‘They're not racist …’ Prejudice denial, mitigation and suppression in dialogue

Abstract

Social scientific work on the suppression, mitigation or denial of prejudiced attitudes has tended to focus on the strategic self-presentation and self-monitoring undertaken by individual social actors on their own behalf. In this paper, we argue that existing perspectives might usefully be extended to incorporate three additional considerations. First, that social actors may, on some occasions, act to defend not only themselves, but also others from charges of prejudice. Second, that over the course of any social encounter, interactants may take joint responsibility for policing conversation and for correcting and suppressing the articulation of prejudiced talk. Third, that a focus on the dialogic character of conversation affords an appreciation of the ways in which the status of any particular utterance, action or event as 'racist' or 'prejudiced' may constitute a social accomplishment. Finally, we note the logical corollary of these observations - that in everyday life, the occurrence of 'racist discourse' is likely to represent a collaborative accomplishment, the responsibility for which is shared jointly between the person of the speaker and those other co-present individuals who occasion, reinforce or simply fail to suppress it.

Narratives of sex-segregated professional identities

“…These findings align with a number of other studies reporting on how group members enhance positive in-group identity whilst reinforcing in-group-out-group distinctiveness (e.g. Condor 2006;Condor et al, 2006;De Cillia et al, 1999;Ladegaard, 2011;Ladegaard & Cheng, 2014).…”

“…This is a struggle similarly reported in analyses of intergroup prejudice and stereotyping (e.g. Condor, 2006;Condor et al, 2006;Galasińska & Galasińska, 2003;Ladegaard & Cheng, 2014).…”

“…see e.g. Condor, 2006;Condor et al, 2006;Galasińska & Galasińska, 2003;Ladegaard & Cheng, 2014). Francis engages in a form of oracular reasoning (whereby a "basic premise is confronted with contradictory evidence, but the evidence is ignored or rejected" Galasińska & Galasińska, 2003, p.849) in order to attend (interactionally) to the defence of his career specialisation, whilst simultaneously establishing and maintaining group solidarity with his fellow SLTs.…”

Discursive Approaches to Race and Racism

“…Research based on focus group data has thus been able to add a more strongly interactional focus to the examination of themes similar to those discussed above, including new racisms and the denial of racism (see, e.g., Augoustinos, Tuffin, & Every, 2005;Goodman & Burke, 2010). Particularly noteworthy in this regard are Condor's (2006) analysis of how participants interactionally collaborate in the production of subtly racist talk, and the extension of previous analyses of denials of racism to consider not just how denials can be produced by a speaker on his/her own behalf, but also how other speakers may deny racism on behalf of others, and may collaboratively suppress potentially racist utterances (Condor, Figgou, Abell, Gibson, & Stevenson, 2006). In addition, studies focus group data have examined how racial and ethnic identities are interactionally constructed and managed, particularly in the context of talk in which matters of race and racism are explicitly at stake (e.g., Verkuyten, 1997Verkuyten, , 2003.…”

“…The interactional features of focus group data have also been used to address the abovementioned tendency to privilege researchers' definitions of racism over those of participants, examining how participants can interactionally construct particular definitions of racism to address specific interactional contingencies, and how other participants may align with or contest these definitions at different interactional moments (e.g., Condor, et al, 2006;Whitehead & Wittig, 2004). Similarly, focus group data have facilitated analyses of how racial or racist discourses may be responded to by other participants in either aligning or resistant ways, and how the original producers of discourses may maintain their positions or back down in the face of challenges from others (e.g., Verkuyten, 1998).…”