Criminalized Subjectivity and Racial Stigma: Implications for the Identity and Self-Concept of Black University Students

Abstract

Racial stigma and racial criminalization have been centralizing pillars of the construction of Blackness in the United States. Taking such systemic injustice and racism as a given, then question then becomes how these macro-level arrangements are reflected in micro-level processes. This work uses radical interactionism and stigma theory to explore the potential implications for racialized identity construction and the development of “criminalized subjectivity” among Black undergraduate students at a predominately white university in the Midwest. I use semistructured interviews to explore the implications of racial stigma and criminalization on micro-level identity construction and how understandings of these issues can change across space and over the course of one's life. Findings demonstrate that Black university students are keenly aware of this particular stigma and its consequences in increasingly complex ways from the time they are school-aged children. They were aware of this stigma as a social fact but did not internalize it as a true reflection of themselves; said internalization was thwarted through strong self-concept and racial socialization. This increasingly complex awareness is also informed by an intersectional lens for some interviewees. I argue not only that the concept of stigma must be explicitly placed within these larger systems but also that understanding and identity-building are both rooted in ever-evolving processes of interaction and meaning-making. This research contributes to scholarship that applies a critical lens to Goffmanian stigma rooted in Black sociology and criminology and from the perspectives of the stigmatized themselves.

Citation

Grayer, J. (2024), "Criminalized Subjectivity and Racial Stigma: Implications for the Identity and Self-Concept of Black University Students", Denzin, N.K. and Chen, S.-L.S. (Ed.) Symbolic Interaction and Inequality (Studies in Symbolic Interaction, Vol. 58), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 149-171. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0163-239620240000058007