Public prejudice as collaborative accomplishment: towards a dialogic social psychology of racism

Existing social psychological perspectives tend to overlook the fact that public expressions of racial, ethnic or national prejudice normally constitute collaborative accomplishments, the product of joint action between a number of individuals. Awareness of the inherently dialogical character of prejudiced talk affords appreciation of the ways in which expressions of ethnic or racial antipathy need not simply be used to display a speaker's private attitudes or to defend a group position, but may also be oriented to the local context of talk in action. Recognizably prejudiced talk may be used to claim the floor, to bully, to amuse, to shock, to display intimacy and solidarity, to mark a variety of personal and social identities or to key the informal, backstage, character of a social encounter. The fact that prejudiced talk can be intricately woven through the delicate choreography of everyday sociability may greatly complicate any attempts to challenge it.