Download Some Themes in the Sociological Study of Race/Ethnic Relations

Some Themes in the Sociological Study of
Race/Ethnic Relations and Gender
OVERVIEW:
1. Different Categories of Women Have Very
Different Experiences/Issues/Problems and
Not All Women are Equally Oppressed
2. Layering of Disadvantage (p. 149, top) &
The Need for Intersectional Analysis (p. 156 mid)
3. Insurmountable Challenge of Feminist Unity
4. The Gender Bias in The U.N. Definition of
Refugees (p. 151)
DETAILED DISCUSSION
1. Different Categories of Women Have Very
Different Experiences/Issues/Problems and
Not All Women are Equally Oppressed
a. Sponsored Refugee Women
b. Illegal Refugees
c. Transnational Migrant Women
d. Domestics
e. Other Immigrant Women
f. Women of Colour (Cdn-born or foreign born)
- “[V]isible minority women experience
racism differently … among themselves
depending upon age, class, ability, sexual
preference, and place of residence…”
(p. 156, ¼ down)
g. Aboriginal Women
h. Women of Religious Minorities
(e.g., Muslims, Sikhs, Jews)
2. Layering of Disadvantage (p. 149, top) &
The Need for Intersectional Analysis (p. 156 mid)
Most of the above categories of women face the
same problems as their male counterparts/partners,
but are additionally disadvantaged because of their
status as women in a patriarchal society.
- Def’n of Patriarchy:
Also, some persons experience multiple bases of
oppression/domination/exclusion:
“[E]ach [race, class, gender, ethnicity]
operates in conjunction with the others to
construct a complex set of interlocking and
overlapping systems of domination and
sub-domination.”
(p. 155, bottom)
i.e., a multi-facetted social inequality
Therefore, sociologists call for an ”intersectional
analysis” (p. 156, mid)
3. Insurmountable Challenge of Feminist Unity
To successfully mobilize women of such diverse
focal concerns to sustained collective action under
a single feminist banner is impossible.
The unique experiences of women because of race,
ethnicity, or class may outweigh the similarities of
their experience as women. (p. 149, near top)
To the degree that minority women must confront
racism, ethnocentrism, and class barriers, they
cannot afford to privilege gender as the primary
site of struggle. (p. 152, ¾ down)
Stasiulis: “To speak about or for “women” [is] no
longer a liberating politics, but a homogenizing
gesture that mask[s] the race privilege of racially
dominant women and the racial oppression and
marginalization of women of colour.” (p. 155, top)
4. The Gender Bias in The U.N. Definition of
Refugees (p. 151)