Perceptions of Whiteness in NASCAR’s Geographies
摘要
This chapter explores how the spatial geographies of NASCAR are shaped and experienced through the lens of whiteness, focusing on the ways Black fans make sense of and navigate the sport’s racial boundaries. It is through this vantage point that participants demonstrate a nuanced understanding of whiteness, particularly through an awareness of NASCAR as a White space, how to effectively navigate such a White space, and a contextualization of more recent enactments of whiteness within these spaces. How Black fans make meaning of whiteness within the geographies of NASCAR is made apparent, advancing theoretical understandings of how whiteness is perceived and represented in the Black imagination. Informed by Southern regional identity and the navigation of White space, these representations of whiteness as exclusive, fearful, and possessive are made salient through NASCAR’s attachment to racialized cultural values. The result is an enriched understanding of how whiteness operates as both structure and culture, and how its presence is made legible through the spatial practices and perceptions of those excluded from its normative framework.