Race And Gender Has Not Only Shaped The Lives Of People

There is common history between Latin Americans and Anglo Americans, like the Arabs and Jews of the Middle East, cousins in constant conflict, often hearing but not understanding each other. In this chapter Gonzalez tells us about how both Latin American and Anglo-American cultures fabricated their colonial origin. The 1500’s through the early 1800s specially explains the foundation of what now makes up the US. Since early on in time Anglo colonist saw Mexicans as an obstacle to evolution. Unfortunately, because most did not know how to read or write they were easily fooled. Because of this so many were done wrong, at times had their lands taken away. Canelas family were some of the witnesses to the lynching’s which occurred as last as 1917. In 1859 Cortina; a Canelas ancestor, declared was against the Anglo settler minority. In 1929, an important year where we had the first organization intended to break down segregation. The name of that organization was League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC). The main goal was to get the Anglo society to accept Mexicans as equal citizens. They could do this by teaching the chief goal to master his

Unfair laboring and immigration in the United States has affected Latinas/os lives for decades. In the United States millions of Latina/o citizens, emigrants, and immigrants have dealt with bias, racially segregated, and limited positions in regards to labor. They have been limited to blue collar jobs with low wages, no benefits, and hardly any raises. In the article, “Heteropatriarchy and the Three Pillars of White Supremacy”, Andrea Smith argues, “This framework does not assume that racism and white supremacy is enacted in a singular fashion; rather, white supremacy is constituted by separate and distinct, but still interrelated, logics.” (Smith 67). I believe that Andrea Smith’s two of the Three Pillars of White Supremacy: Genocide/Colonialism and Orientalism/War fits with Latina/o labor and immigration. I also believe that her first pillar of Slavery/Capitalism could be displayed slightly differently to be more suitable with Latina/o labor and immigration. In this paper I will argue how the two out of the three pillars fit with Latina/o labor and immigration. I will also argue and propose a new pillar to represent Latinas/os labor and immigration. I will also argue how sexuality, power, and gender play a role in these three pillars.

Race and gender are two facets that inherently dominate individuals everyday lives. A person’s social environment, work environment, and educational environment is congruent to their race and gender. From birth, it has been set up that everyone is assigned to a label. A pink or blue blanket is swaddled around a newborn child and a box is checked signifying that child’s place in society. These two actions ultimately define how a child is to be viewed and treated. As children grow into young adults they either decide to stick with their original assignment, while others decide to deviate from it. These individuals deviation results in many of them being viewed harshly and looked down upon because they strayed from their social norms. This constant cycle of being classified and labeled from birth is the social institution of gender and race. These social institutions aid in the inequality that is present in society, and race and gender are shaped by this. However, if these social institutions were removed, race and gender could dissipate. This is due to the fact that race and gender are not real, but are socially constructed concepts used to organize the power, or dominance, within our society to one social group over the other groups.

In the United States early history, Native Americans, Africans and Europeans were marginalized by White People, and categorized as the minorities because they were seen as the inferior race. For nearly three centuries, the criteria for membership in these groups were similar, comprising a person's appearance, their social circle (how they lived), and their known non-White ancestry. History played a major part, as persons with known slave ancestors were assumed to be African (or, in later usage, black), regardless of whether they also had European ancestry. Most often these minorities face significant discrimination in various forms whether through voting, law policy, unequal pay, or even implicit racism, minorities of all kinds have been and still are being put down today. The book Between the World and Me is a letter to Ta-Nehisi Coates’s fifteen-year-old son, Samori. He weaves his personal, historical, and intellectual development into his ruminations on how to live in a black body in America. Not only does Coates give his personal experience in how he experience in first hand discrimination, racism, marginalization but he also gives vivid images on how he lived multiple worlds and how those experiences changed him. In “How to Tame a Wild Tongue”, Gloria Anzaldua exposes her feelings about social and cultural difficulties that Mexican immigrants face when being raised in the United States. She establishes comparisons among English, Spanish and their variations on how

Myths of Harmony by Marixa Lasso is a harrowing account of racial tension and deceit in the Age of Revolution in Colombia. The main theme of the book is that racial harmony is a myth that was cultivated during Colombia’s fight for independence (9). The author states that the lower classes were not any better off after the Revolution than before (4). The culture was known for caciquismo (patron-client relations) and fraudulent elections. These claimed racial equality, but in reality discriminated against certain races (4). Lasso discusses the role of the pardos - free Africans - community as a whole and their role in the political landscape. Racial identities were formed during the Age of Revolution by the struggles of the time period (152). The colonial wars during the Age of Revolution shaped the racial identities of numerous nations. Through racial visionaries, these nations chose a racial identity.

Inequalities within minorities is not limited to economic unfairness but also social inequity. The second story that shows how inequality within minorities is “The Myth of the Latin Woman” by Judith Ortiz Cofer. “The Myth of the Latin Woman” is an essay based on the real life experiences of Judith Ortiz Cofer. The story talks about the racist inequalities she has went through as a women of Hispanic descent. “a young man, obviously fresh from a pub, spotted me and as if struck by inspiration went down on his knees in the aisle. With both hands over his hearts he broke into an an Irish tenor’s rendition of Maria from West Side Story”. The author retells one of her experiences from earing graduate credits one summer and she is met by someone whom ignorantly makes racists remark simply because she is Latina. Furthermore in the story Cofer mentions how people gave the man a round of applause. “amused fellow passengers gave his voice the round of gentle applause” (Page 61). This shows that it is acceptable to generalize an ethnic group into a character from West Side Story. In addition to the unfair generalization, Cofer is confronted unfair expectations. I thought you Latin girls were supposed to mature early”. This is unfair assumption made to Cofer. She is treated like a vegetable rather than a girl who traditionally grows into womanhood. This also generalizes Latin women to be matured at a young age. Which is incorrect just because Latinas fall into a small category in society

Through multifarious ways, female gender roles in Latin American countries have gradually begun to improve over time. These slight improvements have manifested through women’s increasing involvement in politics and presence in the labor force due to immigration, globalization, and global media. Women in Latin American countries have become

In The White Scourge, Neil Foley gives detailed facts about the construction and reconstruction of whiteness and the connection of this whiteness to power, mainly on cotton culture in central Texas. Foley 's book analyzes “whiteness” through detailed analysis of race, class, and gender. What was most intriguing about this book is its comparison of whiteness on various racial groups and classes, for and how each struggled in comparison to the other in order to thrive and exist with one another. In this book, Foley shows a racial system that continues to produce both poverty material wise and poverty of where you stand racially. It is also very interesting that the system exploits not only Mexicans and Blacks, but also the poor whites who competed with them for work.

U.S. Citizens that are defined as being “Black” in the U.S. Census are typically of African origin, yet the process of Spanish colonization in South America from 15th to the 19th

When the Europeans first arrived in Latin America, they didn’t realize the immensity of their actions. As history has proven, the Europeans have imposed many things on the Latin American territory have had a long, devastating effect on the indigenous people. In the centuries after 1492, Europeans would control much of South America and impose a foreign culture upon the already established civilizations that existed before their arrival. These imposed ideas left the continent weak and resulted in the loss of culture, the dependence on European countries, and a long standing ethnic tension between natives and settlers which is evident even to this day. The indigenous people of South America, which

This tolerant attitude led to a wide range of “race classification.” According to how much “white” a slave had, their value in the eyes of society increased. Slaves could be black, octaroon or mulatto to name a few. Thus this led to a classification based on one’s degree of white blood. In the United States no such classes existed. If a slave was born to a black mother, that slave was black. In essence, Latin America judged based upon the degree of “blackness” while the South saw only two races, black or white. Outward appearance, the color of the father or anything else deviated the classification in the United States. It has been said, half-facetiously, that Southerners are color blind, in the sense that individuals, despite their racial composition, are considered to be either white or black, while Latin Americans recognized degrees of blackness and whiteness.

Unwittingly or quite knowingly people have built systems of inequalities around race but people have also built identity, friendships, and college mates around it. Nevertheless, several people I recently interviewed never appeared to be certain when race was a good thing or when it was a bad thing to talk about, which in my mind leaves us all struggling with a particularly intimidating question: When should we talk as if race matters?

Social construct may be defined as the social mechanism or a category which has been created by the society. It may either be a perception which is created by an individual or an idea which is constructed as a result of the culture. The present society has created a large number of constructs which are not good. In this paper, the discussion will be done on the social construction of race and gender and the problems associated with the same. In addition to this, how can social construct forms to be the basis for discrimination and prejudice will be discussed? Further, racism and sexism will be discussed with examples. Further discussion will be done on patriarchy and its role in racism and sexism will be added.

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.

For many years now the people in power or “whites” have passed laws so that other racial groups are kept at the bottom of the social hierarchy. These racial group that are kept at the bottom become racialized and oppressed therefore they become unequal to the people that are at the top of this hierarchy. The racial groups that are kept at the bottom vary from the Native-Americans to the Mexican-Americans and obviously the African-Americans. In this essay I will be comparing how the racialization process has been similar and different between these racial groups. I will also define race and racialization. Furthermore, I will explain how class, gender, sexuality, and citizenship has impacted the racialization process within these groups.