...Privilege is the Greatest Enemy of Equality Educators most often consider multicultural education as teaching their pupils about Blacks, Latinos, Asians, Native Americans, and other descendants of color. However, multicultural education is not complete if it doesn’t challenge the root of structural racism and racial oppression: the matter of white privilege. It’s vital to understand white privilege and the role it plays in affecting society. In essence, white privilege is an unwilling and non-owned racism that has been ingrained into our mindset throughout history, and it affects how we interact with each other and how those who don’t share such advantages are affected. It’s a permeating factor responsible for many inequalities faced among races, widening the social gap between white and nonwhite Americans. Accessibility to education, jobs, and housing are all directly affected by societal inconsistencies of privilege and power. Ultimately, racism isn’t caused by white privilege; white privilege is caused by racism. Yet racism isn't a problem that resides in the minds of individuals; it lies rooted deep in our social institutions. It is necessary we reconstruct the societal ideologies of race and class to expel this self-perpetuating cycle. In this essay I will address these racial struggles for power and privilege, the role it plays in education, and my personal experience towards racism and how it has affected me as a person. Privilege, as defined by Websters Dictionary...
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...Nathan Salupo Professor Vann WMST 231-001 Privilege For my mini paper topic I focused on privilege. Before enrolling in this class I had no idea of what privileges were, who had which privileges, how we get our privileges, and the role that privileges play in our everyday lives. The topic of privileges shows up in Shaw and Lee chapter two which is the main focus. Privilege as defined by Shaw and Lee is defined as “Advantages that people have by virtue of their status or position in society.” For example males have advantages that are inherent just because they are males that females do not have. In the case of my topic I focused mainly on the privilege that white people have over black people. In early August in Ferguson, Missouri, 18 year old Michael Brown, an unarmed African American male was shot multiple times and killed after a confrontation with a cop. The officer, Darren Wilson, drove by the boys walking in the road and told them to move onto the sidewalk. Wilson then reversed his car back to the two boys where there was an apparent confrontation as Wilson recognized Brown as a suspect for a convenience store robbery days prior and the boys split off running in separate directions. It later became known that the robbery was not the reasons for the encounter that led to Brown’s death. (Washington Post) When Brown was killed there was a public outcry for him because he had been unarmed and was shot by a white police officer, Darren Wilson after what witnesses...
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...Institutional Racism Abstract Many people associate racism with bigoted individuals and radical groups on the borders of society. Shirley Better argues that racism is much larger than negative attitudes and that it touches the very core of our lives as Americans. In this paper we will discuss the model of institutional racism and different aspects of it. Introduction Institutional racism is a special form of racism. It received its name because it occurs in institutions, such as governmental and public organizations, commercial companies, educational establishments, etc. As opposed to individual racism, or some other forms of racism, institutional racism is unique in terms of being more open to the public. While other forms of racism occur between individuals or groups of individuals outside workplace or another institution, people involved in institutional racism express their discriminatory attitudes literally in front of the eyes of the public or members of the institution, although they might try doing it secretly. “Racism persists because dominant groups are unwilling to acknowledge, let alone give up, the benefits of whiteness. Through numerous examples, Institutional Racism demonstrates how inequality and racial exclusion are embedded within the fabric of American society. Better explores how racism has restricted equal access to educational opportunities, employment, and housing, and she considers the influence of racism in the criminal justice...
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...Affirmative Action In America University of Phoenix, Axia College Affirmative Action In America Martin Luther King, Jr. once said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” This statement will always ring true especially on the subject of equal opportunity employment and Affirmative Action. While Affirmative Action seemed to be a hot topic in the past, it is still one that should continue to be addressed. Affirmative Action is needed in the American workplace to improve morale and create equity among all Americans. The history of Affirmative Action (AA) is a long one. The first federal law passed was The Civil Rights Act of 1964. This law started the term, “Equal Opportunity Employment” and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. The first legislation to pass was Executive Order number 11246 on September 24, 1965 (Aberson & Haag, 2003). This essentially stated that employers needed to take affirmative action to ensure no one was discriminated against for their race, religion, color, or country of origin. In more recent years, employers have added sexual orientation, abilities, and ethnicity to their list of nondiscrimination. Unfortunately, during these times white men were not always accepting of women and minorities in the workplace. Women who joined the workplace in the 1960s and 1970s were expected to do chores for the men in the workplace. They would also be sexually harassed and abused by their male coworkers...
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...America began transiting to the 19th and 20th century, African-American men and women were officially freed from slavery due to the enforcement of the Emancipation Proclamation and the Thirteenth Amendment. Even though the Emancipation Proclamation and Thirteenth Amendment declared their freedom, they were deprived of their identity and became “emasculated by a peculiarly complete system of slavery.” The destruction of the African-American identity caused enslavement to a submissive mentality. The submissive mentality was a significant factor that slowed down the process of African-Americans expanding their knowledge and becoming American citizens. African-Americans faced the challenge of overcoming the mental blocks caused by slavery, which allowed them to revert their labor training and disregard the ability to succeed academically. Until African-Americans rallied a sufficient number of graduates from college, their help came from organizations that supported educating African-Americans and the Freedmen’s Bureau. Some organizations and Bureau agents from the Freedmen’s Bureau would send northern teachers to the...
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...strengthen families” (Seversonjan). Nonetheless, recent debates have ensued in state penitentiaries about conjugal visits. For starters, these visits are only allowed to a minority of prisoners who are legally married. Those that aren’t would get jealous about not being able to participate. There are also the dangers of sexually transmitted infections (such as HIV) or unplanned pregnancies. The program is also very expensive, costing the prison and tax payers lots of money. Originally, these visits were used as a bribe in the early 1900’s. Sex was used to push African Americans inmates to work harder in the fields. Still holding true today, conjugal visits are used “more as a way to control inmates than nurture relationships” (Seversonjan). Fifty years ago, during the pre-civil war era, a similar, but harsher system was in effect. Slaves and other minorities were not permitted to marry under US law. Marriage’s regulatory role in the past was denying slave’s matrimony because of marriages symbol of freedom; today the denial of conjugal visits indicates that convict’s marriages are less important than others due to their lower status as a prisoner with fewer rights which positions minorities in a racial hierarchy. Marriage creates...
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...Race has been a factor in society long since the times of slavery and when the Jim Crow system was still allowed in American society. However, back then, racism was more obviously present and easy to spot. Nowadays, whether intentional racism or not, one has to look truly hard and at different angles in modern, everyday occurrences to see the faint remaining traces of racial discrimination in society especially if the person is white. People of fairer skin often find it difficult to notice modern racism, either because they believe it is an obsolete issue or because they take for granted what advantages their skin color awards them as a given for all when it is not. These advantages drawn from a white skin tone is generally addressed as white privilege which most whites would deny having or are oblivious to. Since white privilege serves as an invisible shield of protection and favor, white society is likely to have more advantages over non-whites, especially...
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...2011/Fall 2011 African Diaspora & The World (SADW 111-05) Shaping my Diaspora Consciousness vs. Society An old saying about the African American slave trade still circulates amongst us today: "they set us 'free' while keeping us enslaved." After the abolishment of physical slavery, the self-esteem and sense of identity of many African Americans remained in the hands of the dominant race. Their tools of malice and control transitioned from whips and legislation to social stigmas and stereotypes. The social stigmas and stereotypes formed are the concepts of identity, race and gender. As notions of equality grew more popular, the malice diminished but the social stigmas and stereotypes remained. To deny their influence on the shaping of my identity would be equivalent to denying the slave trade's existence. Despite the relevance of both in today's society, both are starting to fade away into the thick cloud of historical amnesia that tends to grasp the minds of every American generation. In order to ensure that the lesson’s learned, and to be learned from both remain, it is imperative that such topics be discussed and evaluated. Identity is a complex shaped by individual characteristics. Gender is however a group defined by masculinity and femininity, the attributes attached to being born male or female. Race is framed by social relations and historical context. All social conceptions formed by social construction. People don’t have an understanding of how society operates because...
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...Study, The Case Jane Central State University ATH-111 This case study focuses on Rosewood, Florida; a once flourishing African American colony annihilated in the course of a weeklong occurrences of violence in early January of 1923. This study will show the effects of segregation in the United States, which continued after laws were passed, but unfortunately ignored by people who wanted to continue to have power, social control, and inequality over an indigenous group of human being living within their community. Rosewood is a true, however historically-stifled chain of events that took place in small blooming town in Rosewood, Florida. Rosewood industry was cedar wood and mills, and a railroad station that transported products, communal relations between the towns of Rosewood and Sumner were one of tolerance. The African American community were aware of the inequality that was afforded to them, but also made every effort to build a culture of stability, and building a new cultural identity of freedom within an almost self-sufficient predominately African American community in spite of the power structure of its white neighbors and systematic racism (Dye, 1997). With the accusation of violence against a white women the mob viewed this act a direct threat to their social structure and the legacy. Social hierarchy played a major role in the mobs attitude, the violence was almost immediate, and within six days the accusation caused ominous consequences that affected...
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...Investigate the History of Slavery and Discuss the ways in which this history Impacts Contemporary Society. HUMN: 303N Week 8 Final Essay The history of slavery has majorly impacted contemporary society as well as the ways in which we live. Ever since slavery was abolished in the United States, equality has been spread amongst African Americans throughout the world. This was achieved by the African Americans themselves, with their strong effort in fighting for what they felt was right. Following their strong attempts, “A terrible price had to be paid, in a tragic, calamitous civil war, before the new democracy could be rid of that most undemocratic institution” (G. Loury, 2015). A huge part of this time period was the Civil Rights movement. This movement was led by strong leaders that helped secure equal opportunities and privileges for African Americans. Although slavery was not officially outlawed until the 13th century amendment was passed, at end of the war slaves were set free. In M. Stevens (2015), “Fasts about the Slave Trade and Slavery, The Gider Lehrman Institute of American History,” slave trade and slavery itself has been thoroughly described. Steven starts off by stating that the United States had the highest natural increase in slave population. He then goes into slave trade, and explains what a slave would go through on a normal work day. This ties into the fact of the actual cost of slaves, and how vastly it changed through the years. The...
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...The disparities between income and economic status between races is staggering and is steadily continuing to rise. For Americans, evidence between the economic/racial differences within our economy lies within and are tied to our socioeconomic resources. Within Metropolitan areas of large cities, residential segregation is quite prominent and with residential segregation, lies a divide in socioeconomic status and the overall average income for those areas. Many studies have been conducted to observe the interplay and effects of this socioeconomic divide between races and collect data on the consequences and patterns in terms of schooling, employment, community resources, crime rates, single parenthood, and health. Socioeconomic status within...
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...Many historians and scholars in the field of African American studies know about the ambitious rivalry between Booker T. Washington and W.E.B DuBouis. This rivalry between two great leaders of the black community in the late 19th and 20th century gave birth to many debates and dissension about which leader actually offered a better way for black people to advance in American society back then. I personally viewed Booker T. Washington’s beliefs about racial equality as somewhat…“colonized”. I believe his ideas were too ground in the white agenda that was going on in that era. I believe W.E.B DuBois ideas were better for the improvement of African American people in American society. Of these two great men, the first to come along was Booker T. Washington. He was a reformer, an educator and one of the most influential black leaders of his time. He preached the philosophy of racial solidarity, self-help and accommodation. He pushed for black people to accept the vicious discrimination that they were going through for the time being and instead concentrate on advancing themselves through material prosperity and hard work....
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...Morrison points out those major themes in American literature that have Caucasians playing the heroic protagonist whereas the African American plays the antagonist. African Americans are seen as the dark, or the wrong within media. Throughout history most African Americans play minor characters that add conflict to stories such as To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee or Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain. American history of race has impacted the world and created problematic stereotypes. “I pointed out that cultural identities are formed and informed by a nation's literature. What seemed to be on the "mind" of the literature of the United States was the self-conscious but highly problematic construction of the American as a new white...
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...broken families and worked very hard in the sharecropping system, nothing was enough for the Reconstruction to succeed. 2. Whites never gave total freedom to African Americans. Blacks were forced to endure curfews, passes, and living on rented land, which put them in a similar situation as slaves. In 1866, the KKK started a wave of violence and abuse against 3. Negroes in the south, destroying their properties, assaulting and killing them in different ways, just because anger white people do not want the blacks to stand up and join in political or any kind of issues or freedom. The Reconstruction Amendment freed African American from slavery and stablish some key rights for them. 13th Amendment 1. Lincoln had issued the Emancipation Proclamation declaration. all people that were...
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...Diversity Response Prompt American society has played a significant role in its view of culturally and ethnically diverse individuals. The design of education and the need for income has limited the inclusion of diversity and forced integration through curriculum, and social requirements for assimilation. The personal image of how those from a European dissent view themselves, as Case (2012) refers to as available unearned resources that whites are unaware of, but have the ability to utilize every day. Due to the opportunities, this places a deeper level of importance on assimilation, which exposes the roles non-white individuals have learned to play for acceptance. In many cases, it has cost humanity the knowledge and growth diversity adds...
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