Mental illness has gripped America since its beginning; the first strides in treatment beginning in the late nineteenth century toward female “hysteria.” The industrial revolution is the first time we see men being diagnosed with more than simple insanity, realizing that the machine-inspired overworking culture of America was already full steam and driving men into the ground through mental exhaustion. “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman and “Bartleby, the Scrivener” by Herman Melville touch on these issues and expand on how mental issues may affect others. The characters of both stories go through a mental decline, and Gilman and Melville implement point of view, symbolism, and their time period between a passive and active…
In 1860 Sam Peppered is a blacksmith living in the Kansas Territory, but he is restless. He's heard about the settlers heading west in search of gold and silver. Most have packed their possessions into large prairie schooners and made their long journey to the western mines.But Sam is impatient and has an inventive mind. Despite the scoffs of neighbors, he builds his own "wind wagon" -- a narrow wooden cart with a large mast in the middle that will sail across the prairie powered by the wind. Sam's persistence pays off one day when the wind is right and he "sets sail" for the silver mines of Colorado.This account weaves U.S. history, science, and geography into a dramatic narrative. Daniel Clifford's illustrations, reminiscent of old…
The belief that race is merely based on the color of a person’s skin has been the most common used method for defining racial boundaries in the modern world. However, this is not an accurate representation of how human beings should be classifies. According to authors, Omi and Winant, identifying an individual’s race on the basis of physical attributes is the most superficial factor in determining a person’s race (2). These authors, unlike many other scholars in the world do not define race based on an individual’s physical attributes. They define race as being a social concept due to the fact that they recognize that the classification of race varies broadly across the world. As stated by the authors, “In our view it is crucial to break with…
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…
In America’s history, the white people saw themselves as the superior population and discriminated against many different races. The majority of discrimination happened to be at the expense of the Black community. Throughout the nineteenth century, society’s views on race continued to evolve; some changed their previous perspectives after personal experiences with the African Americans.…
Popular phrases such as, “the Blacker the Berry, the Sweeter the juice,” and “If it’s White, it’s gotta be right,” have held opposing views in the African American community on the concept of skin complexion. This idea of a “Color Complex” has psychologically altered the way many African Americans perceive beauty, success, and their personal identity. Although some would disagree, there seems to be a strong connection between skin color and social status in the African American community. It may appear that African Americans are dispelling this theory of “light-skinned and dark skinned” to become a more cohesive group, but the politics of skin color and features still remain. Skin color variations among African Americans play a major role in how they perceive beauty standards, social status and themselves.…
During the 18th and 19th century, racism was very actively ruining innocent people’s life. It stopped the America from moving forward, because it was stuck on the color of a man’s skin. With that being the case, many interracial families were not accepted by the law or the eyes of the man. Though interracial marriage became legal in 1967, many men and women who tried to pursue a relationship with another race were taunted, mistreated, and often killed. Within the 21st century, minds that were once afraid of a man’s skin now slowly started to welcome different race marriage within the family. This being the case, the offsprings of the interracial parents did not have to be afraid of being proud of their heritage, instead they started to be able to embrace it.…
The perspective on race is changing rapidly right before our eyes. Intermarriages are becoming more popular and very common to see on an everyday basis, but no time soon will this eliminate race as a whole, “Five hundred years from now, unless human societies undergo drastic changes, Asians, Africans, and Europeans will be physically distinguishable.” (Olson p.260) The people of this world will always look different from one another, nothing can change that, but the mixing of these people is doing something much more powerful. Socially, intermarriage has created an idea that you can designate your own race based on the individuals’ personality because with the different races merged together, who is to determine what race you really are.”Joshua Goldstein calculated that about 20 percent of Americans are already in extended families with someone from a different racial group.” (Olson p.252) Many people don’t realize that they are already mixed and have family members of different ethnic background.”The logical endpoint of this perspective is a world in which people are free to choose their ethnicity regardless of their ancestry.” (Olson p.261) People should have the right to pronounce themselves in any ethnicity that is most closely related to how they perceive themselves. The people of Hawaii are moving beyond concepts of race and the rest of the world is soon to follow. “Many prospective students at the University of Hawaii simply mark “mixed” in describing…
Barack Obama’s election as the President of the United States in 2008 was considered by many to be a representation of the huge strides the country has made in terms of race relations. Considering that blacks in America were denied civil rights less than five decades ago, his election certainly indicates that progress has been made. Obama and his election to office is linked to this progress because much of the population considers him to be black, including himself. Yet, Obama has as much “white ancestry” as he does “black ancestry.” This specific example can be related to the convention ‘that considered a white woman capable of giving birth to a black child but denies that a black woman can give birth to a white child,”[1] identified by Barbara Fields. His classification as black, despite the fact that he is also half white, shows how the idea of the one-drop rule is still very much present in modern times. This rule indicates that a person with even a single drop of “black blood” is to be considered black. The idea of the one-drop rule has a very deep history in the United States and has been ingrained in the countries racial ideology, partly through legislation. The development and use of the one-drop rule is unique to the United States in that “We are the only country in the world that applies the one-drop rule, and the only group that the one-drop rule applies to is people of African decent” [2] The development and use of the one-drop rule has had a profound impact on the construction of race in the United States.…
Multiculturalism is described as “the practice of giving equal emphasis to the needs and contributions of all cultural groups especially traditionally underrepresented minority groups in a society” (Webster’s, 2003). In our country “it is estimated that by the year 2050, no more than 50% of the population will be of Anglo ancestry” (Cillo, 1998). It is also important to consider and recognize the number of sub-cultures that exist such as interracial couples, the disabled such as children with autism, and homosexual cultures.…
Color-Blind Privilege: The Social and Political Functions of Erasing the Color Line in Post Race America. By Charles A. Gallagher…
Over the last two centuries, our society has grappled with the perpetual strife of perceived racial discrimination. Inalienable Rights and founding principles of our nation have been tarnished by the belief that these are mere privileges, reserved for a select few fortunate enough to indulge in such luxuries. However, the last few decades have ushered into existence a transformed nation, where Supreme Court cases and social revolutions have seemingly eroded the dichotomous barriers of race. On one end of the spectrum, open wounds of our nation’s tumultuous past have been stung by the racial inequities of household income and a maliciously disproportionate incarceration system. On the other end of the spectrum, patriotism and unity swell to heights of exuberance at the sight of the increasingly diverse entertainment industry and…
David Brunsma and Kerry Rockquemore wrote an article titled, “What Does Black Mean?” The article analyzed the meaning of what it meant to be black in the United States historically as well as its meaning today. The authors used the 2000 census that was completed in the United States that had a check all that apply moniker for race. There were sixty-three different options to use from. The authors go on to examine the historic meaning of being black. They use the example of the one-drop rule to show how different the meaning of black has come to be. The authors also discussed a study they conducted amongst half black and half white college students. The majority of the students identified as bi-racial, while sixteen percent identified as solely black or white. In all the authors had five different types of racial identity groupings. The authors are making the argument that identifying, as black no longer means the same thing that it used to. The conclusion made by the authors is that meaning of black will continue to evolve and shift from the singular identification of…
Since the beginning of the United States of America becoming one union has been the driving force in the lives of many people. Major Ownes, who was a New York politician as well as a member of the Democratic Party once said, “What is our biggest enemy? Segregation.” However, what he failed to put into his quote was the racial equality was an even bigger enemy. Far beyond the days of the Civil War and even the American Revolution, African American people have been looked down upon because of the color of our skin. Whereas in today’s society having African American blood run through your veins is seen as somewhat of a pleasure, even an honor, so to speak this was not always the case. There were some African Americans who grew up in a time where there was something known as the “One Drop Rule”. If you had so much of a drop of African American blood in your body you were considered to be black. You could be the whitest person in the United States of America but you were treated as if you were the lowest of the low because of the “One Drop Rule”. In today’s society we have black history month being celebrated in schools and by African Americans all over the United States, but that was not always there either. Once upon a century, black people and white people could not be in the same classroom or even the same bathroom for that matter. African American’s could hardly walk on a sidewalk without being shoved aside while a white woman was walking on the same side of the street as them. It took the death of many people and even more standing up and trying to fight for racial equality. This paper will speak on some significant events throughout the course of history that has helped shaped racial equality all over the United States of America.…
Your construal of the second week’s materials breaks down the color line’s problems. This sensitive problem is generated by racial smog that infiltrates throughout our society such as Latinos referred to institutions of higher education as a “white space”. For example, your fairly sheltered life caused some early misconceptions until the participation of several school sports proved otherwise for your African American teammates. The reason as to why is because she built a nice rapport into a more equal playing field, regardless of subsisting in a predominantly white area. By and large, this biologic myth in genetic differences are just bursting with falsities or allusions that can easily dismantled by understanding, social interactions, and…