Ghettoized and marginalized: The coverage of racial and ethnic groups in introductory sociology texts

The coverage of race and ethnic groups in introductory sociology textbooks is studied fora sample of 25 texts. Using index citation counts, we assess the extent, ghettoization, and inclusiveness or topical breadth of coverage. Race-ethnic coverage is found to be fairly extensive and broad; however, it is ghettoized, with the majority of citations confined to a chapter on race. Ghettoization is coupled with a pattern of topical coverage that finds most references to race-ethnicity clustered in a limited set of sociological topics. Together, these findings suggest that people of color are marginalized from many of the major concerns of the text. Newly published or revised texts appear to be more inclusive. Implications for course development and textbook selection and revision are discussed.