The Difference Between Race And Racial Identity In The Modern World

Multicultural education is the key to incorporating ethnic and racial identities in the classroom. I believe implementing a culturally responsive curriculum would work best for the students. I would like to be a future educator who acknowledges and welcome my students’ diversity in the classroom. It is important to bring cultural awareness to the classroom and school environment. I want my students to know that I respect, acknowledge and care about their differences. I would model this behavior because I want the students to do the same for each other. The steps I would take incorporate a positive, trusting and healthy learning environment are:

To many people across a variety of different nationalities and cultures, race has been proven to be a key factor for how society views you in the eyes of those who are prominently in charge. The term race has been brought up in recent years, to be considered a form of identification, as the word race is used to describe physical characteristics such as a person’s color of skin, hair, and eyes. When in reality, the correct term they should be using is Ethnicity. As a result, the term race is used to separate people into sub-categories based on the color of their skin. This type of classification, is a man-made creation used by society to classify certain groups of people into lower classes, while keeping the predominate group in charge at the top.

In America, the lives of Africans did not get any easier. Once the demand for labor began increasing dramatically, more and more Africans were imported to America. Originally, white people and black people worked together in the plantations. As a result of the increase in Africans in these British colonies, less white people took jobs on plantations. Eventually, enslavement became based on race. Numerous slave codes were developed, which included denying slaves the right to be out past sunset and denying slaves the right to meet in groups of three or more. These Africans forced to live enslaved in America were treated as if they were inferior to white people. It is discouraging to think about the fact that this country, though it was long ago, once accepted this kind of social injustice.

In his essay, “Racial Identities”, Kwame Anthony Appiah addresses the topic of racial identification. He describes how and why it’s hard not to identify someone based on their race. Today in the United States, racial identification is quite relevant. People judge and stereotype others based on race. Classifying people based on their looks isn’t bad, it’s the negative attitudes and labels that come with it. Racial identification is hard for most people to avoid, is detrimental due to the bad attitudes people have, negatively affects people’s lifestyles, and divide people.

One of the most prevalent themes throughout the world’s history is the dispute over race and racial differences. But, there is a problem: the majority of the population doesn’t have a clear understanding of what race is. Race is a socially constructed grouping of people that was created in order for people to differentiate themselves from one another and has many sources of influence. While most people believe race is determined by biological characteristics (hair type, skin color, eye shape, etc.), this is not true. To make things more complicated, there is no cut and dry definition to race. Authors of Race and Ethnicity in Society, Elizabeth Higginbotham and Margret Anderson, claim that there are seven different distinct ways to define race. They begin with the popular belief of biological characteristics, and, as mentioned before, through social construction. They go on to note that race can be formed from an ethnic group, from social class rank, from racial formation by institutions, and also can form from one’s self-definition (Higginbotham & Anderson, 2012, p. 13). All of these ways to define race have been seen throughout our history, and many of them have caused problems for minorities, especially in the United States.

Kwame Anthony Appiah’s The race, Culture, Identity: Misunderstood, questions racial labeling of all sorts. What is the difference between race, ethnicity and culture? Appiah reevaluates people’s ways of thinking, which encourages his readers to think outside of the norms to analyze what their definition of race is. He argues that if one rejects the existence of racism, which is the idea that there are distinctions of our species, then that person cannot adhere to the fact that there are hereditary differentiations such as superior or inferior ethnicities. That individual insinuates that we are equal in all racial related aspects, but that is not the case in our current environment.

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.

Due to the complexity related to both individual and group racial identity, the subject is inherently interesting. Even more complex is the subject of race relations, which are the interaction and relationships between different racial groups. This interaction can be examined from infinite angles and on many levels. For instance, on an economic level, do members of different races have equal access to jobs? Do members of different races control a vastly different percentage of the country’s wealth? On a political level, do different races exert greater control over the political process? Does this control result in legislative and/or legal bias? Is this bias racism?

The basis of identity is formed through the concept and ideas of race and racial consciousness. The implied stereotypes that are labeled on to each race has the ability to cause an individuals to become racially conscious about themselves. Race builds a wall that creates a consciousness mind that connects to the identity of person forming the way they live, speak, act, believe, and feel. In the memoir Between the Word and Me written by Ta Nehisi Coates, Ta Nehisi’s letter to his son reveals how race and racial consciousness can shape identity and elaborates of how the meaning of identity is developed.

The title of the paper intends to raise awareness about the large number of historians and activists still struggling to clearly define their understanding of racial identities. Given the complex use of the term “race” in biology, in everyday life, and in the social sciences, this does not come as a surprise. However, without properly addressing issues of historical and present understandings of race, both scholars and activists run the risk of reinforcing rather than challenging racial misconceptions.

Some shifts in racial identity can end in categories that society, which insists on the harshness of race, has not defined yet. Race, although it does not exist in the world in any real objective way, it is still very real in society. Race is a social mechanism that has serious consequences and effects. These consequences and effects, along with the notion that race is subjective is methodologically objective.

Many people forget or do not realize that race is a social construct used to obtain superiority over others of different skin pigmentation. Race is defined as “a group whose inherited psychical characteristics distinguish it from another group” (Henslin, 2015, p. 263). Although the construct of race may be different in one culture to another, the idea of race is still one that has been conceived by society. There is no biological evidence that race is part of a biological makeup. Ethnicity has to do more with how someone identifies culturally, and can identify with multiple groups no matter their “racial identity.” As ethnicity is defined as “having distinctive cultural characteristics” (Henslin, 2015, p. 266). However, even though race is

A defining time in African’s lives as they came to America was when the transatlantic slave trade developed at the beginning of the sixteenth century. Against their will, at least fifteen million Africans were transported to the Americas and the Caribbean.¹ When the United States emerged as an independent country in 1787, around 650,000 Africans were resettled as slaves. Here, Africans were immediately confronted with the harsh reality of body exploitation and forced labor for the benefit of whites. Anyone of African descent was labeled as private property. They were denied

Race is a construction of social aspects that refers to individuals and groups that contain certain characteristics (Cornell). Races are identified differently in societies over a given amount of time; an example would be, “that one time racial classifications were based on ethnicity or nationality, religion, or minority language groups. Today, by contrast, society classifies people into different races primarily based on skin color” (Cornell). Ethnic and racial identities are quite important for many children and adolescents, particularly those who are members of minority ethnicity (ACT).

“If we don’t fully understand our individual and collective roles in maintaining a system of white superiority, our relationships with people of color remains superficial, our ability to work in diverse workplaces is greatly diminished, and we fail to create a just world in which everyone has an equitable opportunity to contribute and thrive” (Kendall, 2013, p. 1). This paper discusses who I am as a cultural person and how I have come to be this way. The first section of this paper discusses my cultural background and my cultural identity. I address the factors that make up my cultural identity and the challenges that I have faced because of my cultural identity. The next section discusses my White racial identity development and the events in my life that have led me to become the person I am today in relation to my racial identity. The final section of this paper outlines the implications my own racial and cultural identity will have on my career as a clinical mental health counselor.