beginnings in France, some projects focus on the modalities of construction of the category “White” and “French”, and on the dynamics of categorization and different registers of identification involved.

These questions will be addressed through the following studies :

 Racism and anti-racism : a historical approach to public and academic debates (Y. Gastaut)

 Anti-Arab racism and Anti-Jewish racism in France : articulation and accumulation (V. De Rudder)

 Measuring and quantifying racism (J-L Primon)

 The family as a space of experiencing racism in France : questioning the articulation of race, gender, class, generation (A. Rabaud- M. Eberhard)

 Analyzing the combination of social relationships of power through biographical narratives (Poiret)

 The health of aging women : analyzing racist and sexist discrimination and interrogating the articulation of origin, gender, class, and age/generation (M. Cognet)

 The production of “whiteness” through media discourse (C. Poiret)

 Reflection on the complemental nature of methods of recording racism and discrimination through analyss of the TEO study in France (M. Eberhard)

 Analysis of the lived experience of discrimination through the DRIS study (P. Cuturello)

Doctoral theses in progress: Migrant trajectories and therapeutic treatment of African migrants living with HIV-Aids and/or tuberculosis in France and Canada (E. Adam Vezina); Construction of categories of otherness in public health: the case of medical treatment of type 2 diabetes (R. Braud); The faults of marginalization: the flea market at Porte Montmartre (M. Duclos); Access to medical treatment among irregular immigrants in France (C. Gabarro); Intertwined power relations : “racialized gays” in France (D. Trawale); The political implication of minority elites : towards an empirical approach to intersectionality (N. Pullivand); Institutional construction of the category “French” (Y. Tahata); Constructions of ethnicity in the workplace in France (J. Scheepers)