Chicago Sun Times Article Features Dr. Nadine Naber and Our Report: “Beyond Erasure and Profiling”
Arab American community in Chicago says data from new racial category could help address disparities
A recent Chicago Sun Times article highlighted findings from the latest IRRPP report on Arab Americans in Chicagoland Beyond Erasure and Profiling, and features lead author Dr. Nadine Naber, "Nadine Naber, a professor of gender and women's studies and global Asian studies at the University of Illinois-Chicago, described the change as transformative for the community." The lack of data collected on Arab Americans has meant that socioeconomic disparities have gone unaddressed. Naber said their research found in talking with Arab Americans that many had experienced racism at work, in interactions with police and with housing. “Even if we had all this data about racism, we wouldn’t have evidence to show that these everyday experiences of racism can help explain the socioeconomic disparities,” Naber said.
The report uses demographic research, surveys, focus group data, as well as expert commentaries by organizers and academics to analyze how systemic inequities and anti-Arab/anti-Muslim racism affect the lives of Arab Americans in employment, education, health care, housing, and policing. The report engages with the diversity of experiences among Arab American communities and their common challenge in navigating being at once hypervisible as a result of commonplace stereotypes as well as invisible due to being classified as white by government agencies and due to the general lack of knowledge about Arab Americans in our society.