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Challenging the hierarchies of Swedish whiteness: Negative experiences and undesired effects of passing as white and Swedish
Södertörn University, School of Historical and Contemporary Studies, Ethnology.ORCID iD: 0000-0001-6482-9182
2022 (English)In: Kulturella perspektiv - Svensk etnologisk tidskrift, ISSN 1102-7908, Vol. 31, p. 1-9Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]

This article focuses on the hierarchies inherent in the Swedish version of whiteness and shows how these hierarchical structures are challenged by subjects placed within the category white. Passing as white is often presumed to be something sought after. The aim of this article is however to empirically explore the other side of the coin, that is, negative experiences and undesired effects of passing as white. With theoretical inspiration drawn from critical race- and whiteness studies, interview narratives from 31 women and men in the rarely researched area of descendants of Polish migrants in Sweden, are examined. The analysis shows that the descendants in various ways contested racialized ascriptions of whiteness, Swedishness and sameness. They furthermore voiced a dissonance between the sameness they were attributed and their own perceptions of otherness, thereby illustrating that betweenship can also be experienced by descendants that pass as white.

Abstract [sv]

Den här artikeln intresserar sig för de hierarkier som finns invävda i den svenska versionen av vithet och synliggör hur dessa utmanas av subjekt som passerar som vita. Att passera som vit antas ofta vara något eftersträvansvärt. Syftet här är dock att empiriskt undersöka den andra sidan av myntet, nämligen negativa erfarenheter och oönskade effekter av att passera som vit. Med teoretisk inspiration från kritiska ras- och vithetstudier analyseras djupintervjuer med 31 kvinnor och män i den underutforskade kategorin vuxna barn till polska migranter i Sverige. Analysen visar att de intervjuade på olika sätt utmanade rasifierande tillskrivningar av vithet, svenskhet och likhet. De gav vidare uttryckt för erfarenheter av dissonans mellan den likhet de tillskrevs och de egna upplevelserna av olikhet. Artikeln visar därmed att mellanförskap kan erfaras även av vuxna barn till migranter som passerar som vita. 

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Umeå: Föreningen Kulturella Perspektiv , 2022. Vol. 31, p. 1-9
Keywords [en]
whiteness, Sweden, descendants of Polish migrants, passing, betweenship
Keywords [sv]
vithet, Sverige, vuxna barn till polska migranter, passera, mellanförskap
National Category
Ethnology
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:sh:diva-49610DOI: 10.54807/kp.v31.1975OAI: oai:DiVA.org:sh-49610DiVA, id: diva2:1683729
Part of project
Transnationalism and belonging in the Baltic Sea region among descendants to Polish migrants in Sweden, The Foundation for Baltic and East European Studies
Funder
The Foundation for Baltic and East European Studies, 28/2017Available from: 2022-07-18 Created: 2022-07-18 Last updated: 2024-12-19Bibliographically approved

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Runfors, Ann

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CiteExportLink to record
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Citation style
  • apa
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  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • harvard-anglia-ruskin-university
  • apa-old-doi-prefix.csl
  • sodertorns-hogskola-harvard.csl
  • sodertorns-hogskola-oxford.csl
  • Other style
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