ABSTRACT
Drawing on structured action theory, the author examines the ways in which racially and ethnically motivated hate crime emerges as a forceful means of constructing identity and difference within the institutional settings of culture, labor, sexuality, and power. The author summarizes the trends in racially and ethnically motivated violence nationwide and then explores hate crimes as a readily available means of doing difference. The author argues that racially motivated violence is not an aberration associated with a lunatic or extremist fringe. Instead, it is a normative means of asserting racial identity relative to the victimized other; it is an enactment—of the racism that allocates privilege along racial lines.
