“I’m Not Spanish, I’m from Spain”: Spaniards’ Bifurcated Ethnicity and the Boundaries of Whiteness and Hispanic Panethnic Identity

Abstract

This study counters potentially premature demographic and sociological claims of a large-scale Hispanic transition into mainstream whiteness. Via in-depth interviews and ethnographic observations of recently arrived Spanish immigrants in the United States, it presents a distinctive shift in American categorization logic, whereby race and ethnicity switch in order of everyday importance. Despite Spanish immigrants’ direct links to Europe and few structural social boundaries between them and mainstream U.S. whites, their everyday experience is of a largely “symbolic whiteness” that is subservient to the more consequential and essentialist Hispanic panethnic identity. Forced to maneuver this unique “bifurcated ethnicity,” Spaniards highlight a theoretically important deviation from the established ethnic options for European coethnics in the United States. Overall, Spaniards’ ethnoracial adaptations and their identity vary by institutional sites, by social settings, and along gender lines. Their ethnic bifurcation brings into question the overall logic and stability of the U.S. Hispanic/white boundaries.

What We Talk About When We Talk About Ethnicity: Hispanic Self-classification and Appraisal in an Online College Forum

“…To date, however, most research about ethnic claims-making has examined either macro-level ambiguity or individual decision-making, via survey and interview data. This is consistent with the broader literature on boundaries, where research has cataloged the mechanisms that produce boundaries, but is less extensive when it comes to the cultural negotiation of boundaries (Lamont and Molnár 2002; for an exception, see Soto-Márquez 2019). Scholars have identified a need to understand the cultural negotiation of boundaries, as well as the norms that govern racial appraisal.…”

“…Language is often meaningful to ethnic identity and its use can be a core component of boundary-making processes (Anzaldúa 1999; Soto-Márquez 2019; Telles and Sue 2019). In addition, Spanish surnames have historically been linked to Hispanic populations (Word and Perkins 1996).…”

How Race Counts for Latinx Homeownership

“…For some Latinx groups, whiteness may reflect how they are racialized in the United States or their countries of origin (Darity et al, 2005;Golash-Boza and Darity, 2008;Vargas, 2015). For example, elaborate racial schemas exist in Brazil (Hordge-Freeman, 2013Telles, 2012Telles, , 2014, and the processes of racialization in the United States are highly contextual (Hordge-Freeman and Veras, 2020;Roth, 2012;Soto-Márquez, 2019). Our findings show how these ideologies and experiences are intimately tied to the material realities of resource distribution and how race operates as a master status in housing inequality (Ray and Seamster, 2016;Seamster and Ray, 2018).…”

“I was discriminated against because I was seen as PRC‐Chinese”: The negotiation between ethnicity and nationalism among Taiwanese migrants in Australia

“…As scholars (Jiménez, 2008; Soto‐Márquez, 2018; Waters, 1994) point out, immigrants often choose between different identities following their perceptions of the opportunities open to them, Taiwanese migrants also strategically change or reveal their identities based on pragmatic needs. Taiwanese nationalism or national identity is usually downplayed within some nonprofit organizations.…”

“…From the above discussion, we know that ethnic identity is the result of a dialectical process involving internal self‐identifications and external outsiders' ascriptions (Brown & Jones, 2015; Nagel, 1994). Other scholars (Jiménez, 2008; Soto‐Márquez, 2018; Waters, 1994) have also pointed out that immigrants constantly shift their identities between a national‐based identity and an immigrant/ethnic identity according to different perceptions of race relations and of opportunities in different settings. Therefore, concepts of ethnicity, race, and nationalism cannot be dissociated from each other (Calhoun, 1993), yet, it would also be equally questionable to “construct a single unified theory of ethnicity, race, and nationalism.” (Brubaker, 2009, p. 25) Based on Brubaker's (2009) claim that distinctions can be drawn on membership, social organization, and political action, this article highlights that the focus should be placed on dynamic processes of group interaction, identity negotiation, subjective perception, and boundary making/unmaking, which I discuss in greater detail below.…”