Neighborhoods and Racial Progressiveness

Growing up across the street from a cornfield and a horse farm in rural Illinois meant that as a child my interactions with races outside of my own were limited.  My five closets friends, many who I met in high school (which was surrounded by cornfields) are white as well.  I grew up in a highly racially segregated community with maybe 2 to 3 percent of my high school’s students being minorities.  Bonilla-Silva dives into the concept of racial progressiveness in Detroit, which ultimately results in white women from the working class to be the most racially progressive demographic.  This data originates from fifteen years ago, and a new Reuters/Ipsos poll surveyed over four thousand Americans to see how racially diverse American’s acquaintances (coworkers, friends, relatives) are.

The results of the poll were that “30 percent of Americans are not mixing with others of a different race” (Dunsmuir) and that about 40 percent of white Americans were not mixing with others of a different race.  One of the people who were polled, Kevin Shaw, may fit into Bonilla-Silva’s descriptions of someone who is racially progressive.   Shaw, who is white, grew up in downtown Kansas City, Missouri and attended a high school where he was in the minority.  He met his wife in high school, who is a Hispanic.  Shaw shares some of the same traits as the women who Bonilla-Silva identified as racially progressive.  Though Shaw’s comments were not published at great length, he commented that (when his neighbors asked if his mother-in-law was his maid) that “it was just a matter of ignorance," and “a lot of it comes down to where you grow up” (Dunsmuir).

The poll found that “as a group, Pacific states - including California, the most populous in the nation - are the most diverse when it comes to love and friendship. By contrast, the South has the lowest percentage of people with more than five acquaintances from races that don't reflect their own” (Dunsmuir).  Author of Some of My Best Friends Are Black: The Strange Story of Integration in America Tanner Colby, who  grew up in Birmingham, Alabama, was surprised that the 40 percent of whites who didn’t mix with others outside of their race wasn’t higher.  Colby set out to write a book that explained why he didn’t have any black friends growing up, or even as a young adult, despite his eagerness to vote for Barack Obama.  Integration in the South, Colby argues, almost only occurred when initiated by blacks or when busing which “treated the issue of integration as a largely mathematical one” (Demby). Like Shaw, Colby came to the conclusion that “most people's social circles become entrenched as they get older; if you don't have friends of a different race by the time you're settling down, you're not likely to have many opportunities to make any” (Demby).

While these poll numbers might seem daunting, the Reuters/Ipsos poll showed that not all hope was lost.  Younger Americans, as a population, are more likely to have interactions with people of a different race.  “About one third of Americans under the age of 30 who have a partner or spouse are in a relationship with someone of a different race, compared to one tenth of Americans over 30. And only one in 10 adults under 30 say no one among their families, friends or coworkers is of a different race, less than half the rate for Americans as a whole” (Dunsmuir).   While interviewing people for his book, Colby said that the biggest issue for people, no matter their race was “comfort” (Demby).  If people are willing to reach across the racial lines running through America, despite it being uncomfortable, friendships and relationships can be formed that might make the generation after us Millennials to be even more racially progressive.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/08/08/us-usa-poll-race-idUSBRE97704320130808

http://www.npr.org/blogs/codeswitch/2013/08/11/210585899/some-of-my-best-friends-arent-black-or-brown-or-asian