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The Process of Ethno-Racialization
Ethnic And Racial Identity
• Ethnicity is a principle by which
people are defined, differentiated,
organized, and rewarded on the
basis of commonly shared cultural
characteristics.
• From the Latin ethos – “my
people.”
• Consciousness of kind.
• Common stock of knowledge.
• In modern everyday usage
ethnicity connotes identification of
people on the basis of “cultural
characteristics.”
The Social Category of Race
• Race refers to a group that is "socially"
defined but on the basis of real or
imagined "physical" characteristics.
• Origin uncertain – in early Italian
razza – “breed, lineage, common
descent”
• A particular people or stock.
• Is generally regarded as having no
empirical validity or scientific merit.It
exists instead as a “social
construction” that is manipulated to
define and reinforce the unequal
relations between dominant and
subordinate groups.
Ethno-Racial Process
• One of the most difficult things for
students to understand is that race and
ethnicity are social realities not
objective/biological/genetic realities
== it is not just that they change over
time and space == it is that people do
not look at how they change ==
people tend to treat them as a "thingin-itself”, not as "a way of organizing
"meaning" and "status" in the
world"
• Race is not a “thing in itself” == but
rather == “a social process.”
Ethno-Racial In-Distinctions
• Now, although the distinction between race and ethnicity
is clear – one is biological, the other cultural – people
often confuse the two]
• Ex: German use to be thought of as a race – Aryan (more
specific than Caucasian). Now we define it as a ethnicity
– cultural characteristics not physical biological
attributes.
• Ex: poles and Ukrainians were known as “Galicians” –
imported into Canada to farm empty prairies – viciously
attacked as “social sewage” and “human vermin”.
• Implications: When you define a race you “physicalize”
or “biologize” them – treat them as having biological
aptitudes/attributes (often inferior and/or repugnant).
• The concepts of ethnicity and race have a elastic
character in that they change in space and time.
Racial Ambiguity
• If we think about “racial ambiguity” in our
mixed-genetic lives it is much easier to
understand how ethno-racial categories are
socially constructed.
• (Modern life is subject to wide biological
variations that have lead to a modern
phenomenon of racial ambiguity– ex:
Mariah Carey, Amanda Marshall, Jennifer
Beals] == which exposes the “social
construction” of race == their bodies don’t
define them, we define their bodies — and
“only when they are defined, do certain
expectations about their lives and
sensibilities come into play”.
Genetically Mixed Postmoderns
• Although we may assume that we can
distinguish between people on the basis
of "race", biology would confirm that
most Canadians, like people all over the
world, are genetically mixed.
• Ex: Tiger Woods - mother is one-half
Chinese and one-half Thai, and his father
had one White, one Native, and two
Black grandparents. (What is he? Fuzzy
Zeoller - fried chicken and collar
greens).
• Racial ambiguity in everyday life shows
us there is no clarity or exactness to biophysical characteristics. But it also
shows that we interact with people “as
if” there is no ambiguity.
I’m a Cablinasian!
Welcome to the I Dream of Genie Pool
Somatic Understandings in Everyday Life
• Ethnicity and race are malleable concepts
that change in space and time.
• Ethno-racial reality, then, is in historical
flux – meaning – it actually has an
interpretive foundation as opposed to a
natural [objective nature] one.
• People do not see “race” they see what
sociologists call “racialized” formations” ==
or, “biologized formations.”
• Combinations of real and imagined somatic
{of the body} and cultural characteristics
that they attribute meaning to (with the idea
of race).
• To see race is engage in a thought process
which biologizes people by attaching
meaning and status to the physical.
The Personal and Sociological Level
• The interpretive nature of designations of ethnicity and
race function at two levels:
• At a personal level ethnicity and race provide meaning
for life, and sense of self and self-respect, and can
furnish a sense of belonging and security.
• They are designations that involve a search for
continuity, community, and commitment in a world of
diversity, change and uncertainty
• At a sociological level (social and historical context) they
represent systems of differential power, property and
prestige -- "graduated privilege" -- often unintended,
non-malicious, unassertive totem pole].
• “They are determinants of who gets what there is to
get” – structured inequality and stratification systems
[ranking scales].
The Biologically Incommensurable
Postmodern Diversity Mix
Racialized Formations
• To see race is engage in a thought process which biologize people by
attaching status to the physical.
• People are the subjects and objects of "racialized formations" -meaning -- people do not see "race"; Rather they observe certain
combinations of real and sometimes imagined somatic [of the body]
and cultural characteristics that they attribute meaning to with the
idea of "race".
• A difference in skin colour is not essential to the process of
"marking" here -- it actually goes beyond the biological
• Race is a social process of attributing superior- inferior status === the
complex relationships of exploitation, control, and exclusion
grounding the differences of race, and giving rise to (the ideological
construction of) "the racialized other"
• Racialization refers to the assigning of racial connotations to the
activities of minority people.
Social Theorists (Theoretical) Stipulation
•Society is pervaded by race-based advantages
and disadvantages.
•Most people don’t go out of their way to assert
power and privilege. It is all ready assigned –
“built into the system.”
•Ex: there is nothing normal and natural about
the inequitable status of minority women and
men in Canada. Rather, their inequities are
embedded within institutional structures, or
imposed by those with power to make these
decisions within structural frameworks. These
inequities are racialized in that they adversely
affect those who are most visible.
Racial Discourse in Society
• Many theorists have focused on the concept of "race" as an ideology,
as a discourse (a way of mapping out the world == that confers
meaning and status).
• [[Sociological note: “Discourse - is a set of topics for discussion and
a way of talking about those topics that is continued over time by a
number of people who have certain interests in common. Through
discourse, the participants come to have a shared "knowledge" about
the world.]]
• Cultural discourse” provides the conceptual models for people
around which they map the world === “racial discourse” part of a
dominant cultural discourse in our society that provides the
conceptual models for people around which they map the world
• The dominant discourse on race maps a “social biology” as an
assumptive reality {meaning it is often assumed that certain “bodies”
are connected to certain “patterns of action”} ]]
So What Is Racialization?
. Racialization - is the social process by which certain
groups of people are singled out for unique treatment on
the basis of real or imagined physical characteristics ==
conferring a racial meaning to events and/or investing
people with biologically determined attributes == a
process by which some groups and their activities come
to be defined on the basis race (biology).
• Racialization == as a sociological concept preserves the
idea that race relations do not exist (since there is no such
thing as race) but focuses on why certain relations
between groups become defined by reference to race —
why patterns of interaction become defined by reference
to race — why patterns of interaction become imbued
with perceptions of biological differences to account for
differences and similarities.
The Politics of Race
• Many social scientists suggest that the concept
of "race" is really a myth -- (race is really a
invidious status distinction).
• The malleability of the concept allows for
definitional maneuvering in terms of “power
politics.”
• Ex: The concept of race is only in existence
because of racism - the acquisition of power and
status -- "politics of dominance and
domination" - creates "status and status
anxiety".
• This is established through the racialization
process.
Racialized Formations
• Racialization also entails the idea that certain
ideas or activities become linked with race
(racialized) when and because minorities are
invested with negative biologically determined
attributes that are seen as creating problems,
posing a threat to society, and providing
unwanted competition for scarce resources.
• Ex: racial schemes and unarticulated analytic
frameworks == “minorities as problem people”
== dark bodies have and cause problems]]
• Ex: minorities seem as creating social
problems [Blacks-crime culture], posing a
threat to society [Asian “boat people”], and
providing unwanted competition for scarce
resources [“Third World” immigration].
Racialization as a way of “Othering” People
• Many social scientist argue that the existence of races in a given
society presupposes the presence of racism, for without racism
physical characteristics are devoid of significance.
• I.E., Racial majorities carry a social prestige and stature along with
their experience of dominance that becomes associate with their
physical appearance.
• Racial minorities carry a social stigma along with their experience of
oppression that becomes associated with their physical appearance.
• In contemporary sociological terms, distinctions of race are made for
“Othering" people - making people into the "not-us" - when they are
not-us they lack something -- when they lack something then they are
"less than us".
• I.E., It is a way of "protecting" status from acquisition by others, and
justifying its being deprive from others
• I.E., It comes into play only in an attempt to establish “status” and
identify the object of "status anxiety".
Status Ascription Through “Othering”
• The concept of “Othering” was first elaborated in the work of Simone
de Beauvoir (1908-86), in particular in her work The Second Sex, in
which woman is defined and constructed as “Other” to “Man” (man
in the generic sense as well as in the specific sense). “Man”
represents both the neutral and the positive poles while “Woman”
represents the negative – not man. “Man” requires the social and
biological construction of “Woman” as “Other” in order to construct
himself.
• Some sociologist believe race was used (historically) to construct an
“Other” that established and affirmed the normal and natural
definition of “Whiteness” as a neutral standard by which all else is
measured – e.x., the “White man’s burden” and “manifest destiny” to
bring progress to less intelligent races.
• The concept of “Othering” produces complex interlocking discourses
that are used to justify the power wielded by those who do the
defining.
Synchronizing Differences:
Re-aligning the Social to fit the Forces of History
• Even if we see ethnic and racial differences are socially constructed
and not objectively given; arbitrary and not essential – they are still
real in their consequences -- and the social problems they induce.
• The purpose of isolating and clarifying the components, perspectives,
and dynamics of these “kinds of people” categories in Canada and
elsewhere is to avert the danger of applying incorrect solutions to the
poorly defined problems.
• The sociological presumption is we can change consequences
{“power politics/dynamics”} by introducing resources that promote
enrichment, empowerment and community.
• [So] the sociological understanding of ethnicity and race is necessary
for effective socio-political arrangements and policy instruments to
get the best out of our human resources.
• It is crucial to understanding the forces of ethnicity and race in
modern life to meet the challenges of managing our accelerated
diversity, and/or the new globalism.
Ethno-Racial Diversity as Basis of Multiculturalism
•Canada, like much of the world, has become conspicuously
complex, diverse and demanding.
•How does Canada engage the global phenomenon of
growing ethno-racial diversity?
•To meet this challenge, it has introduced (what many
consider) an enlightened philosophy, a potential mandate for
the future to "promote unity through diversity”
l
•Canada officially sanctions ethno-racial diversity under a
“mosaic” umbrella – where ethno-racial differences are
recognized and legitimated as integral components of society
•Ethno-racial identity is celebrated in the form of
"multicultural policy“ {a framework for inclusiveness}.
•[Everyday definition: tolerance of and encouragement for all
cultural groups as vital to Canadian society. Recognition and
celebration of cultural differences.]
Riding the Wave of 21st Century Diversity:
Or to be Continued