Culturalized Heterogeneities: Comparing Race and Religion in Germany and the U.S.

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to discuss in a comparative perspective the role of race and religion as heterogeneities in Germany and the U.S. Both categories are crucial for the legitimation of symbolic and social boundaries and thus for the (re-)production of social inequalities. We argue that the culturalization of these heterogeneities - the categorization of group differences along cultural markers and thus the ascription of attitudes and behavior to these categories - becomes particularly visible in a cross-national perspective. To develop this argument, we draw on important comparative work that emphasizes the boundary-making processes along the categorization of religion and race. We present and discuss our findings from a cross-national analysis of several heterogeneities, in particular religion and race as salient heterogeneities in Germany and the U.S., respectively. Our approach and findings open up the discussion of race and religion as functional equivalents in processes of culturalization and inequality production in an empirical cross-national comparison. We argue that comparative studies in sociology contribute to a deeper understanding of the cultural determinants of migrants’ social inequalities.