Gretchen Gruenburg Professor Sue Muecke

Gruenburg 1

Gretchen Gruenburg

Professor Sue Muecke

English 1020

2 March 2011

Members of the KKK and Various Other Diversely Intolerant Individuals,

The term race can be defined in a number of ways, however scientifically or morally incorrect those definitions may be. The most common connotation of the term is a culmination of these three definitions: “a family, tribe, people, or nation belonging to the same stock; a class or kind of people unified by shared interests, habits, or characteristics; a category of humankind that shares certain distinctive physical traits”.

(Merriam Webster) These definitions have been used throughout history to create barriers between civilizations, as I’m sure you are aware of, and to create social stratification based on appearance alone. My goal in this paper is to break down those barriers through clear-cut evidence and logical explanation. To my knowledge, race is a way of categorizing people into groups based on appearance, although this categorization makes it easier to decipher the groups, it does not include any scientific reasoning. My purpose in writing this paper is to explain the social implication of race, with a brief explanation of how scientific research has actually proven this to be incorrect, and the effects of the connotation of this term, on both society and the individual.

Racial intolerance has been prevalent throughout history, mainly used as a means to enslave or discriminate against people with a different skin color or cultural [Type text] [Type text] [Type text] background. Although this notion has been accepted by various groups of people throughout history and across the globe, it is just simply not reasonable, and has been proven to be harmful to society as a whole. The article, “Race” and the Construction of

Human Identity, looks at the concept of race from a variety of different viewpoints; historical, current, and juxtaposed to “ethnicity”. This article questions the nature of the word race, and moreover, it’s connotations throughout time. In regards to the overall effect of the term and consequences of it’s presence, the author stresses:

“American society had made “race” (and the physical features connected to it) equivalent to, and the dominant source of, human identity, superseding all other aspects of identity…”Race” identity took priority over religion, ethnic origin, education and training, socioeconomic class, occupation, language, values, beliefs, morals, lifestyles, geographical location, and all other human attributes that hitherto provided all groups and individuals with a sense of who they were.” (Smedley, 695)

The author emphasizes that having such a strong prominence on race can skew an entire populations’ personal and cultural identity. Essentially, instead of viewing a population of people from mixed backgrounds as almost 100% biologically similar, the former connotation of race has affected almost the entire worlds’ viewpoint of the term and it’s importance. This negative, exclusive view on race can stunt the progress of any singular person, and especially a society as a whole.

The old fashioned concept of race has been quite detrimental to cultures of ethnic backgrounds, specifically with the African American culture in America. Due to the fact that European colonists essentially ripped Africans out of their home, culture, families, and way of life in order to enslave them and treat them like Gruenburg 3 livestock, African Americans of today still tend to feel slightly out of place not knowing exactly where they came from. I mean, think about it, if your family hadn’t had a name passed down from the “old country”, or stories and pictures, or even an opportunity to track your genealogy through websites or a specialist, you would probably feel out of place as well. Knowing for a fact that your family was basically abducted to travel halfway across the Earth to be another persons’ property would probably not sit too well in your conscience. Aside from that terrible fact of

American history, the turmoil experienced by this “race” of people even after slavery was abolished, i.e. segregation, hate crimes, the simple fact of fighting for basic rights and freedoms, is still very fresh on the minds of the older generations who have actually lived through it, and their relatives, who have lived through various stories of these obscene crimes against humanity. Being a member of a younger generation, going through school learning about Harriet Tubmann and the

Underground Railroad, Malcom X, Dr. King, and the Civil Rights Movement, I have never been able to wrap my head around such heinous acts of violence, hatred, and outright ignorance. To be quite frank, I have absolutely no respect or understanding towards any person that feels as though treating people in this way is at all acceptable or excusable.

In the documentary, A Girl Like Me, young, African American women are interviewed with questions about their self image in regards to the color of their skin. Almost every girl in this film expresses the fact that in general, young, black women have to strive to look like someone other than themselves in order to feel or be perceived as beautiful. Some women, and even young girls, go to extreme lengths [Type text] [Type text] [Type text] to be perceived as beautiful according to general standards, like bathing in capfuls of bleach in order to lighten their skin. Young African American women have to know what “good hair” is, and usually treat it accordingly; relaxing, perming, weaves, or, if it’s not kinky, letting it be natural, although that can tend to look African, which can be an issue to some people. 18 year old Jennifer, one of the young women interviewed for this documentary, says about skin color, “Since I was younger, I also considered being lighter as a form of beauty, or more beautiful than being dark skinned.” (A Girl Like Me)

Racial Intolerance has absolutely no good outcomes, as you can see. People are people, no matter what they look like. We are all a part of the human species, and our differences should bring us closer, due to the interesting variation and diversity, not push us apart. Humans are unlike any other species on the planet, aside from dogs, in that we have a very broad spectrum of variation that has almost no limits. Societies ignorance has set us back hundreds of years in the realm of acceptance of variation, which most cultures don’t participate in. The good news is, similar to our seemingly never ending gene pool, this mindset is not unchangeable.