“The prerequisite cases show that race is a social construct fabricated in part by law.” (Haney Lopez) posted by Charles Johnson at How the Tejanos Became Non-White 01 Feb 2017 2:44 pm
Ian F. Haney López, White By Law: The Legal Construction of Race (New York: New York University Press, 1996), 155.The prerequisite cases show that race is a social construct fabricated in part by law. More than this, these cases specifically illuminate the construction of Whiteness, constituting that rare instance when White racial identity is unexpectedly drawn out of the background and placed abruptly in question. Moving away from legal theory, it is useful to ask what the prerequisite cases tell us about Whiteness. It may seem that these cases say relatively little, both because the courts failed to offer a developed definition of White identity, and also seemed to concern themselves much more with who was not White. In the end, however, it is exactly these practices that tell us most about the nature of White identity today, drawing into view both the maintaining technologies of transparency and the relational construction of White and non-White identity.
