Publication Date

1996

Journal or Book Title

Arizona Anthropologist

Abstract

This paper examines the interrelations of whiteness, gender, class and nationalism as represented in popular media discourses surrounding the coverage of the assault on Olympic ice skater Nancy Kerrigan and the investigation of her rival, Tonya Harding. As with other recent works that have refocused the issue of "race" on whiteness, this essay seeks to unveil the exclusionary social processes in which boundaries are set and marked within the" difference" of whiteness. The concepts of habitus and historicity are used to understand how Tonya Harding became marked as "white trash," and the implications of her "flawed" qualifications are explored. Furthermore, this paper identifies ongoing ideological struggles over moral regulation and reproduction of the nation and its subjects.

Comments


This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Pages

31-55

Volume

12

Included in

Anthropology Commons

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