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Chapter 10
Race and Ethnicity
Race
 Since ancient times, people have attempted
to group human beings into racial categories
based on physical characteristics, such as
skin color, hair texture, and body structure.
 Race: Categories of people who share
inherited physical characteristics and whom
others see as being a distinct group.
Race
 For sociologists, the important issue is not
that a person has a specific color of skin or
hair of a certain texture.
 Sociologists are concerned with how people
react to these physical characteristics and
how these reactions affect individuals in
society.
Race
 Scholars have placed people into 3 racial groups:
 Caucasoid (Whites)- fair skin and straight or
wavy hair.
 Mongoloids (Asians)- yellowish or brownish
skin and folds on eyelids.
 Negroids (Blacks)- dark skin and tightly curled
hair.
 There are NO Biologically pure races.
Ethnicity
 Ethnicity is a cultural characteristic.
 The set of cultural characteristics that
distinguishes one group from one another is
called ethnicity.
 Ethnicity is based on cultural considerations
whereas race is based on physical
considerations.
Ethnic Groups
 An ethnic group is a group of people who
share a common cultural background and a
common sense of identity.
 EX. Whites: Irish, Polish, Russian,
Americans
 Ethnicity is generally based on such cultural
characteristics as national origin, religion,
language, customs, and values.
Minority Group
 No particular skin color, physical
frame, or ethnic background is superior
or inferior by nature.
 However, sociologists agree that those
who hold power may place a value on
specific characteristics.
Minority Group
 Those who hold power- Majority
 Those who don’t hold power- Minority
 Not necessarily based on numbers of
people like other areas (voting, etc.)
Conflict Theory in Ethnicity and Race
 From the conflict perspective, many
sociologists have concluded that a
dominant group’s position of power
allows them to enjoy certain privileges,
such as better housing, better schools,
and higher incomes.
Louis Wirth
 Identified a minority group as a group
of people who, because of their physical
characteristics and/or cultural
perspectives- are singled out and
unequally treated.
Minority Group Characteristics
 Identifiable physical/cultural characteristics
which are different from dominant group.
 Victims of unfair/unequal treatment.
 Membership in group is ascribed (born into).
 Members share a strong bond and a sense of
group loyalty.
 Members tend to practice endogamy- marriage
within the group.
Discrimination and Prejudice
 Often these two words are used
interchangeably, but they do not mean the
same thing.
 Discrimination- The denial of equal
treatment to individuals based on their
group membership.
 Prejudice- An unsupported generalization
about a category of people.
Blue Eyes v. Brown Eyes
 http://vod.nort2h.com/SAFARI/mon
tage/play.php?keyindex=5557&chapter
skeyindex=-1&keyconceptskeyindex=1&sceneclipskeyindex=1&location=local
Discrimination
 Found on an individual or societal level.
 Between 1882 and 1970 more than 1,170
African Americans were lynched by white
mobs in the U.S.
 Most of the time these people were
attempting to vote, use the same public
facilities, or had become too successful.
White Privilege
 White privilege refers to any advantage,
opportunity, benefit, head start, or general
protection from negative societal
mistreatment, which persons deemed white
will typically enjoy, but which others will
generally not enjoy.
White Privilege
 These benefits can be:
 material (such as greater opportunity in the
labor market, or greater net worth, due to a
history in which whites had the ability to
accumulate wealth to a greater extent than
persons of color)
 social (such as presumptions of competence,
creditworthiness, law-abidingness, intelligence,
etc.)
White Privilege
 psychological (such as not having to worry
about triggering negative stereotypes, rarely
having to feel out of place, not having to
worry about racial profiling, etc.).
Societal Discrimination
 Appears in one of two forms
 Legal discrimination- upheld by law.
 Institutionalized discrimination- an
outgrowth of the structure of society.
 What are some examples of legal
discrimination throughout history?
 What are some examples of institutionalized
discrimination today?
Legal Discrimination
 Minors Drinking age (21)
 Smoking age (18)
 Voting age (18)
 Marriage age (in Ohio, 16 with parental
approval, 18 without parental approval)
Legal Discrimination
 Marriage
 In the state of Ohio, it must be between a man
and a woman.
 Apartheid
 Laws to keep the races separate in S. Africa
until early 1990s.
 Apartments
 No pets, no children, no one under 55
Institutionalized Discrimination
 Overtime, unequal access to the resources
of society pushes some minority groups into
less-powerful positions.
 When this occurs, it is no longer necessary
for the dominant group to consciously
discriminate against the minority group to
maintain a system of inequality.
Institutionalized Discrimination
 Redlining Coined by John McKnight.
 It marks the practice of marking a red line on
the map to delineate the area where banks
would later not invest.
 NFL Rooney Rule
 Interviewing minority coaches in the league
Institutionalized Discrimination
 Airlines
 Restrictions on overweight fliers
 http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/04/
17/earlyshow/living/travel/main4952134.sht
ml
 Sin Tax
 Taxing things like tobacco and alcohol as well as
soft drinks, candy, coffee, gambling or
prostitution.
Hank Williams
 Hank Williams Jr.’s song All My Rowdy Friends has been the
opening to the NFL’s Monday Night Football since 1991.
 The NFL pulled the song before the Colts v. Dolphins game
on October 3rd because of remarks that Williams made to
Fox News.
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1eF6vCv13bw&safety_m
ode=true&persist_safety_mode=1&safe=active
 Since the remarks, Williams has apologized, but the NFL has
permanently pulled Williams song and said they will not use
it any longer.
Prejudice
 Prejudice is an unsupported generalization.
 Does not always have to be about race or
ethnicity
 It is an attitude
 Can be positive (for) or negative (against)
 Sociology focuses on the negative
 Generally, someone who is prejudiced also
discriminates.
Stereotyping
 An oversimplified, exaggerated, or unfavorable
generalization about a group of people.
 An individual forms an image of a particular
group and then applies that image to all members
of the group.
 If individuals are found to differ from the
stereotyped image, they are thought to be
exceptions to the rule, rather than proof that the
stereotype is wrong.
Stereotyping
 “ If people define situations as real, they are
real in their consequences.” W.I. Thomas,
American sociologist
 Self-fulfilling prophecy: A prediction that
results in behavior that makes the prediction
become true.
Racism
 Belief that one’s own race or ethnicity’s group or
religion is superior to all others.
 When an individual or group believes they are
innately superior, it justifies their mistreatment of
others.
 Ex. Hitler and the Nazis, Slave masters and slaves
 Prejudice and discrimination are related, but they do
not always go hand-in-hand.
 http://thefw.com/lost-disney-
characters/?utm_source=zergnet.com&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=zergn
et_41253
Racism in Disney Movies
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jHyzAbV6nuM&safety_mo
de=true&safe=active&persist_safety_mode=1
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSYAY1nv6tg&safety_mode
=true&safe=active&persist_safety_mode=1
Robert K. Merton’s Patterns of
Prejudice and Discrimination
No
Yes
Discrimination
Yes
Prejudice
Timid Bigot:
Prejudiced person
who does not
discriminate
Active Bigot:
Prejudiced person
who discriminates
No
All-Weather Liberal:
Non prejudiced
person who does not
discriminate
Fair-Weather Liberal:
Non-prejudiced
person who
discriminates
Sociological Explanations
 Most sociological explanations of prejudice
and discrimination focus on social
environment.
 Often a learned behavior (comes from
home).
 Embedded in social norms (socialization).
 People often become prejudice to maintain
their place in a group (peer pressure).
Psychological Explanations
 Theodor Adorno- Came up with common
characteristics among people studied who
were prejudice.
 Strongly conformist
 Great respect for authority and tendency
to follow orders of those in authority
 Great deal of anger and are likely to blame
their problems on others.
Psychological Explanations
 Prejudice might be the product of anger and
frustration.
 Scapegoating- The practice of placing the
blame of one’s troubles on an innocent
individual or group.
 Anyone know where the term ‘scapegoat”
comes from?
Psychological Explanations
 Minority groups become scapegoats because
of their distinctive appearance, language,
style of dress, religious practices.
 They tend to lack power in society
 Tend to be concentrated in one geographic
region.
Cultural Pluralism
 Cultural pluralism is a policy that allows
each group within society to keep its unique
cultural identity.
 Good example- Switzerland: 3 official
languages, French, German and Italian.
 Extremely loyal to Switzerland and live
peacefully.
Assimilation
 Assimilation is the blending of culturally
distinct groups into a single group with a
common culture.
 Good example- America: the idea that
various groups can be blended into a single
people with a common, homogeneous
culture.
 “Melting pot”
Segregation
 Segregation is the act of using policies to
separate a minority group from the
dominant group.
 Two types of segregation
 De jure segregation- based on laws
 De facto segregation- based on informal
norms
Genocide
 Genocide is the intentional
extermination of a targeted
population.
 This kind of extermination has been
attempted many times, and
sometimes achieved, throughout
history.