Research projects
Cooking Up Inequality!
Maître Divas & Misogynoir
Maître Divas & Misogynoir
DISSERTATION RESEARCH
Cooking Up Inequality: An Ethnographic Study of Racial Hierarchies in Miami's Restaurant Industry
Racial inequality is a significant problem in the US Restaurant Industry. In Miami, a tropical tourist destination with a majority Latinx population, restaurants serve as a site of multiculturalism, and are promoted by officials as a place where visitors can enjoy ethnic food and culture. However, these same locations of diversity are also spaces where whiteness is normalized as superior and racial hierarchies ensue. Previous studies have documented racism in the restaurant industry but fail to address the intersectional complexities that arise when race is layered with gender, class, nationality, language, and sexual orientation.
Maître Divas & Misogynoir
Maître Divas & Misogynoir
Maître Divas & Misogynoir
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CURRENT RESEARCH
Dr. Williams' current research on “Maître Divas”, Black women who work in lucrative front of the house positions in the restaurant industry, examines how Black women navigate entrenched misogynoir to make themselves indispensable in an industry that has historically restricted race and gender diversity. This work centers Black women’s experiences as a lens through which we can evaluate the effect of white norming practices on tokenized minorities, who are simultaneously expected to conform to heteropatriarchal systems and diversify white restaurant culture.