Race and Ethnicity

Race and Ethnicity Chapter Ten

Outline • Race and Ethnicity • Prejudice • Discrimination • Racism • Sociological Perspectives • Ethnic Groups in Canada • Racial and Ethnic Inequality in the Future

Race and Ethnicity • The Social Significance of Race and Ethnicity • Majority and Minority Groups

Race and Ethnicity • Race: a category of people who have been singled out as inferior or superior, often on the basis of real or alleged physical characteristics such as skin colour, hair texture, eye shape, or other subjectively selected attributes • Ethnic Group: a collection of people distinguished, by others or themselves, primarily on the basis of cultural or nationality characteristics

Race and Ethnicity • Ethnic Groups have the following characteristics: 1. Unique cultural traits (clothing, music, religion) 2. a sense of community 3. a feeling of ethnocentrism 4. ascribed membership from birth 5. territoriality

Race and Ethnicity • The Social Significance • Ethnicity and race form a base of hierarchical ranking ..illustrated by white privilege • The dominant group holds power over others • The classic study, “The Vertical Mosaic” by John Porter, revealed strong links between class, ethnicity, and race

Top 10 Ethnic Origins in Canada Canadian Census 2001

Race and Ethnicity • Majority and Minority Groups • Majority: a group that is advantaged and has superior resources and rights in a society • Minority: (or subordinate group): a group whose members, because of physical or cultural characteristics, are disadvantaged and subjected to unequal treatment by the dominant group and who regard themselves as objects of collective discrimination

Race and Ethnicity • Majority and Minority Groups • Visible Minority: refers to an official government category of nonwhite or non-Caucasian persons • Some examples: Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, Filipinos, and Arabs • Numbers: 2001 census, about 4 million or 13% of Canadians • Minority does not necessarily mean small—it can also refer to power or the lack thereof

Prejudice • Defined: a negative attitude based on preconceived notions about members of selected groups • Its etymology: Latin: prae (“before”) and judicium (“judgment”) • Racial Prejudice: involves beliefs that certain racial groups are innately inferior to others or have a disproportionate number of negative traits

Prejudice • Roots of prejudice: ethnocentrism and stereotypes • Ethnocentrism: • Defined: the tendency to regard one’s own culture and group as the standard, and thus superior, whereas all other groups are seen as inferior • Stereotypes: • Defined: overgeneralizations about the appearance, behaviour, or other characteristics of members of particular groups

Prejudice • Stereotypes: • Etymology of the term: from the Greek stereos (“solid”) and refers to a fixed mental impression • Effects: Negative stereotypes result in negative outcomes such as hurt, pain, harm, or anguish to the recipients • Sources: Media, ethnic jokes, learned attitudes from parents, classmates, fellow workers, and religious associations

Prejudice • Theories: • Scapegoat: a person or group that is incapable of offering resistance to the hostility or aggression of others • Authoritarian personality: a person characterized by excessive conformity, submissiveness to authority intolerance, insecurity, a high level of superstition, and rigid, stereotypic thinking

Prejudice • Measuring prejudice: Borgardus constructed a scale that uses social distance as a criteria. • Social Distance: the extent to which people are willing to interact and establish relationships with members of racial and ethnic groups other than their own • In the following table, those who agree to number one are the least prejudiced. Those who select number seven are the most prejudiced.

The BorgardusScale of Prejudice

Prejudice • 1991 Canadian study: Canadian born respondents reported significantly less comfort when interacting with Canadians of West Indian, Black, Muslim, Arab, Indo-Pakistani, and Sikh origins

Discrimination • Defined: actions or practices of dominant group members (or their representatives) that have a harmful impact on members of a subordinate group • Examples: refusal to hire, associate with, or become a friend of those of a subordinate group

Discrimination • De jure: legal discrimination which is encoded in laws. Examples: The Chinese Exclusionary Act, parts of the Indian Act • De facto: informal discrimination which is entrenched in social customs and institutions • The research by LaPiere reveals that people say they would accept others of subordinate groups but when asked to do so, they refuse

Merton’s Four Combinations of Prejudice and Discrimination Not Prejudiced and Discrimin-atory Because of peer pressure or for political or economic benefits traditional ways Prejudiced and Not Discriminatory Are prejudiced but because of peer pressure or for political or economic interests do not discriminate Not Prejudiced and non Discrimin-atory Those not prejudiced and who do not discriminate Prejudiced and Discriminatory Those who are prejudiced and who discriminate against others

Discrimination • The most extreme form of discrimination is the actual homicide of whole subordinate groups • The term Genocide: the deliberate, systematic killing of an entire people or nation • Examples: Europeans killing Native Americans, the Nazis destruction of Jews, the “ethnic cleansing” of Muslims in the former Yugoslavia by the Serbs

Racism • Defined: a set of ideas that implies the superiority of one social group over another on the basis of biological or cultural characteristics, together with the power to put these beliefs into practice in a way that denies or excludes minority women and men Elements: prejudice, ethnocentrism, stereotyping, and discrimination

Racism • Examples of types of racism • Overt: Beating death of a 65 year old Sikh Temple employee in Surrey in 1998 • Polite: Study by Ginzberg found that with equal qualifications, white job applicants received employment offers three times more often than blacks • Subliminal: 250,000 Canadians signed a petition that RCMP officers wearing turbans was “un-Canadian”

Racism • Examples of types of racism • Institutional: The Canadian Civil Liberties Association (1991) found evidence in 15 employment agencies • Systemic: criteria set that are not overtly racist but, in effect, are. Criteria such as weight, height, and education can be used to exclude subordinate racial groups

Sociological Perspectives on Race and Ethnic Relations • Symbolic Interactionist • Functionalist • Conflict • Feminist • Postmodern • Critical Race Theory

Symbolic Interactionist • Theme: an awareness of the importance of intergroup contact and the fact that it may either intensify or reduce racial and ethnic stereotyping and prejudice • The contact hypothesis: contact between people from different groups should lead to favourable attitudes and behaviours when certain factors are present

Criteria for Positive Outcomes of Inter-racial or Ethnic Contact One: Have Equal Status Two: Pursue the same Goals Three Cooperate with one another in achieving their goals Four Receive positive feedback when they interact with one another in positive, non-discriminatory ways

Functionalist Perspectives • Problem statement: how do members of subordinate racial and ethnic groups become part of the dominant group? • Two ways: • Assimilation • Ethnic Pluralism

Functionalist Perspectives • Assimilation • Defined: a process by which members of subordinate racial and ethnic groups become absorbed into the dominate culture • Types: • Cultural assimilation: members of an ethnic group adopt dominant group traits such as language, dress, values, and religion • Structural assimilation or integration: when members of the subordinate group gain acceptance

Functionalist Perspectives • Assimilation • Types: • Biological or amalgamation: Through inter-marriage. Examples: Mexico, Brazil and Hawaii. • Psychological: a change in racial or ethnic self-identification on the part of an individual • Ethnic Pluralism • Defined: the coexistence of a variety of distinct racial and ethnic groups within one society

Functionalist Perspectives • Ethnic Pluralism • Equalitarian or accommodation: when ethnic/racial groups live together on a equal basis. Example: Switzerland • In Canada, the goal of the Canadian Multiculturalism Act of 1988 • Segregation: the spatial and social separation of categories of people by race, ethnicity, class, gender, and/or religion • Examples: Blacks in Nova Scotia; Reserve system for Aboriginal Canadians

Conflict Perspectives • Theme: a focus on economic stratification and access to power informs our understanding of ethnicity and race • Terms: • Internal Colonialism: a situation in which members of a racial or ethnic group are conquered or colonized and forcibly placed under the economic and political control of the dominant group. Example: Aboriginal peoples

Conflict Perspectives • Terms: • Split-Labour-Market Theory: the division of the economy into two areas of employment: a primary sector or upper tier, composed of higher paid (usually the dominant group) workers in more secure jobs, and a secondary sector or lower tier, made up of lower-paid (often subordinate groups) workers in jobs with little security and hazardous working conditions

Feminist Perspectives • Theme: minority women are doubly disadvantaged as a result of their gender • Term: Gendered racism: the interactive effect of racism and sexism in the exploitation of women of colour • Combined with split-labour-market theory • Example: who is more likely to be a nurse or a custodian in a Canadian hospital?

Postmodern Perspectives • Focus: That ethnic and racial identities are largely the effect of personal choice (agency) and subjective definition • Further, these identities are socially constructed and given meaning in our fragmented society

Postmodern Perspectives • Discourse: refers to the different ways of structuring knowledge and social practice • Deconstructing: to analyze the assumptions and meanings embedded in scientific works • Racist Discourse: an identifiable repertoire of words, images, and practices through which racial power is directed against ethnic and racial minority groups

Postmodern Perspectives • Discourse of denial: suggests that racism does not exist in our nation Discourse of colour-blindness: that Caucasions do not recognize skin colour of racial minorities • Critique: Very difficult to use in understanding racial and ethnic relationships because the concepts are so abstract

Critical Race Theory • Origins: • From the civil rights movement from such persons as Martin Luther King Jr., W. Du Bois, Malcolm X, and Cesar Chavez • Key premises: • Racism is so much part of North America that it appears “natural” and ordinary • Affirmative action helps surface concerns but does not effect ordinary life

Critical Race Theory • Key premises: • The best way to learn about racism is to listen to those who have been affected by it • Interest convergence: white elites tolerate or encourage racial advances if the dominate-group members believe that their own self-interest is increased

Ethnic Groups In Canada • Canada is a nation that has become increasingly multi-ethnic • Types: • Aboriginal • Charter Europeans • Multicultural Minorities

Aboriginals • Defined: the original or indigenous occupants of Canada • Various terms: Native or First Nations: refers to about 55 sovereign peoples • Subtypes: • Status Indian: those with legal rights under the Indian Act • Non-status Indian: those without legal status

Aboriginals • Subtypes: • Metis: descendents of Indian and non-Indian unions (primarily French settlers and Indian Women) • Inuit: (formerly termed Eskimo) Those located in the Eastern Arctic and northern islands • In Pre-European contact, there may have been between one and twelve million in North America

Aboriginals • Theories of why there was such a drastic depopulation? • Genocide • Forced Migration • Forced Assimilation

Aboriginals • Genocide • Many were actually massacred or died from European diseases • Forced Migration • Infamous “Trail of Tears”: in 1832, the Cherokee Nation were forced to leave Southeastern United States to Oklahoma • Forced migration of prairie peoples into reserves to make room for European settlers • The Indian Act of 1876 gave control of almost every aspect of Indian life by the Canadian Federal State

Aboriginals • Forced Assimilation: • The ideology that Aboriginal peoples were savages or uncivilized and that they would best succeed if they became like Europeans • Example: the Residential Schools which were a joint project of the Canadian Government and various Christian Churches

Aboriginals • Aboriginal Peoples Today: • 2001 census (see Figure 10.1) reveal this pattern: • Total: 1,000,000 • North American Indian (Status and Non-Status): 609,850 • Metis: 292,310 • Inuit: 45,070

Aboriginals • Aboriginal Peoples Today: • Characteristics: • Most disadvantaged of all Canadians in terms of income, employment, housing, nutrition, and health • Life chances are less (ten years less than others) • Highest infant mortality rate and diseases • Limited educational opportunities

Race and Ethnicity