My Research

There is a contemporary debate over the utility and/or harm racial recognition has caused, polarized by the eliminativism on one end and conservatism on the other. Eliminativism considers racial categorization to be mistaken and oppressive and thus calls for the abandonment of it altogether. Conservatism feels that racial identities are beneficial and must be preserved, yet reformed. Both positions look for a change in the way we perceive race. The motivation behind my research paper is an intuition that Americans have a preset qualitative belief on race that lurks in one’s subconscious. If this is so, such an implicit bias poses problems for reforming modern racial categorization in either direction (eliminativism or conservatism). How do you autonomously overcome something you are not even aware of?

My intuition is empirically grounded in the implicit association test (IAT), a psych study revealing that our opinions on race elude our consciousness and are not necessarily available to introspection. In my research paper, I plan to use this empirical platform to embark on a discussion regarding the pitfalls of eliminativism and/or conservatism (I might just choose one to focus on) as well as the potential solution to reforming our ideas on race (once establishing that our current ideas are diseased and undesirable). In my pragmatic prescription to the diagnosis, I foresee the possibility of appealing to concepts developed by W.E.B De-Bois, specifically on his ideas for self-empowerment of the suppressed races.