Its Time to Move Beyound Race Essay - 583 Words

In Michael Omi and Howard Winant’s essay â€Å"Racial Formation†, we see how the tendency to assign each individual a specific race as misleading. This essay suggests that race is not merely biological, but rather lays more in sociology and historical perspective. Once we look at someone and say, â€Å"They’re white†, it brings forth all the stereotype’s that go along with that â€Å"race†, and once the race is assigned, it is assumed that we can know something about the person. Indeed, if we were to accept that people do fall nicely into specific races, it would seem to ascribe a sort of universality to the group. In other words, if a black man from Kenya was raised in Chicago, IL, rather than Kenya, due to his biological race, it could be assumed the†¦show more content†¦This also doesn’t convince us that attributing every individual to a certain category is even beneficial or necessary. Ultimately, the paper states that once we designate someone as a certain race, we then have a basis to differentiate ourselves. This serves a people in power the most, as when the Irish-Americans, though viewed as somewhat unruly, were still able to enter and run for public office because of naturalization laws of the late nineteenth century. Once it was established in the United States that there were competing groups out there in the labor force, namely African, Asian, Latin, and Mexican-Americans, it became advantageous to draw a color line to create a large group, those of lighter skin color, to raise and continue to hold the power through numbers and mass alone. Once it becomes established that a group’s tendencies are of a natural prescription, as in the â€Å"Ethnic Notions† film, and once the greater society adheres to the simple guidelines fed to them, the argument is then taken out of the minority group’s hands. â€Å"Immutable† then would describe the group lacking power enough to break the stereotype. This social construction of race, one that lumps a mass of people into an ambiguous category, becomes an enigma. In order for the group to break free from this, they must acquire a perspective, but their morale is so beaten that they are happy to have any place in the society, so the enigma grows. One thing is evident; we couldShow MoreRelatedMarriage and Cohabitation13809 Words   |  56 Pagesgood or bad times, it remains through sickness or health, no matter what happens throughout the years, as marriage continually exist between two individual until death comes. Anthropologist have proposed several competting definition of marriage so as to encompass the wide variety of marital practices observed across cultures. Edvard Westermack in his book, the history of marriage, 1992, defines marriage as a mere or less durable connection between males and females, lasting beyound the mere act