Racism and Discourse in Spain and Latin America

Abstract

This new book extends Teun A. van Dijk’s earlier research on discursive racism to the Latin world. He presents a first inventory of elite discourse and racism in Spain and Latin America by examining discursive reactions in Spain to recent immigration, as well as age-old racism and ethnicism in text and talk in Latin America (especially Mexico, Brazil, Argentina and Chile). Through careful analysis of the media, political discourse, textbooks and other public discourses in these countries he shows that discursive euro-racism is ubiquitous also in countries outside Europe. Spain reproduces, but as yet in a less radical way, the kind of racist discourse we find elsewhere in Western Europe. In Latin America, ethnicism and racism against the indigenous peoples and against Afrolatins has prevailed in elite discourse since colonialism and slavery. This is the first integrated study of discursive racism in the Latin world and provides a useful framework for similar research.