Moral And Immoral Whiteness In Immigration Politics PDF Download

his dissertation examines the determinants, both internal- and external factors, of attitudes towards restrictive immigration policies. I frame my examination and discussion of this research within a larger argument about immigration as a series of racial projects that have and continue to contribute to the imaginaries of American-ness. Essential to these racial projects are both internal and external factors, of which I focus on individual level predispositions as internal factors, and the media and geographic context as the external factors. First, at the individual level, I explore the ways in which five predispositions - racial resentment, authoritarianism, moral traditionalism, anti-egalitarianism, and social dominance orientation-affect individuals' attitudes towards immigration policies, and I argue that underlying these predispositions are conceptions of American national identity. Second, the media works as an external factor to frame the issue of immigration in ways that are not only predominately negative and conflate illegality with Latinos and immigrants alike, but also in ways that engage the aforementioned predispositions further emphasizing the link between immigration and the definition of what it means to be "American." Finally, geographic context is key to understanding attitudes towards restrictive immigration policies. Geographic context is associated with both varying levels of individual's predispositions and the framing of immigration in the media. Moreover, territory and borders (as part of geographic contexts) are intricate concepts vis-a-vis the birth of American nationalism. Borders delineate us from them. Accordingly, geographic contexts are interlaced with sociopolitical historical legacies. Environments -- whether a neighborhood, state or a region -- have a specific history that is embedded within the psyche of that environment in ways that affect contemporary immigration rhetoric and discourse. I put forward a novel theoretical framework that furthers our understanding of immigration politics, and that has wide applicability beyond the immigration context.