A sense of belonging within the imaginative constraints of racial realism: a critical race analysis of Latinx students’ racialized experiences during the Trump presidency

Abstract

The continued significance of Derrick Bell’s theory of racial realism is exemplified by the exclusionary sociopolitical and institutional climate that Latinx students experienced throughout the Trump presidency. I utilize various tenets from CRT and LatCrit as analytical and methodological tools for conducting a qualitative study at four colleges and universities in Southern California that explores how the Trump presidency influenced Latinx students’ “sense of belonging” on college campuses and within the broader U.S. The findings reveal how the Trump presidency influenced the lives of Latinx students in interpersonal and superstructural ways. However, I problematize the concept of “sense of belonging” within the context of racial realism by arguing that it is counterproductive to cultivate a sense of belonging within an endemically racist society and/or higher education institution. I provide pragmatic and theoretical implications for how higher education professionals can utilize racial realism as an intervention for research and praxis.

Keywords:

• Sense of belonging
• racial realism
• racist nativism
• critical race theory
• LatCrit
• Latinx students

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 I borrow from Garcia et al. (2018) in the way I employ the term “Latinx” as an umbrella term to refer to “women, men, transgender individuals, and communities that come from the Spanish-speaking Caribbean, Latin America, and/or the descendants of former Spanish colonies in the Western and Southwestern US” (p. 155). This is by no means an attempt to disregard those who identify as Chicanx or Hispanic.

2 Racial microaggressions are the “brief, everyday exchanges that send denigrating messages to people of color because they belong to a racial minority group” (Sue et al., 2007, p. 72).

3 Racist nativist microaggressions are defined as “the specific intersections of race/ethnicity and immigration status (real or perceived) that contribute to the discursive constructions of Latinx people as non-native to the United States, and justify their perceived subordinate status” (Gómez et al., 2021, p. 144).

4 Each student provided their own pseudonym or was assigned one to ensure confidentiality.

5 Critical race theory research demands that we name the institutions where racism manifests in order to ensure accountability (Patton, 2016). Unfortunately, I was required to give institutional pseudonyms due to Institutional Review Board (IRB) constraints. I do not believe the pseudonyms diminish the validity of the findings in any way, as I was primarily concerned with the influence of the phenomenon of the Trump presidency rather than how racism is reproduced by specific institutions.

6 Villenas et al. (1999) explain that “Critical race theory in education may not provide a new set of methodological tools…for the qualitative or quantitative researcher. However, the theory does provide educational researchers with an interdisciplinary, race-based interpretive framework aimed at social justice” (p. 32).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Sy Stokes

Sy Stokes is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow for the National Center for Institutional Diversity at the University of Michigan. His research is focused on campus racial climate, critical theories of race, and student activism.