Race and Ethnicity

1. Race and Ethnicity The United States is among the most racially and ethnically heterogeneous societies in the world.

2. Race • a category composed of people who share biologically transmitted traits that members of a society deem socially significant. • Three categories of race in the US • White • Black • (East) Asian • (19th century terms: Caucasoid, Negroid, Mongoloid)

3. Race • The United States is one of the few places where race is based entirely on skin color. • What other characteristics could be used to determine race? • The one drop rule • If you have even one ancestor who is black, then you are considered black. Some people argue that race is becoming less significant in the US. Do you agree or disagree?

4. Ethnicity • a shared cultural heritage • Ethnic options • the ability of whites in US society to pick and choose with which ethnic group they want to be identified. • Ethnic enclave • a segment of a community in which many of the residents share a common heritage and where their needs are catered (grocery stores, restaurants, entertainment, religious institutions, etc.)

5. Majority and Minority Interaction • Minority group • a category of people, distinguished by physical or cultural traits, who are socially disadvantaged. • Pluralism • racial and ethnic minorities are distinct but have parity

6. Majority and Minority Interaction • Miscegenation • biological reproduction by partners of different racial categories • Assimilation • the process by which minorities gradually adopt patterns of the dominant culture • Melting pot vs. Salad bowl

7. Majority and Minority Interaction • Segregation • physical and social separation of categories of people • Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) • the Supreme Court approved legally enforced segregation as long as the law did not make facilities for blacks inferior to those of whites. • Brown v. Topeka Board of Education (Brown v. Board) (1954) • The Supreme Court ruled that “separate but equal” does not work. Segregated schools provide African Americans with inferior schooling.

8. Prejudice and Discrimination • Prejudice • rigid and irrational generalization about an entire category of people (can be based on race, ethnicity, class, sex, or any other category) • Racism • the belief that one racial category is innately superior or inferior to another

9. Prejudice and Discrimination • Stereotype • Stereotype – a prejudicial, exaggerated description of some category of people • Scapegoat • person or category of people, typically, with little power, whom people unfairly blame for their own troubles

10. Prejudice and Discrimination • Discrimination • any action that involves treating various categories of people unequally • Institutional Discrimination • bias in attitudes or action inherent in the operation of society’s institutions

11. Prejudice and Discrimination • Genocide • the systematic annihilation of one category of people by another • What are some examples?