What blood won't tell
Subtitle: a history of race on trial in america
By: Ariela J. Gross.
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Published: 2008
Place of publication: Cambridge, Mass
Language: eng
Number of pages: 368
ISBN-13: 9780674031302
Subjects: Race discrimination -- Law and legislation -- United States; Minorities -- Legal status, laws, etc. -- United States; United States -- Race relations
Description: Gross (Univ. of Southern California, School of Law) writes an amazing book that addresses the relationship between race and citizenship in the US. This book reminds us that the imaginary connection between racial identity and fitness for citizenship remains potent today and continues to impede racial justice and equality. Challenging the presumption of many scholars of the dominance of the one-drop rule in conferring black status, Gross argues that despite the rule, in court and by custom, racial boundaries were much more fluid and flexible yet, primarily in the service of white supremacy. Through a close reading of racial identity trials in America, this book offers an eloquent contribution to ongoing debates over affirmative action, identity politics and the construction of a "colorblind" society.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: The common sense of race; title: Performing whiteness; title: Race as association; title: Citizenship of the "little races"; title: Black Indian identity in the allotment era; title: From nation to race in Hawai'i; title: Racial science, immigration, and the "white races"; title: Mexican Americans and the "Caucasian cloak".