Professor Roger Waldinger
Department of Sociology
UCLA
Hershey Hall 2525
Office hours: Tuesdays, 9-11am, and by appointment.
Telephone: 206-9233

Sociology 235
Comparative Immigration

This course is entitled "Theories of Ethnicity," a title that would seem to violate truth in advertising laws, if not good sociological sense. A root problem is that neither of the two nouns in the course title do an adequate job of describing the subject of study. On the one hand, the course's purview extends considerably beyond "ethnicity" as customarily understood. A more appropriately labeled course would focus on the social phenomena denoted by the concepts of "race" and "nationalism", as well as "ethnicity". Of course, such a course would be a twenty, not a ten-week endeavour and its intellectual demands would exceed this instructor's capacity. On the other hand, the word "theories" seems excessively ambitious in light of the much more modest intellectual reach of much of the work in this field. While the field suffers from no shortage of so-called theories, most are concerned with middle-range, or even middle of the middle-range phenomena. I find myself hard-pressed to think of a theory that convincingly treats the entire scope of ethnic phenomena - ethnic group formation, maintenance, decline, inter-ethnic conflict, the relationship between ethnicity and other social affiliations and identities - within a single, encompassing intellectual framework. Of course, classical theories, or rather those who lay claim to the classical thinkers, appear to present just such an all-encompassing approach. But in my reading, these are essentially sensitivities informed by a Marxist, Weberian, Durkheimian, or what-have-you perspective, which, however insightful, do not an adequate theory make.

So if this course is mislabeled, what are we doing and why? As I've designed it, this course focusses on those phenomena denoted by the concepts of "race" and "ethnicity", with both concepts in quotation marks since the status of each concept is precisely what we seek to examine. Above all, we will try to gain clarity as to the nature of the concepts we use, and the problematic relationship between those concepts and the social phenomena to which we refer. We will also seek to appreciate the theoretical status of the major conceptual approaches: how do they define the (limited) phenomena they seek to explain? what are the major factors/variables that enter into the explanatory framework? how are these factors/variables expected to affect the outcome of interest? We will also spend time discussing approaches directly influenced by classical sociological theory, but rather than focus on so-called theoretical work, which seems to be mainly hot air, we will focus on some substantive topics, in order to learn how a particular, classical sensitivity may inform more empirically-oriented work.

My assumption is that most of the students enrolling in this course will principally be interested in American (or to be sensitive to the concerns of this course, United Statesian) society. Me too, but that's not the point of this course. As our work will focus on concepts and conceptual approaches,it is therefore useful to gain distance from the study of the United States, and therefore I have included a great deal of comparative material, and some historical material as well.

In this vein, let me be clear about the nature of the discussions I hope to pursue. One can criticize a theory or conceptual approach for its inapplicability to a particular social situation, or its failure to adequately specify the crucial elements at work in that setting. As case in point, consider the huge literature on assimilation in the United States, much of which contends that "assimilation theory", whatever that is, does not apply to such and such group. I've made the same argument myself, but for the purposes of this course, it's irrelevant. When considering this topic, the key questions, instead, are those specified above: to what social phenomena does the concept of "assimilation" refer? what are the factors that supposedly produce "assimilation", assuming that it can be adequately defined? is there a logical connection between those factors and the outcome of interest? does the theory satisfactorily exclude alternative explanations?

For better or worse, this course is a reading course and there is plenty of reading. I have not ordered books, but have rather assembled a lengthy reader, which will be available for purchase from Quinx Copy, in Westwood, shortly before classes begin. In addition, all readings will be placed on reserve in URL. I will anticipate that each student will come to class prepared. I will expect full participation - and will encourage it by calling on every student in every class.

There will be two requirements. I will ask you to write weekly memos, in response to questions that I give you the preceding week. I will then return these questions, with comments, the week after they are due. I will also assign a take-home final.

I will hold

September 30: Week 1: Introduction

October 7: Week 2: Concepts of Ethnicity

Ellis Cashmore, "Ethnicity", in Cashmore, ed., Dictionary of Race and Ethnic Relations, New York: Routledge: 1994

Malcolm Chapman, et al,. "Introduction: History and Social Anthropology," in Tonkin, et al., History and Ethnicity, London: Routledge, 1989, pp. 11-17.

Ronald Cohen, "Ethnicity: Problem and Focus in Anthropology," Annual Review of Anthropology, 1978

Nathan Glazer and D.P. Moynihan, Ethnicity, Cambridge: Havard University Press, 1975, Chapter 1.

William Petersen, "Concepts of Ethnicity," in Harvard Encyclopedia of American Ethnic Groups, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1980

Donald Horowitz, Ethnic Groups in Conflict, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986, Chapter 1

Manning Nash, The Cauldron of Ethnicity, Chapter 1

Werner Sollors, Beyond Ethnicity: Consent and Descent in American Culture, New York: Oxford, 1986, Chapter 1

Stephen Thernstom, et. al., "Introduction", Harvard Encyclopedia of American Ethnic Groups

Pierre van den Berghe, "Minorities", in Cashmore, ed.

optional:

Max Boehm, "National Minorities," Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences (1936)

Caroline Ware, "Ethnic Communities," in Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences (1936)

October 14: Week 3: Race: A (Social) Scientific Concept?

Kwame Anthony Appiah, In My Father's House: Africa in the Philosophy of Culture, Chapter 1

Michael Banton, "Caucasian," "Genotype," "Phenotype", "Unesco" in Cashmore, ed.

Frantz Fanon, "The Fact of Blackness," in D. T. Goldberg, ed. The Anatomy of Racism, Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press

Colette Guillaumin, Racism, sexism, power, and ideology, London: Routledge, 1995, Chapter 1.

James King, The Biology of Race, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1981: Chapters 1,6,7

Week 3 (cont'd)

Robert Miles, "Race: Perspective Two," in Cashmore, ed; Racism and Migrant Labour, London: Routledge, 1982, Chapter 1

Michael Omi and Howard Winant, Racial Formation in the United States, New York: Routledge, 1986 (1994): pp. 9-23; 47-76.

John Rex, Race Relations in Sociological Theory, London: Routledge, 1970, Chapter 1

Pierre van den Berghe, "Race: Perspective One," in Cashmore, ed.

optional:

Franz Boas, "Race" in Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences (1936)

Marvin Harris, "Race", in International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, (1968)

October 21: Week 4: Theories of Ethnicity

Fredrik Barth, "Introduction," Ethnic groups and boundaries : the social organization of culture difference. Boston : Little, Brown and Company, 1969.

Jack Eller and Reed Coughlin, "The Poverty of Primordialism: the demystification of ethnic attachments," Ethnic and Racial Studies, V. 10, 2, 1993

Clifford Geertz, "The Integrative Revolution," pp. 103-130 in C. Geertz, ed.. Old Societies and New States, New York: Free Press

James Geschwender, "Portuguese and Haoles," American Sociological Review, V. 53, 4, 1988

Donald Horowitz, Ethnic Groups in Conflict, Chapter 2

Joane Nagel, "Constructing Ethnicity: Creating and Recreating Ethnic Identity and Culture," Social Problems, V, 41, 4, 1994

Sandra Wallman, "The Boundaries of 'Race': Processes of Ethnicity in England," Man 1978, V. 13

Max Weber, "Ethnic Groups," in Economy and Society, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978.

Michel Wieviorka, "Ethnicity as Action," in John Rex and Beatrice Drury, Ethnic Mobilisation in Multi-Cultural Europe, Aldershot: Avebury.

October 28: Week 5: Race ("Race"?) and Society

Andre Beteille, "Race, Caste, and Ethnic Identity," in Leo Kuper, ed. Race, Science, and Society, UNESCO, 1976

Gerald D. Berreman, "Race, Caste, and Other Invidious Distinctions in Social Stratification," Race, 1972

Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, "Rethinking Racism," American Sociological Review, V. 62, 3, 1997

Frank Dikotter, "Group Definition and the idea of 'race' in modern China (1793-1949), Ethnic and Racial Studies, V. 13, 3, 1990.

Barbara Fields, "Slavery, Race, and Ideology in the United States of America," New Left Review,

William Chester Jordan, "The Medieval Background," in Jack Salzman and Cornel West, eds., Struggles in the Promised Land: Toward a History of Black-Jewish Relations, New York: Oxford, 1997

George Fredrickson and Dale Knobel, "A History of Discrimination," in Harvard Encyclopedia of American Ethnic Groups

George Mosse, Toward the Final Solution: A History of European Racism, New York: Howard Fertig, 1978, pp. 1-34

optional:

Oliver Cox, "The Modern Caste School of Race Relations," Social Forces, 1942: 218-226 (reprinted in Thomas Pettigrew, ed., The Sociology of Race Relations, New York: Free Press, 1980).

W. Lloyd Warner, "American Caste and Class," American Journal of Sociology, 1937: 234-7 (reprinted in Pettigrew)

November 4: Week 6: Marxisms and Ethnicity

Case 1: Classical/Critical Marxism on "The Jewish Question"

Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno, The Dialectic of Enlightenment, "Elements of Anti-Semitism"

Abram Leon, Marxism and the Jewish Question, New York: Pathfinder, 1970 (1946), Chapters 1, 7

Ernest Mandel, The Meaning of the Second World War, Chapter 9

Franz Neumann, Behemoth: The Structure and Practice of National Socialism, "The Racial People;" "Anti-Semitism"

Enzo Traverso, The Marxists and the Jewish Question: the History of a Debate (1843-1943), Introduction, Chapter 5

Case 2: British Neo-Marxism on Race ("Race") and Migration

Robert Miles, Racism and Migrant Labour, Chapters 6 & 7

Paul Gilroy, There ain't no black in the Union Jack, Chapter 1

John Solomos, "Marxism and Racism," in Cashmore, ed.

November 11: Week 7: Weberian perspectives

John Rex, Race Relations in Sociological Theory, London: Routledge, 1970, Chapter 7

Frank Parkin, Marxism: A Bourgeois Critique, New York: Columbia University Press, 1979, Chapters 3,4,5

Rogers Brubaker, Citizenship and Nationhood in France and Germany, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1992; Introduction, Chapters 1, 7, 8

November 18: Week 8: Theories of Assimilation

Harold Abramson, "Assimilation and Pluralism," in Harvard Encyclopedia of American Ethnic Groups

Richard Alba and Victor Nee, "The relevance of assimilation for post-1965 immigrant groups," Paper prepared for the Social Science Research Council Conference on "American Becoming/Becoming American", January 1996, pp. 1-56

Herbert Gans, "Symbolic Ethnicity: The Future of Ethnic Groups and Culture in America," Ethnic and Racial Studies, 1979

Nathan Glazer and Daniel Moynihan, 1969, Beyond the Melting Pot, Cambridge: MIT Press, 1969, Preface;