Race And Ethnicity

The book has as its principal thesis the consideration of race as “a folk classification, a product of popular beliefs about human differences that evolved from 16th to 19th centuries” (Smedley, 2007, pag.24). The book also specifies three characteristics that distinguish the racial ideology in America: the absence of a category for biracial people, the homogenization of the black or African American Americans, and the impossibility to change a person’s race. (Smedley, 2007, pag.7)

A majority of people here in the United States have felt a touch of the issues, that come with classification of race. Due to this, many men and women of the minority racial groups are put in to sub-groups as a way to “help” give them an identity that can relate to. This idea to separate people by giving them identities is called the Racial Formation Theory. First introduced by Michael Omi and Howard Winant, the theory is a tool that helps build the idea that race is a social contracted tool where your racial status is weighed upon by many factors such as by those social, economic and political origin. By using race a way to build lines and boundaries, this has resulted in causing a rift to grow between the majority and minority

Humans define race by how they conceive and categorize different social realities. Thus, race is often referred to as a social construct. The differences in skin color and facial characteristics have led most of society to classify humans into groups instead of individuals. These constructs affect us all, and they often result in situations where majority racial groups cause undue suffering to those that are part of the minority. The understanding of race as a social construct is best illustrated by the examination of racial issues within our own culture, specifically those that have plagued the history of the United States.

Racial formation theory is an analytical tool in sociology, developed by Michael Omi and Howard Winant, which is used to look at race as a socially constructed identity, where the content and importance of racial categories are determined by social, economic and political forces. Race has political, religious, and scientific components. Race can determine the treatment of certain individuals solely based on skin color, and can also determine the characteristics of a person associated with that skin color. Race is not synonymous with ethnicity or racism. Science and racism emerged during the 18th and 19th centuries as an attempt to justify the mistreatment of people of color, highlighting they are physiologically inferior to Europeans.

According to Howard F. Taylor ‘race’ is complex, therefore it cannot be defined by a single definition . The term is ‘multiply defined’; as a result, he has created a set of his own definitions which all coexist with each other meaning ‘no one definition takes precedence over another’ . They include the following categories: biological, social construction, ethnic group, social class/prestige rank, racial formation/society’s institutions and self-defined . These associations will be used to get an understanding of ‘race’ in accordance to the early nineteenth century in the USA by the ‘Christian Missionaries Oppose Removal, 1830’ and New Zealand in the extract from ‘The Letters and Journals of Samuel Marsden’ .

Much of America’s history has been saturated with situations dealing with race and the people associated with them. It is impossible to talk about the founding of America without looking at the invention of race. This is because race was intricately embedded in the foundation of America through the two part process of racialization. Through this a dichotomous race structure was developed and implemented. This was carried out mainly by the U.S. government, which used policies, social arrangements, and institutional patterns (class notes 10-6-10) to further embed race into American society. The government helped to increase white’s superiority. When the government could not do it all publicly they brought in the private sector. The public

In Michael Omi and Howard Winant’s essay “Racial Formation”, we see how the tendency to assign each individual a specific race as misleading. This essay suggests that race is not merely biological, but rather lays more in sociology and historical perspective. Once we look at someone and say, “They’re white”, it brings forth all the stereotype’s that go along with that “race”, and once the race is assigned, it is assumed that we can know something about the person.

Back when the European explorers discovered people who did not look like them it started racial conflicts. They questioned if the natives where human and did not treat them as equals. In the nineteenth century Max Webber disregarded the biological explanations for racial conflict and emphasized the social and political factors which engendered such conflicts. Since Webber did this it began changing perspective on race. In the text is states that in the contemporary social science literature race is assumed to be a variable which it shaped by broader societal force. In this time race is not seen as difference in skin color but difference in status. Which made society believe one race is better than the others. Over the years the meaning of race has changed tremendously. For example, the existence of water is not based on collective acceptance, or

Race and ethnicity cannot always be defined. As children, we grow up and we learn to associate different contexts with different meanings and even different cultures. My paper is based on the origin of race and how ultimately it can be used

I would like to discuss the issue of race and ethnicity in sports. We will also explore the bigger questions. How much does race and ethnicity matter in the sports world? Are certain races dominant in certain sports? Is there a difference in how we treat players based on race and ethnicity? Does it matter? I would like to answer some of these questions and gain a better understanding of how much of a part they play.

Michael Omi and Howard Winant’s arguments from “Racial Formations” are about how race is socially constructed and is shown in Caucasia by Danzy Senna. Michael Omi and Howard Winant believe that race is socially constructed in society; therefore, the meaning of race varies within different cultures and societies. According to Omi and Winant, influences such as, media, school, politics, history, family and economy create society’s structure of race. In Caucasia, media, family and school are forces that create race by stating how one should conform to social norms for different racial groups.

Race, gender and class defines our experience. Studies have shown that, even though, these three aspects define who we are, they are interwoven. Each of these three aspects affects our decisions which could be either positive or negative. Class, race and gender as an individual is determined by our parents and If any of these changes, it would automatically change every aspect of the individual.

Summarize Stuart Hall’s alternative to reductionist and pluralist (i.e. “economic” and “sociological”) theories of race: Hall suggests race is not only cultural or ideological and developed over a historical epoch. Therefore, in his work “Race, articulation and societies structured dominance” Hall suggest alternatively one must start, then, from the historical 'framework of how racism came about by investigating the historical, political ideological, economic conditions and social practices, that concretely articulate, and ascribe racial positioning of different social groups in relation to one another with respect to structures in society, and how those practices became fixed and ascribed as on-going social practices; that legitimates peoples

1, To say that race and gender are socially constructs means that while both race and gender help shape the world in which we live, society can alter their meaning and significance. They have power because we give them power. Race is a social construct because, by definition, society can and does arbitrarily define it. For example, when American society forbidden interracial marriage (Conley 331), and determined an individual's race using the “one drop rule,” where someone is considered black if even their most distant ancestor was black. This is an example of how race can be imposed upon someone without his or her own individual endorsement. Race is not even biologically sound. Wayne Joseph was a man who was born and raised black, yet from

Race has always been an indicator of who you are and where you will be placed in the society of the United States. The Europeans, since the conquering of the Americas, dominated over the Native Americans and frown down upon them for their differences, they were viewed as too dark and “uncivilized.” At this very moment in which the Europeans viewed down upon the Native Americans was the moment race and ethnicity began to be an important factor in the New World. Since the Europeans were able to conquer over the Native Americans, they essentially became the dominant race, which was further established when slavery began. With this in mind, I will be discussing what race and ethnic relations are in the United States and how the minority groups of the United States use their race and/or ethnicity in their society. I will examine these experiences and explain why they occur by going into depth as to what race and ethnicity really are, analyzing the racial formation theory by Michael Omi and Howard Winant and lastly explore how ethnic groups practice their racial and ethnic ideologies.