Neo-race Realities in the Obama Era

Edited by Heather E. Harris

Subjects: Political Communication, Presidency, The, Cultural Studies, African American Studies, Political Sociology
Hardcover : 9781438474151, 174 pages, May 2019
Paperback : 9781438474144, 174 pages, January 2020

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Table of contents

List of Illustrations

Foreword
Amardo Rodríguez

Acknowledgments

Introduction
Heather E. Harris

Part I

1. Obama’s Transformation of American Myths
Zoë Hess Carney

2. Transformational Masculinity and Fathering in the Age of Obama: “Roses and Thorns”
Shanette M. Harris

3. How Obama’s Hybridity Stifled Black Nationalist Rhetorical Identity: An Ideological Analysis on His Two-Term
Third-Space Leadership
Omowale T. Elson

Part II

4. “Who Gets to Say Hussein? The Impact of Anti-Muslim Sentiment during the Obama Era”
Nura A. Sediqe

5. The End of AIDS? A Critical Analysis of the National HIV/AIDS Strategy
Andrew R. Spieldenner, Tomeka M. Robinson, and Anjuliet G. Woodruffe

6. The President Was Black, Y’all: Presidential Humor, Neo-racism, and the Social Construction of Blackness and
Whiteness
Jenny Ungbha Korn

7. L’homme de la créolisation: Obama, Neo-racism, and Cultural and Territorial Creolization
Douglas-Wade Brunton

Notes
List of Contributors
Index

Considers the impact of neo-racism during the Obama presidency.

Description

Neo-race Realities in the Obama Era expands the discourse about Barack Obama's two terms as president by reflecting upon the impact of neo-racism during his tenure. Continually in conversation with Étienne Balibar's conceptualization of neo-racism as being racism without race, the contributors examine how identities become the target of neo-racist discriminatory practices and policies in the United States. Individual chapters explore how President Obama's multiple and intersecting identities beyond the racial binaries of Black and White were perceived, as well as how his presence impacted certain marginalized groups in our society as a result of his administration's policies. Evidencing the hegemonic complexity of neo-racism in the United States, the contributors illustrate how the mythic post-race society that many wished for on election night in 2008 was deferred, in order to return to the uncomfortable comfort zone of the way America used to be.

Heather E. Harris is Professor of Communication at Stevenson University. She is coeditor (with Kimberly R. Moffitt and Catherine R. Squires) of The Obama Effect: Multidisciplinary Renderings of the 2008 Campaign, also published by SUNY Press.

Reviews

"…a collection of seven insightful essays on the issues of identity and power during that pivotal time in American history." — Montreal Community Contact

"Well organized and compelling, this book covers everything from perspectives on the AIDS epidemic to racial authenticity, yet the reader never forgets that he/she is on a journey through the Age of Obama and its many contested nuances." — Ricky L. Jones, author of What's Wrong with Obamamania? Black America, Black Leadership, and the Death of Political Imagination