Abstract
Reinventing Race, Reinventing Racism, edited by John J. Betancur and Cedric Herring, is an important work on a timely subject. The book provides a comprehensive account of a series of new challenges confronted by immigrants to the United States in the 21st century. Contributors address the theoretical implications of new forms of race and racism, and they go further to provide empirical evidence and related policy implications.
Several themes emerge from this book, which examines the role of race in health, education, crime, income, and political engagement. Three chapters evaluate housing, community redevelopment projects, and the related displacement problems. Three chapters analyze the new forms that race and racism take in this era of globalization and the fascinating ways that immigration shapes and reshapes racial boundaries. Three further chapters focus on the criminalization of immigrant youth and families. Other chapters examine political empowerment and the ways that immigrants mobilize around race.
Reinventing Race brings together solid interdisciplinary scholarship from urban planners, sociologists, and public policy analysts. While it would have been helpful to have a wider scope of racialized groups, and particularly to address the issues faced by Asian American immigrants who are not specifically Muslim but also face racial discrimination in their everyday life in America, the editors are to be commended for bringing new voices and new perspectives to these important issues we face.