This book takes place in New York around the year 1855 to about 1889 when many immigrants from all over the world came to North America. In Jacob Riis’s book he breaks down the immigrants in to different race groups. This book is also about the overcrowding and the unhealthy living conditions of the tenement and how there community changes to become a healthy place to live and work.…
Analytical tool used to look at race as a socially constructed identity, where the content and importance of racial categories is determined by social, economic, and political forces…
RACE Definitions/Concepts Racial Formation: idea of how race is created. Race: socially constructed categorization process that describes phenotype, not genotype. Ethnicity: nationality/origin. Whiteness: ideology tied to social status, provides privilege for those labeled white; process by which non-white “other” created for benefit of whites. Racism: about structural advantages/disadvantages placed on people based on perceptions of their race. Can be individual or institutional. Covert: not hiring someone due to skin color. Overt: designated drinking fountains/bathrooms. Ex: Federal Housing Agency in ‘50s, Freddie May/Freddie Mac loans through GI Bill, media/local community demonizes young black men. Larger system that influences individual actions (structure vs agency). Privilege: special advantage/benefit. Can be based on: race, gender, ethnicity, class, ability, sexual orientation, religion. Race as a social construction: changes based on political, economic, cultural, and historical events. No taxonomic significance; rely on “folk” taxonomy: unscientific notion that you can identify someone’s raced based on stereotypical physical features. Ex. Sammy Sosa: black in the US, mulatto (mixed) in Dom Rep, white in Haiti, Taino (indig.) in Puerto Rico. Ex. One Drop Rule: created b/c white slaveowners had children w/ their slaves, wanted them to be slaves (economic purpose). How race impacts people’s outcomes? 2 examples. Takaki Origin of slavery = class conflict. Uprisings, rebellions solidarity among land/slave owners. How white/white class conflict generated led to institutionalization of slavery and a new racial order: many English settlers came as indentured servants. Freemen enacted legislation to lengthen time of servitude, made it harder for servants to become landowners. “Giddy multitude”: discontented class of indentured servants, slaves, landless freemen (white and black). Bacon’s Rebellion exposed volatility of class tensions, accelerated process.…
made friends and experienced cultures from around the world. Khanna and Johnson (2010), also state that biracial individuals have found that having the ability to associate with various races have actually worked as an advantaged because of their ability to associate with multiple groups. This attitude eventually became the approach the student had with dealing with his racial identity. According to him, he no longer tried to identify with a particular group, and part of this a lesson that he was taught by his parents. Though he experienced different ideas about his identity from family members, his parents were very intentional with the way they socialized all of their children to the world they lived in. Neither of them could relate to his…
Race is a factor of life that is constantly being judged by society. Society has created individuals who judge others on skin color, and ethnicity; spawning hate and spreading acceptance of different set of standards to each race. “Largely about what wealthy… white men wear in silicon valley and wall street” (Sengupta 228). Race is part of the identity, most of the time it determines how you are treated by others, how one’s life is lived, and which stereotypes are carried. “... from racist people who think all Asians look the same! or ...Why on earth would you say something like that?” (Chung para. 9). Race is the…
Racial Identity Development is the steps minority or majority groups go through to gain understanding of their racial identity. Many people don’t go through all these stages in their life and it requires a lot of inner growth to get there. After watching Malcom X, a civil rights leader, I saw how Malcom went through each of the stages of black/ minority racial identity development; some with difficulty and others with not as much trouble.…
Race might be the most divisive thing, mankind experiences during their lifetime. Race being divisive is not all bad, because without race the world would be a very dull place indeed. However, some people think that because they are part of one race, they are better than another race. Racism stems from the fact that one believes that their race is superior to other races. Every person will have to deal with the effects of racial differences during their life. For example, the narrator in The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man and Walter in A Raisin in the Sun will have to face the effects of their race. Some people are proud of their race and some are ashamed of their race and want to be a part of the other race. The narrator is of a mixed background and can pass for a black or white person, ultimately he will have to decide which race to be a part of.…
| |racial categories, and by which they are in turn shaped by racial meanings. |…
Today’s social construction has been highly influenced by the ideology of race. Race has created this process of racialization, which is when a group becomes labeled as physiologically different and inferior. Racialization involves oppression, violence, and discrimination. The term race has created a social construction and ranking system.…
Does race play a significant role in conflicts in America? The obvious is yes, but the real question is why? Black skinned Americans and their white American counterparts have been entangled in some form of conflict in society since the inception of America. The conflict between races for black people has been documented such as the horrors of slavery, the Jim Crow era, and the Civil Rights movement. However, white skinned Americans are not exempt from unfair treatment from their black counterparts. Many pale skinned Americans are excluded from joining other minority groups even if they share a heritage with these groups. With a multitude of issues, variables, and subcategories of differences, each color can feel alienated from the other.…
In the novel Maus II by Art Spiegelman you hear first hand from a survivor of Auschwitz the experiences of the holocaust and the horrific consequences of racism. Race is something that has developed over time and is constantly changing. Race is something that is seen differently by different people. “There is a continuous temptation to think of race as an essence, as something fixed, concrete, and objective. And there is also an opposite temptation: to imagine race as a mere illusion” (Michael Omi and Howard Winant, Racial Identity 183). Race can be seen as something concrete or as something changing. “The effort must be made to understand race as an unstable and “decentered” complex of social meaning constantly being transformed by political struggles” (Michael Omi and Howard Winant, Racial Identity 183). Race hasn’t been and will never be something that is set in stone and will never change. As society progresses and changes over time, so will the definition and make up of race and racism. “We should think of race as an element of social structure rather than as an irregularity within it, we should see race as a dimension of human representation rather than an illusion” (Michael Omi and Howard Winant, Racial Identity 184). The most common definition for race (the word definition is used very lightly because race is something that is always changing) is “race is a concept which signifies and symbolizes social conflicts and interests by referring to different types of human bodies” (Michael Omi and Howard Winant, Racial Identity 183). Race is something that distinguishes “different” human beings apart from one another. Sometimes in the end result of this some humans are put “higher” or at a level of greater important than others.…
There are still negative, unintended effects from the societal classification of race. The deep-seeded circumstances that face many populations—poverty, crime, and education—can be derived from how society treats, and has treated, a specific population because of its…
The establishment of identity is an important, complex task for all adolescents, and is considered a major developmental task for all adolescents. It is particularly complicated for adolescents belonging to ethnic and minority groups. Ethnic identity of the majority group of individuals is constantly validated and reinforced in a positive manner where as the minority group is constantly ridiculed and punished in a negative manner. What does this say for those adolescents who are the minority and not the majority? It is important to study or research ethnic identity because it provides better knowledge to help one understand striving for a sense of unity and connectivenesss in which the self provides meaning for direction and meaning of ethnic identity (Spencer, 1990). It is also important to study or research the differences between these groups due to beliefs and values.…
The monoracial child, either black or white, growing up in America has a much easier time of identifying with their natal race than that of a biracial child. Not only does the child identify with the race and its issues but it is also recognized as a member of the race by other member and by onlookers. For example, a monoracial black person is considered a member of the black race by both black and white people; the same is true for members of the white race.…
Ethnicity and race has had a big influence on peoples' every day life choices. In some way or another, most people will be judged according to their color of their skin or their ethnic background. We live in a society full of different races and cultures affecting the way we interact with each other, as well as influencing our views on equality and differences among the many different races in our society. Often influential media groups and social standards shape our beliefs, also affecting how we interact with cultures different from our own, and how various groups interact with each other. Race and ethnicity may be defined as a type of grouping or classification based on a persons origin of birth and includes their racial appearance, language, religion and culture. Ethnicity can be defined as a social construction that indicates identification with a particular group who share common cultural traits, such as language, religion and traditions.…