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THE RACE AGAINST TIME

Lived time, Time Loss, and Black Health Opportunity

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 November 2017

Naa Oyo A. Kwate
Naa Oyo A. Kwate*
Affiliation:
Department of Africana Studies, Center for Race and Ethnicity and Department of Human Ecology, Rutgers, The State University of NewJersey
*
*Corresponding author: Naa Oyo A. Kwate, Center for Race and Ethnicity, 191 College Ave., Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, New Brunswick, NJ, 08901. E-mail: nokwate@africana.rutgers.edu
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Abstract

In this paper I argue that time is a social determinant of health, and one that perpetuates racial health inequalities. Specifically, Black people in the United States experience time losses across numerous domains throughout the life course, putting them at risk of disproportionate morbidity and mortality. Fundamental cause theory holds that social conditions structure health through pathways to resources including money, knowledge, power, prestige, freedom, and social networks. Racialized time indirectly harms health by disrupting or denying access to these flexible resources and by undoing utility among those that are obtained. Racialized time harms health directly when it produces stress and exacerbates conditions of racial subordination. I examine racialized time in three categories: 1) Black people spending too much time to meet basic needs; 2) Black people having less time spent on them than is required; and 3) lost years of (good quality of) life. Linkages between time and health disadvantage exist in material resources, interactions with the state, intimate lives, public space, and cognitive processes.

Keywords

African American/BlackTimeHealthInequalitiesHealth Disparities
Type
State of the Art
Information
Du Bois Review: Social Science Research on Race , Volume 14 , Issue 2 , Fall 2017 , pp. 497 - 514
Copyright
Copyright © Hutchins Center for African and African American Research 2017 

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