Sociology of the Micro-Culture: Ethnicity - Research Paper Example

Ethnic origin provides an individual with a sense of identity from other people. It reinforces the idea that a certain individual is what he or she is because of his or her belongingness to this certain group, where the culture of that group is passed on to that individual by means of language. It is quite comparable to an intangible home of the individual where different members of a huge family interact in seemingly similar ways and value similar cultural norms. Ethnicity is closely linked to the concept of nationality, which, in Political Science, refers to the perception of belongingness to a group or a collective of people exhibiting uniqueness or a sense of distinction from other groups of people.

Ethnicity is Janus-faced as it presents two paradoxical roles in society. The concept of Ethnicity unites people of the same ethnic origin and consolidates a homogenous collective group of that same ethnic origin. We can see this in the classic example of the Chinese. In seemingly most major cities in the world, there is always a sector in that city deemed a Chinatown, where most, if not all, people, citizens or migrants, that are ethnically and conservative Chinese establish their homes and their businesses. It strengthens the Chinese identity of the people by reinforcing the group ethnicity, employing endogamy, maintaining Chinese beliefs and culture, and preserving the language as a means of communication in their homes or among the members of the group. It reinforces the Chinese-ness amongst the people even if they are half a world away from their motherland

Ethnicity, while consolidating the members of the same ethnic group, it separates this group from the mainstream culture, especially if the ethnic group is located in a foreign land away from their ancestral domain. The dominant culture, or the culture of the majority, though acknowledges the existence of other cultures in their immediate territory; the dominant culture would still always claim to be the rightful and correct culture to be followed. It considers the out-group to be deviant and thus violates the values that the dominant culture’s norms are, though these violations may not necessarily be illegal, as these violations can be immoral or unusual. Through ethnicity, it creates a bigger heterogeneous social environment consisting of at least two different ethnicities. A heterogeneous social environment is prone to misunderstanding and conflict or clash of ideas as the ethnic groups perceive the world differently, depending upon their culture’s worldview and how their culture interprets the events, sceneries, and perceptions of the individuals of the collective ethnic group.

There are a number of public policies that the government or any other body of organization with the respective authority in order to address the negative effect of ethnicity on social consolidation, one of which is assimilation.

Assimilation is directly learning, understanding, and adapting another culture as part of an individual or a couple of individuals’ purpose of being part of that respective society. It’s like a process of unlearning one’s own culture and adopting another culture. This usually happens as a response to migration movements of people from across the borders of the world. Migration is good for a country, especially for a dying population (old people > young people, i.e. Canada), as it adds up to their population count. Excessive Migration, on the other hand, can over-power the culture of the accepting society, threatening such culture to be extinct. Furthermore, excessive migration produces a sheer heterogeneous society of different ethnic origins with different cultures and thus making one’s community prone to cultural problems and misunderstanding. Through assimilation, governments can ensure the unity of their population by facilitating an assimilation program for migrants to accept and understand the culture of the society the government stands for, regardless of the ethnic origin of the migrant.

Ethnicity is indeed one of the most fundamental ingredients for the creation of social institutions, as it is the main embodiment of all of the cultures of a certain group of individuals or of a society. It acts as a blueprint as to how one interacts with one another, and ultimately, the nature of social institutions that seeks to promote the culture of the ethnic group to the young generations. What is problematic about Ethnicity is that by strengthening the ethnic group’s closeness to its members, it creates a barrier and sets a distance between its members and the non-members. It often breeds misunderstanding, and conflicts usually arise because of this misunderstanding. In order to combat this misunderstanding, the individual person must learn to understand each other’s culture even by mere exposure to their environments, otherwise, more problematic means will be utilized, such as assimilation, in order to maintain national security within the territory.