Moving racisms, shifting targets: An analysis of race in postcolonial Britain

In order to explore the contemporary manifestations and meanings of race and its operation within racist discourse and practice, this paper draws on a secondary analysis of two qualitative research studies. The first study involved young separated migrants seeking sanctuary in Britain and the second focused on the experiences of lone white mothers of mixed-parentage children. Here we analyse the everyday and structural racism experienced by each group in order to consider how seemingly different manifestations of race and racism are in fact linked together and in some ways dependent on each other within a postcolonial logic that reconstructs race and racism to serve shifting hegemonic interests. The discussion seeks to address the salience of race and racism in contemporary Britain and how this interrelates with other social inequalities, such as migration status and family composition.