Barbara VS Omi and Winant
Formation of Race
In Slave, Race, and Ideology in the United States, Barbara Fields explains how race was created in order to justify slavery in a free nation. There is no biological evidence that racial differences exist among people, therefore race is an illusion that has no physical consequences. However, Omi and Winant believe that race does have physical effects because it is formed by racial projects and hegemony. Social, Economic, and political factors combine to define racial categories which dictate how people give meaning to race. Barbara Field’s claim is supported in America is in the Heart by Carlos Bulosan, by the fact that race was not prevalent in the Philippines because there was no social reason to create an illusion. Once Bulosan enters the United States his experiences with racial manifestation parallels Omi and Winant’s theory of how race has physical effects that are created by economic, social, and political factors. It is thought that classifying people into racial categories and placing them into hierarchies of superiority is a natural response to physical differences. This explains why some people believe that Europeans specifically chose Africans to be slaves because of their race. When in actuality, race was created so that the denial of their freedom and democratic rights required no further explanation. Fields explanation of racial formation demonstrates that an individual will not experience race unless they live in a society that uses physical differences to justify abuse. For example Bulosan does not blame race as the reason why his family faced hardship. When his family lost all of their land he understood it was because of economic factors that left them with no money “for a first payment on what [they] owed the moneylender” (pg.28); proving that Bulosan did not think about race as a cause for his misfortune. This allowed him to witness race as an illusion once he enters the United States because he saw abuse happen to
In Slave, Race, and Ideology in the United States, Barbara Fields explains how race was created in order to justify slavery in a free nation. There is no biological evidence that racial differences exist among people, therefore race is an illusion that has no physical consequences. However, Omi and Winant believe that race does have physical effects because it is formed by racial projects and hegemony. Social, Economic, and political factors combine to define racial categories which dictate how people give meaning to race. Barbara Field’s claim is supported in America is in the Heart by Carlos Bulosan, by the fact that race was not prevalent in the Philippines because there was no social reason to create an illusion. Once Bulosan enters the United States his experiences with racial manifestation parallels Omi and Winant’s theory of how race has physical effects that are created by economic, social, and political factors. It is thought that classifying people into racial categories and placing them into hierarchies of superiority is a natural response to physical differences. This explains why some people believe that Europeans specifically chose Africans to be slaves because of their race. When in actuality, race was created so that the denial of their freedom and democratic rights required no further explanation. Fields explanation of racial formation demonstrates that an individual will not experience race unless they live in a society that uses physical differences to justify abuse. For example Bulosan does not blame race as the reason why his family faced hardship. When his family lost all of their land he understood it was because of economic factors that left them with no money “for a first payment on what [they] owed the moneylender” (pg.28); proving that Bulosan did not think about race as a cause for his misfortune. This allowed him to witness race as an illusion once he enters the United States because he saw abuse happen to