Description
Book SynopsisIt is hard to avoid seeing ethnicity, race, or nationality wherever one looks. Differences in education, income, and health are often patterned along ethnic or racial lines. But how do we disentangle discrimmation and preferences for certain groups from the everyday working of labor markets and educational institutions or privileging family members or those with similar educational backgrounds? Drawing on a boundary-making perspective first championed by anthropologist Fredrick Barth, Andreas Wimmer introduces a new comparative theory of ethnicity. It explains precisely how and why ethnicity matters in certain societies and contexts but not in others, and why it is sometimes associated with inequality and exclusion, with political and public debate, with closely-held identity, while in other cases ethnicity, race and nationhood do not structure the allocation of resources, invite little political passion, and represent secondary aspects of individual identity. Wimmer argues that when e
Trade ReviewEthnic Boundary Making has the makings of a classic. The author takes on a vast and important topic, provides a bold and ambitious theoretical agenda, and engages in theory development by convincingly confronting his hypotheses with data of various kinds. As he goes along, Wimmer explains the implications of his findings for a wide range of theories and debates in sociology and beyond, engaging with the best and the brightest in the multi-disciplinary literatures on ethno-racial divisions, immigration and citizenship, and group formation. This ambitious book will surely leave its mark and be widely debated. * Michele Lamont, author of The Dignity of Working Men: Morality and the Boundaries of Race, Class, and Immigration *
Table of ContentsIntroduction ; 1. Herder's Heritage ; 2. Strategies and Means ; 3. Conflict and Consensus ; 4. Categorization struggles ; 5. Network Boundaries ; 6. Culture and Closure ; Conclusions ; Acknowledgments ; Notes ; Bibliography ; Index
