What Does Race Have to Do with It?

Abstract

Lorick-Wilmot examines contemporary race relations in terms of post-Civil Rights era policies, ethnicity, education, employment, residential patterns, language choice and treatment by law enforcement, and as it relates to the American Dream trope of middle class success. She presents the national demographic profile of Middle Class Second Generation Caribbean Immigrants to show their social import, both in numbers and their place at the intersection of several social strata, by pointing to the ways this cohort of English, French, Dutch and particularly Spanish-speaking people are identified and counted in the US Census. Lorick-Wilmot argues these census counts reveal the intersectional and complex ways legacies of colonialism and colorism influence this generation’s racial and ethnic self-identification and their identification by the government, which have direct implications for the communities they reside in.