Impact Of Race On Personal Life

Before I studied human race in detailed, it was just one simple concept and classification that people hardly bothered about. The effects of race upon an individual are way too surprising. It affects one’s life chances, the area where one lives in, the way an individual is treated, one’s financial condition, education, life expectancy and so on.

When defining oneself race tends to stick out in the forefront of our minds. Race tends to separate one person from the next. The term race refers to people who have differences in biological traits that society feels are socially significant. Society’s emphasis on race has caused a seemingly unamendable division. People treat people differently because of their skin color. A person’s behaviors, actions and skin colors have been attributed to race. Skin color is the main factor when it comes to race. Ethnicity comes into play when people are being classified by nationality. Race is simply black or white, or simply light or dark, which plays into internalized or reverse racism. Personally I believe that African Americans struggle with race more than any other ethnicity because they struggle with both internal and external racism. W.E.B. Dubois as well as Glenn Loury spoke about the African American struggle in their works.

Race is important because it is not biological, it’s a social construct that humans beings formed years ago. The social construct is racial classification for individuals would remain constant throughout the world. By grouping individuals through cultural or social practice. And can also socially group people into categories based on shared norms, values, beliefs, and behaviors.

As a black girl, I have thought about race a lot. I have personally seen how race has affected my education, opportunities, dealings with police, employment, and everyday interactions with people. Of course, I know that race does not exist as a scientific category. The theory of race is not a biological reality, and has been proven as illegitimate.There is after all only one race - the human race. We all have the same basic characteristics and genetically are all homo sapien sapiens. Our physical differences can be explained by means of Charles Darwin’s concept of human variation. Thus, our various physical characteristics such as skin colour and hair texture are a result of our ancestors geographical origins. In contrast to its biological

Racial oppression and racism have been an issue seen throughout the history of the United States. During the 60’s the era of the Civil Rights movement Americans saw advances in racial equality. This seems to have created a notion throughout the United States that racism was not an issue for many years. Yet racism still seems to be engrained in American society, it is just hard to realize when it is happening. Recently racial controversies surrounding the United states Justice System have been making the news headlines. What Americas are seeing is institutional inequalities that are creating racial conflict. Institutional inequalities have lead to racial oppression do to the power structure in the United States. Critical Race Theory provides an explanation showing that race is imbedded in American society today; can the theory explain why racial inequalities between the United States Justice System and citizens of different colors seems to be a reoccurring cycle.

In an effort to discover how one thing affects another, I decided to study how race affects different aspects of life; those aspects being income, social class (or class) and education. How do we ascertain what effects what when preparing a study; does race effect how much we make or how far we go in our education or where we might live? There are many studies researching the variables mentioned, race, income, class and education. Perhaps education effects race, class and income. I am attempting to analyze the first combination. I want to determine to what extent income and class and education are affected by race.

In a world where words and color have so much meaning and power, I’ve grown confused by the word “race” and the bizarre pigments it assigns. We’re called the human race, yet while we run together in the single race of life, we have split into teams: white, yellow, brown, black. My bewilderment fails to end there. Though his cheeks are ruddy and spotted with moles, my father is called white, and my mother, though pale as porcelain, is a yellow woman. As for me, I belong nowhere, hopping between my mother and father’s people, unwanted by either.

In order to study ethnicity, one must know what it isn’t. Ethnicity is not race, nationality, locality, or religious denomination. Ethnicity is when people share the same cultural heritage. However, in society individuals are often categorized by race. Many believe that race is genetic, meaning that different races are genetically different. This idea has been in practiced since the early 18th century. With the development of technology, specifically DNA testing, scientists studied whether racial categories were actually genetically different. The scientist found that there were more differences between individuals of the same race, than individuals from two different races. (Adelman 2003). The experiment and other research show that race is not biological and unimportant factor in the human lineage. What make race important is how society defines race. Society uses race to categorize groups of people, which can often lead to social inequality.

According to our textbook, race is defined as “a group of people who are believed to be a biological group sharing genetically transmitted traits that are defined as important” (180-181). The term “race” has been a topic of many conversation for the past couple of years now. This term has been used quite freely in the past several years. Many debate that the term “race” shouldn’t be used anymore, while others believe that there is nothing wrong with this term. I believe how you use the word “race” is of great importance. When it comes to using this word, it is where many individuals make a mistake, which ultimately leads to hurting and/or offended the feelings of another person.

In human societies, understanding the construction of categories of difference to create meaning and explanations for the distribution of societal roles and statues is essential to analyzing the creation of language and culture. In its most basic form, societal ideologies and value systems deliver themselves through language that shapes the perception of difference and phenomenon. Race plays a particularly important role as a category of difference in American society; the language most directly related to race often coming under intense scrutiny as attitude about the innate nature of race have shifted in recent history. A linguistic category that is commonly seen as benign or at least simply referential in relation to race is the paired terms of “black” and “white,” which denominate the two primary racial statuses in American society. The terms black and white, in reference to the racial categories, create through their linguistic associations the idea that the two races are discontinuous and suggest that the two are binaries of each other with opposing traits and attributes. Claudia Rankine touches on the linguistic associations in relation to “blackness” and “whiteness” trough her writings in her book Citizen. Citizen is a circuitous and personal descent into past experiences that truly illuminate racial discrimination in America. Rankine’s book explores the racism and prejudice that are prevalent in the United States. Through her use of vernacular and diction, Rankine

Race can be categorized quite differently and can vary from country to country. When defining race, it can be complex in that every country, even an individual within a country, has different criteria and viewpoints when identifying a person’s race. For some countries and for some people, race is the color of your skin, or the background that you come from, or even biological and physical traits. Therefore, it’s crucial to thoroughly explain the topic of race and how it plays into context in today’s society.

Throughout this course, I have read many articles that have left distinct imprints on how I view things. I used to think of gender, race and class as something natural and meaningful. However, after this course I am inclined to feel differently. It is truly upsetting that each social construct results in some type of disadvantage for some and empowerment for others.

Race is something that is in all of us. Everyday we see how it affects us in both positive and negative ways. Looking back on what race and gender has been, we have come a long way in creating more equality throughout all of the people that make up our country.

This weeks selected works all center around the theme of race and the harmful effect of the subjugation and  apocryphal stereotype that comes with it.  In Tomi’s segment she states “Is it because the black unemployment is double what it is for whites, or the homicide rate or the dropout rate…..”  . While in “I , racist he states “Black and Muslim killers are ‘terrorists’ and ‘thugs’. Why are white shooters called ‘mentally ill’?”. And lastly in  Chief Seattle's 1854 Oration he states “If we have a common Heavenly Father He must be partial”.  Evidently all these works center around the subject of race and its effect and perspective on all parties, However there is contrast between I, Racist and ‘Tomi Lahren DESTROYS Colin . In I, Racist, he

In today’s society race is often considered to be the tone of your skin. If a person seems a little darker they must be Latin or Islamic and if a person just seems a little too light the presumption is that they are from the UK where the sun does not really shine. There are all these social stigmas on what a person has to be based on the color of their skin and there have been serious actions taken because of these assumptions. The concept of race has continued to bewilder the human race throughout time. Why were someone people darker and why were some so light? During the sixteenth century no one had an answer, the possibility of different races coming from the same creator was socially unacceptable. Now, the stigma of this concept still exists but, humanity has proven to prevail and most people see one another as equals. The concept of race has drastically changed from the sixteenth century to present time. Humans have become more excepting as a species.