James Balwin, affirms that is the notion of epistemic privilege, which develops as a result of unequal power relationships in societies. While power is often concentrated in the center of society, those individuals on the margins often gain the greatest appreciation of the existence and complexity of various forms of inequality. This appreciation grants them with a type of epistemic privilege. “The trouble about diversity, then, just that people differ from another. The trouble is produced by a world organized in ways that encourage people to use difference to include or exclude, reward or punish, credit or discredit, elevate or oppress, value or devalue, leave alone or harass’.…
Ronald Ross outlines where, when, and how mosquito brigades should be created within the subcontinent of India. While Ross does accept newly found health practices and scientific discoveries; he does not focus on the general health of all and only gives instructions that benefit the rich white man. In his second point about “Isolated Houses” Ross explains that using the drainage at a poor person’s home is not cost effective, and shows that he is more interested in the profitable benefits of selling this drainage. Another recommendation is that only houses with a small amount of pools should be drained. Larger pools may be more dangerous but since that would be too expensive Ross ignores them (Ross 44). Not only does Ross care more about profit;…
How would you feel if you were stripped of your rights, and treated as everything that is less than equal? That’s what the African-Americans went through, and what the Civil Rights movement was against. By asking for basic human rights, many men and women ended up dead or imprisoned, all because people had forced them into hard labor rather than treating them as equals. The point in which equality was achieved was due to many series of people and events, such as Michael Schwerner and Bloody Sunday.…
For centuries African Americans have been indoctrinated to subsist in a cultural and historical vacuum by their oppressors who would seek to bar them from ever making the connection to their illuminating past. This systematic agenda of mis-education and lies by omission has made possible the subjugation and enslavement, in body and mind, of the African American by his oppressors. In his essay “The Study of the Negro,” Dr. Carter G. Woodson sets out to ruminate on why the African American has been misled in his ascension to human equality and dignity and how he can remedy the dismal state of his affairs. A thorough reading of Woodson’s pioneering work indicates that we should study the experiences of African-descended people to gain knowledge…
In this past week, we learned about inequality, mainly concerning African Americans. I will be discussing the film White Like Me, along with the readings 5 Faces of Oppression, and Identity/Social Location. White Like Me is a film about inequality among the African American population. In 1959 a man named John Howard Griffin, conducted an experiment using himself as the subject. He did this by making the color of his skin darker by taking medication and spending up to 15 hours under an ultraviolet lamp. Griffin then traveled for six weeks to some of the southern states. He was treated differently now that his skin was darker, Griffin met another African American who told him that he would never fully understand what it is like to live in the…
Equality! Some people believe it has finally been achieved and some people disagree. Despite this, most people believe that the United States has come a long way from the country it once was. Not too long ago this nation used laws to discriminate against African American people. In the year 1877 Jim Crow laws were born from the ashes of the civil war. This war fought for freedom for the slaves in the south. Jim Crow laws were created by white men to keep African American men and women from being truly free. These laws segregated and hindered many aspects of African American people’s lives. These aspects include their personal lives, their education, and their daily activities.…
Social equality generally means the social state of affairs whereby all the people in the society have equal rights under the law. This includes the right to vote, physical security, freedom of speech and assembly, and the right to own property and to protect it. Based on this definition, social equality may have been unattainable during the 19th century for African Americans. Because of social inequality, African American were seen as beneath whites, which lead to racial discrimination and therefore struggle to advance in society. W.E.B DuBois and Booker T. Washington were two awe-inspiring African Americans that contributed to the great change regarding social equality. The short story “Battle Royal” is about a young African American male who is asked to be a guest speaker before a congregation of prominent white men. Before the protagonist gives his speech, he is made to participate in horrific and humiliating events to entertain…
In the early and late 1950s, discrimination against African Americans (AA), especially in South America - still existed even after the Abolition of Slavery in 1865. AA’s were segregated from the rest of the White Americans and were not treated equally and so were unable to experience the freedom the white people had. Jim Crow laws (1877-1954) stated that Black and White people must be segregated from each other at all times (but equal to each other) as also the Political and government roles in the country were led by mainly white people of America who were often biased towards AA. This hatred towards AA’s sparked events throughout the following years which caused the movement for Civil Rights - to come closer to the truth. However in between…
The concept that all men are created equal and have the right to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness, is true if you were born a white, upper class male. If you were born of another gender or of a different skin color, or both, you face an uphill battle to thrive, let alone survive. Women face an uphill battle for equal rights, control over their own body, equal pay, respect, and a voice. If you were born a woman of color, the battle you face is also racism and prejudice, which even in today’s time and history, is a huge struggle every day. However, if you entered this world as a white man, especially into the privileged upper class, you have all the rights of Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness…
White Privilege is the privilege that is given to white skin or light skin people. They do not earn it, it is given to them due to their skin tone. White privilege is unfair for people of color, this is unfair by Caucasians getting better treatment, and this has been going on for generations. The majority of the time a person of color has the chance to earn privilege, a white person comes in and takes the chance the person of color had. People of color are told, they are considered “equal”, yet it is never shown as the old quote has been said before “actions speak louder than words”. The government has always said look past skin color and look at the individual’s personality, yet when shown in action there us hate shown based upon skin color.…
It is human nature to regard someone as inferior to yourself. Time and time again, groups of people deemed inferior have risen up to fight for their rights. Sometimes the quarrel was small, but these kinds of injustices can tear countries apart. The American Civil War had over 500,000 casualties, all of them fighting over African American rights. But whites weren’t the only ones acting as agents of change. African Americans had many ways that they fought for their freedom, in combat and out. These methods changed the African American population and the…
If this world had been Opposite , white people could have been slaves , and black people would be superior ? Everyone is human and color nor ethnicity nor your sexuality should matter. Why have a right for someone because their color . Their color shouldn't matter the only thing that should matter is the characteristics of a person. Everyone should be free and equal it shouldn't matter about their skin color.…
Only a free white man was truly able to talk about freedom at this time. The right of liberty was refused to native Americans, their land get conquered by the Puritans and almost all of them had been exterminated. The native Americans were not considered citizens in their own land, according to the Marshall in the case Cherokee Nation versus Georgia in 1931. By this way they could not be protected by justice and had to either accept the oppression of Puritans or be kill. The situation for black people was not really better. Most of them were slaves, working in terrible and hard conditions and were considered as a kind of kine. For each part of our individuality, there is always one, which will dominate the other. The dominant will never be able to understand the dominated’s feelings, so he could be insensitive with the dominated’s situation. This could explain why the white people, who were obviously the dominant ones, were able to oppress the other races. Nevertheless, this was not the only…
The struggle of African Americans to make the promise of “all men are created equal” a reality began long before the Civil Rights Movement of the 20th century. Early leaders like Frederick Douglass and John Mercer Langston not only worked to bring…
In the documentary “I am not Your Negro” directed by Raoul Peck, the most memorable moment for me is the section focuses on integration at American public school. It is difficult for me to believe that many people march on the street only because an African American girl is going to school with the white kids, and I feel really angry and shocked when people are saying things like “when a negro child walk into the school, all decent parents should take their white children out of the broken school”, or “God can forgive adultery, but he is angry about integration ”. Even though those comments and events can have a huge impact on social discrimination and hurt to African American, they are real things that happened in the American history, and…