Macionis defines racism as “the belief that one racial category is innately superior or inferior to another” (2008).
Racism can also be defined as bias, prejudice, discrimination or bigotry. How some people react to and treat others is partly because of fear of the unknown and lack of knowledge. Macionis defines prejudice as “rigid and unfair generalization about an entire category of people”(2008).
And if you break down the word prejudice it is pre and judge. How is it logically possible to judge something without having all the facts about it?
Prejudice generally takes form in a stereotype or misunderstanding of the lifestyles of the groups of people that are being discriminated against. Some common examples of stereotypes would be that all African Americans listen to hip hop music, particularly like certain foods such as watermelon and fried chicken and are all uneducated and are on some form of public assistance. These stereotypes are based on little or no knowledge of the people being unjustly categorized.
These discriminations can manifest in the forms of slurs, negative attitudes directed towards the groups of people, members being denied jobs or promotion opportunities for which they are indeed qualified and can lead to violence, even death. For the purposes of this paper, I am going to explore how discrimination has changed over the years and in what forms racism exists in this country in the present day. Racism in the United States has been a major issue and concern for hundreds of years.
The Essay on Scout And Jem People Prejudice Black
Prejudice Everywhere Wherever one goes, prejudice is most likely to tag along. In the book To Kill A Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, one of the most apparent themes is that of prejudice. Throughout the book, the main characters, Scout and Jem, experience the effects of prejudice in their society through multiple scenarios. In turn prejudice is viewed in its paramount form: racism. From various ...
Historically this country has been pre-dominantly Caucasian after the first settlers started immigrating. I used the word Caucasian as this country is a land of various immigrants, so using the term “white” would not be entirely correct. Judging just by a person’s outer appearance does not give the whole story, which is part of what this essay is meant to explain. Several groups throughout the history of the United States have been targeted adversely by racism. These groups include Native Americans, African Americans, Asian Americans and Irish Americans, among other immigrant groups.
The focus for this paper will primarily be on Native Americans and African Americans. Prior to the first settlers arriving in this country, Native Americans were the first known inhabitants of this country. Hence the earliest group of people who were affected by racism was the Native Americans. Part of the reason behind the way that they were approached and treated was fear of the unknown. This fear and misunderstanding developed into a pre-conceived notion of what type of people the Native Americans were and what kind of living habits they had.
They came to be thought of as savages. A large part of the struggle was the new settler’s constant need for more land, and as the expansion grew larger and larger to cover more territory, the settler’s needs were deemed more important than the Native Americans. Mann states that Native Americans “had an enormously complex impact on American history and racial relations. ” (2006), the result of which was wars, massacres, forced displacement, and the imposition of treaties (later broken in large part), land was taken and numerous hardships imposed.
The Indian Citizenship Act of 1924 granted all Native Americans US citizenship, although approximately two thirds of Native Americans were already citizens. Even though formal equality has been legally granted, American Indians, Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders remain among the most economically disadvantaged groups in the country, and according to dosomething. org, American Indians as a group are among the most economically disadvantaged in this country and tend to suffer from high levels of alcoholism, depression and suicide.
The Essay on Native American Vs African American Trickster Tales
Beep BeepVRRROOOOMMMMand the Roadrunner speeds away from the deceitful Coyote as Coyote falls over a Cliff with his Acme dynamite still in hand. The tale of the trickster is known and shared all around the world. It is an age old story that has many different versions and is culturally diverse. Almost every culture has some version of the trickster tale; from the early West African people and ...
Since the members of a society place importance on race, and African Americans first entered this country as slaves their importance in society was very much pre-determined. African Americans entered this country as slaves in the early 1600’s. Approximately 645,000 Africans landed in this country on ships from the 16th to the 19th centuries. By the 1860 US census, the number of slaves in this country had grown to approximately 4 million. The treatment of slaves was entirely determined by their owners.
They were given shacks to live in, worked at hard labor for long hours, were generally denied an education and could be subjected to physical punishment including being whipped, placed in chains and shackles, and being hanged. Slave families were routinely separated and members sold to other owners. Female slaves were subject to sexual violations by their owners, often for breeding purposes to increase the slave population. In 1861 the American Civil War began, one of the chief reasons behind the war was the issue of slavery. The southern states were decidedly pro slavery while the northern states were anti slavery.
The north won the war in April 1865 and all slaves were freed by the Emancipation Proclamation. In December 1865 the thirteenth amendment to the constitution officially abolished slavery and the fourteenth amendment granted full civil rights. Southern states in particular took devious steps to prevent African Americans from exercising their voting rights under the 15th amendment, including literacy tests, poll taxes, white only primaries, and rewriting of state constitutions. Racism against African Americans did not stop with emancipation.
From 1875 to 1965, Jim Crow laws were enacted in which states mandated segregation in public facilities such as restaurants, public transportation, medical care, and housing. There were countless acts of violence perpetrated against African Americans up to and including murder. It is estimated that 5000 lynching of African Americans occurred between 1860 and 1890. Records of lynchings kept by the Tuskegee Institute shows 3437 African Americans were lynched between 1880 and 1951. The frequencies of lynching dropped in the 1930s and declined sharply by the 1950s.
However, lynchings would increase again in the 1960s as forceful resistance against the civil rights movement. Although the word hate crime only became widely used in recent culture, these acts would most certainly be considered hate crimes. Hate crimes are a form of deviance, which Macionis defines as the “recognized violation of cultural norms”(2008).
The Essay on African Americans In The Civil
In the history of the United States, African Americans have always been discriminated against. When Africans first came to America, they were taken against their will and forced to work as laborers. They became slaves to the rich, greedy, lazy Americans. They were given no pay and often badly whipped and beaten. African Americans fought for their freedom, and up until the Civil War it was never ...
Hate crimes tend to inflame the public’s ire more than other crimes and also the victims of hate crimes typically suffer greater injuries than victims of crimes with other motives because hate crimes are emotionally motivated.
Hate crimes continue to occur to the present day. The African American civil rights movement occurred in this country from 1955 to 1968. These were the movements in which primarily African American citizens of the south and organizations such as the NAACP took place in non violent protests in attempts to gain their lawful rights previously denied to them. Some of these actions and protests included the Montgomery Bus Boycott, numerous sit-ins, the march on Selma, the fight to desegregate Little Rock High school and many others.
Some charismatic leaders who headed the fights for rights and justice emerged during the civil rights movement. Two of the better known leaders were Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. Their leadership and demonstrative styles varied greatly. King was an advocate for a peaceful resolution to civil rights for his people and was a fantastically eloquent speaker. He led many marches including the march on Washington DC in which over 200,000 people participated. Some of his speeches remain very famous to this day, including the “I Have a Dream” speech.
King was assassinated in Memphis, TN on April 4, 1968. Malcolm X’s philosophy was against segregating the races and instead believed from the teachings of the Nation of Islam that blacks were superior to whites and advocated for the separation of the African American race entirely from that of the white race. He rejected King and the civil rights movement quest for non violence and instead advocated a policy of change and protection for African Americans by any means necessary. Malcolm X was assassinated on February 21, 1965.
The struggles of these and other heroic people resulted in the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Civil Rights Act of 1968. Some important features of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as outlined on ourdocuments. gov, were that it effectively invalidated the Jim Crow laws and made it illegal to force segregation in schools, housing or hiring based on race. Another act that greatly aided the cause for African Americans was affirmative action, which was passed with the purpose of taking racial bias out of the employment process.
The Essay on African American History heritage Not Hate
When exploring African-American history, the most important things to focus on are that because of the times, black people were enslaved and treated poorly. They endured it all and worked hard to rise above the boundaries of slavery and prejudice. However, the most portentous aspect of African-American history is that it's heritage; it's history; and it's over. Jane Minor was born as Gensey Snow ...
Although these acts helped to usher in a great increase in opportunities for African Americans, according to Takaki “black poverty and lack of education deepened in the context of deindustrialization”(1993).
Although undoubtedly African Americans have more opportunities than they had nearly half a century ago, one need only look at the headlines to realize that there is still racism in this country directed towards African Americans, including heinous hate crimes. In a case that made national headlines in 1998, James Byrd Jr.
was murdered in Jasper, Texas by means of being chained to the back of a pickup truck and dragged for several miles until he was eventually decapitated. Another more recent case that received national attention was the death of Sean Bell, a 23 year old African American male was shot by NYPD as he was leaving his bachelor party held at a strip club in Queens, NY on November 25, 2006. In retelling the story, the NY Times tells how he was caught in a barrage of 50 bullets fired by 5 police officers because they believed he was armed and claimed to be in fear for their lives.
In fact, after the dust settled, he was found to be in possession of no weapons. In addition to hate crimes, African Americans are still plagued by other issues such as lack of educational opportunities and poverty. Consider these statistics from rohan. sdsu. edu: 45% of African American children live below the poverty line, compared to 16% of white children. African American professors hold less than 5% of faculty positions, and there are more African American men in jail than there are in college.
Unfortunately, since all societies have some social stratification, once the value of a race has been determined by its society the opportunities for social mobility become limited. As this paper has attempted to show, some upward mobility has been achieved by races which have been historically discriminated against. As races continue to mingle and more racial categories are recognized (30 in the 2000 census as opposed to 3 in the 1960’s), there is hope that more progress can be made in further eliminating bias and racism.
The Term Paper on American Presidency: War On Poverty
Introduction Approximately five decades ago, in the midst of, the mass media, unprecedented national prosperity, policymakers, and the American public made a startling discovery that millions of the Americans were living in poverty. In January 1964, the American president by then, President Lyndon B Johnson declared a ”War on Poverty” slogan that led to the introduction of initiatives designed to ...