Yes We Can?: White Racial Framing and the Obama Presidency

The first edition of this book offered one of the first social science analyses of Barack Obama’s historic electoral campaigns and early presidency. In this second edition the authors extend that analysis to Obama’s service in the presidency and to his second campaign to hold that presidency. Elaborating on the concept of the white racial frame, Harvey Wingfield and Feagin assess in detail the ways white racial framing was deployed by the principal characters in the electoral campaigns and during Obama’s presidency. With much relevant data, this book counters many commonsense assumptions about U.S. racial matters, politics, and institutions, particularly the notion that Obama’s presidency ushered in a major post-racial era. Readers will find this fully revised and updated book distinctively valuable because it relies on sound social science analysis to assess numerous events and aspects of this historic campaign.

Adia Harvey Wingfield is an associate professor of sociology at Georgia State University. Her research focuses on the ways intersections of race and gender shape various groups’ experiences in different occupations. Her recent work addresses the experiences of black male nurses, minority faculty at independent schools, and black female entrepreneurs.

Joe R. Feagin is Ella C. McFadden Professor at Texas A&M University. Feagin has done research on racism and sexism issues for 48 years and has served as the Scholar-in-Residence at the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. He has written many scholarly books and articles in his major research areas, and one book (Ghetto Revolts) has been nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. He was the 1999-2000 president of the American Sociological Association.