The Construction of Race and Racism - Assignment Example

A History: The Construction of Race and Racism During the 16th % 17th century, there was one main issue which was in the attention of Christian religious hierarchy, that the Black and Indians were human or not. Europeans were influenced to Africans and indigenous people of North and South America. The church was fluctuated in one’s opinion. Later after so many queries, The Catholic and the Protestant churches arrived to a certain point which created the meaningful difference between the two systems of slavery. The Catholic Church was the very first to admit the fact the Blacks and Indians are also human like us, and similarly carries the soul. Due to this The Protestant-Calvinist Church tried to separate their selves from the Catholicism. The adaptation of Blacks and Indians was very slow in process by the whole nation. Racism began to construct on the basis of religion and color of the people. Blacks and Indians were treated as slaves and soulless. The economy of slavery in South forced a system based on racialism which developed the biological, zoological and botanical theories, which explained the human difference &slavery justification. (DISMANTLING RACISM: A Resource Book). From my personal point of view, Racism and slavery in south has always been a major issue of human rights. Slaves and Blacks being treated as lesser beings is what led to society with a born mindset against slaves and Blacks. Historically, sociology in context with the race has failed to observe the construction of both sides of America black/white, in terms of radical inequality. The real situation of America’s society is defined by both ‘race’ and ‘whiteness’. It was observed by Blumer that the Americans race system emerged from the intersection into three events occurred in the history of America. That was the conquest of the Indians, the forced importation of Africans, and more or less solicited coming of Europeans, Asians, and Latinos. Race was created in America during the time of 16th and 17th century. As per norms and values the trend was that the Catholics preferred to marry Catholics, the wealthy people preferred to marry wealthy, white preferred white and black preferred black. So, the norms of endogamy became the major issue in the ‘races’ of America. In 1967, van den Berghe observed that “sociologist might regard racial distinction as a special case of invidious status differentiation”. Blumer also pointed the distinction of statuses among the American people. The American ‘race’ relations represent the historical activities of humanity (Guess) There are two kinds of people living in the world, the freemen and slaves, and Americans explained the true meaning of freemen to the others. At the time of intense politicization, the American Revolution used the slavery in order to describe the political situation of white existence. They used the political slavery of white as mark & reference and compared them to slaves. The servants generally never seem to be opened and compared themselves. But theUnited States did not give signal to the rise of the white worker in form of self-identification within the country. The un-freedom of both whiteness and blackness were not firmly connected, but the revolution in spreading the independence in America among whites and its failure in admitting blacks helped to bring a lot of change in the country. (ROEDIGER) It has been seen that in the past ten to fifteen years that the government is trying and putting its full effort to manage the race and racism attitudes in the workplace. For this task they have also formed government agencies, corporations and non-profitable firms. Therefore diversity training has brought boom in the industries. Due to the employ diversity training organization can protect the liability, and diversity in the workplace can also bring new ideas plus higher profits to the organization.The effective racial justice approach is required to make some progression in the social change. The Dismantling Racism Project was highlighted by the Western States Centers, which states that the racism is a set of societal, cultural, and institutional beliefs and practices. An individual’s attitudes and beliefs are always considered as a factor of change. The goal of the organization in multi-cultural workplace is that, they apply the diversity training program to prominence the awareness and appreciation of the contributions of different cultures. The Western States Dismantling Racism (DR), in its project shed the light on the issue that the race is not such a problem which could be easily solved by the individual’s itself. Race comes under institutional and cultural context. This project was made to make the analysis on the racism issue caused within the organizational structures and processes. Regarding the issue of racism and injustice, a friendly workplace is never enough, therefore the DR project is designed with such practices which could clearly take racism and injustice issue into consideration and turn the output of the organization progressive & profitable(David Rogers) During the era of Jim Crow, after the put down of rebellion the government embarked on a division and shaped the confrontations between the poor white and Black southern. It was stated that the Americans colonies can never treat the Africans as social equals of European settlers. As it was seen in the colonies of Virginia, the poor and Blacks were treated badly, as slaves by the whites. The wealthy whites were ruling over blacks and Indians. As in early America, they distinguish the European settlers from Native America, to distinguish the Africans from Europeans. Racism is still important to the Americans. In America, at the time of the elections of Barack Obama’s, racism was seen all over the country. First time the Whites were forced to enter the voting booth and confronted their race. As in the past it was Black people who used to confront their race at the time of national elections (Gilmore, 2009) After the coming of Barack Obama the place of racism has changed in America. Many conversations are taking place in the United States from past years, ‘to end race’ the system which has been going on from history. Even Obama confirms the concept that the race in United States no longer matters.Dinesh D’Souza wrote a Book in 1995 named, ‘The End of Racism’, and his book stood out as a role model for the nations. In his book he mentioned that racism system has become episodic now. David R. writes that the racism system would end on its own, as the coming of African American President ‘Barack Obama was the first step towards the end of racism. He also says that the whitesupremacy in America points that the racism might have abolished accidently with the coming of Obama, and it requires a deep and conscious anti-racist action. The election of Obama also brought the new trends and changes in the thinking of the American nation plus a change in the society (Roediger). What happened during 16th& 17th century between Catholics & the Protestant churches was a true denial of God’s creation as a whole. Both people refused to accept Blacks & Indians, in their nation. Racism suddenly began to attack the human mind during that time. The nation got divided into two, a battle started to take place in America against the Blacks & Indians. Construction of racism boomed. The Blacks & Indians faced hard time on the basis of their color and religion. Whites treated them as dogs. They accepted them but in form of their slaves. They used to punch them with harsh behavior. Humanity just slipped out of the hands of whites. Later when Catholics began to accept them, that incident resulted into disagreements. However the American government realized this racism war, took serious action against it. Government created agencies to overcome this battle of racism. Laws were developed in favor of Blacks. Blacks stood themselves as protestors.They began to fight for their equal rights in America. The nation as a whole was destroying. Racism is the insect of a human mind. No one can kill this insect instead, of a human itself. Color, religion cast, nationality, nothing matters. What matters in the first place is that we all are human. All over America, colonies etc., yet the racism is injected in the minds of people. Barack Obama is like the light to the Black nation. He has fought & yet he is trying to destroy the racism in all parts of America. With time white have started to equalize themselves with Blacks, but on the basis of religion the issue is still in light. Slavery of Black people has overcome finely. We can see blacks in every industry. Blacks are much motivated to join US army, as compared to men. We can also see some Hollywood movies, encouraging the discrimination of racism by setting examples in the films. Blacks are treated equally as Whites. The thinking of Americans towards the color of the people has changed widely. Blacks are promoted along with the Whites. Blacks are getting respected and motivated. Blacks have conquered the hearts and minds of American nation. African American identity has become legal. Blacks are walking with their heads up. Differences on the basis of society norms and valueshave ended so far. Whites have begun to prefer blacks, to marry with. Even in workplace the unity has formed by abolishing the race differences, to achieve the organization’s goal. Racism should never be the part of this world. Every human has a right to be treated nicely and equally in the hands of the others. Racism has survived in America by time. Works Cited David Rogers, Moira Bowman. Dismantling Racism Project - Reflections on six years of anti-racism. 2005. DISMANTLING RACISM: A Resource Book. Western States Center, 2003. Gilmore, Brian. Black ans White World. Dec/Jan 2009. 12 March 2014 . Guess, Teresa J. The social construction of whiteness: Racism by intent, Racism by consequence. USA, 2006. ROEDIGER, DAVID R. The Wages of Whiteness. New York: THE HAYMARKET SERIES , n.d. Roediger, David R. Why race still matters. 2008. 12 March 2014 . Read More