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White enough, not white enough

Racism and racialisation among Poles in the UK

Bibliographic Data

ID3617841
AuthorsKasia Narkowicz (0000-0003-3733-922X, Middlesex University, corresponding author)
Year2023
Volume49
Issue6
Pages1534-1551
Publication date2023-04-03
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueNew Community (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0047-9586 • E-ISSN: 1469-9451
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/1369183x.2022.2154913
OpenAlexW4319841186
LanguageEN
Citations received58
References cited56

This paper discusses race, racialisation and whiteness in relation to Eastern European migrants living in Western Europe. Focusing on Poles in the UK, it examines both Polish migrants’ experiences of racism as well as their own investment into racial exclusions of other racialised groups. The paper interrogates how migrants navigate their peripheral whiteness in broader racial hierarchies of Eastern European in-betweenness that are both historically rooted and constantly negotiated. Benefitting from relatively easy access to the UK, Polish migrants occupy at once a racially privileged and racially marginal position that echoes historical tensions around the place of Eastern Europe in wider racial hierarchies of Europeanness. While being white enough to engage in racial exclusions Eastern Europeans are at the same time not white enough to escape racialisation. Drawing on semi-structured interviews with Poles in the UK conducted between 2019–2020 the paper offers insight into complex racialising practices of Polish migrants when they are both racialised and able to benefit from their position as ‘paler migrants’ to distance themselves from other migrants as well as ‘darker citizens’. It contributes to scholarship on racialisation of East–West movers within Europe, in-betweenness and whiteness

Anti-racism · Immigration · Political science · Racism · Scholarship · Sociology · Eastern European Communism and Reforms · Gender Studies · Law · Migration, Refugees, and Integration · Polish Historical and Cultural Studies

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Unique citing works58
Citations per year19,33
Citation span2023 - 2026 (4)
Citation velocitycurrent
Highly citedNo
Citation typesNeutral: 57
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