Adjectives and predication can reorient racial labels into negotiated identity categories

Evidence

While Eric negatively characterizes Jin’s roommate as a ‘prototypical whitey’, Jin describes the ‘ghetto whiteys’ in his working-class neighborhood as ‘cool’. In this interaction, adjectives and predication reorient the social meaning of whitey from a fixed racial reference term to an intersubjectively negotiated identity category. — Mary Bucholtz and Kira Hall, Identity and Interaction, 54

Categorization

• XREF: Directly feeds the reader’s project on identity as ‘routing and reinvention’ kept open in real conversational data — label categories bent open by modifiers in situ. — connects to: Naturalized racial labels perform their own silencing of hybrid identities — Stuart Hall, Essential Essays, Volume 2: Identity…, 860; Prejudice is sustained through routine conversational identity categorization — Cristian Tileagă, The Nature of Prejudice: Society,…, 508; Identities are reinforced by outsider-given labels (+8 more)
• DEFINE: Shows concretely what an ‘intersubjectively negotiated identity category’ means as opposed to a fixed referential term.

Broader Connections

• Fragmenting dominant slogans linguistically lets colonized subjects remap their own identity #exemplifies (0.82) — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 2505
• Negational identity is manipulated by writing about not being a Caucasian #exemplifies (0.80) — Chen-Bo Zhong, Adam D. Galinsky, and Miguel M. Unzueta, Negational racial identity and…, 24
• Words function as performative interpretations rather than nominal labels #corroborates (0.80)
• Naturalized racial labels perform their own silencing of hybrid identities #complicates (0.78) — Stuart Hall, Essential Essays, Volume 2, 860
• Linguistics decentered identity by showing subjects are positioned in pre-existing discourse #complicates (0.76)
• Prejudice is sustained through routine conversational identity categorization #expands (0.75) — Cristian Tileagă, The Nature of Prejudice, 508
• Racial identity functions as practice and intention, not just appearance #expands (0.75)
• Category labels like race and mentality are evaluative interpretations, not neutral designations #expands (0.74) — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 570
• Race both creates belonging and produces rejection through categorization #qualifies (0.73)
• Identities are reinforced by outsider-given labels #qualifies (0.72)