Racism
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Racism is commonly defined as a belief or doctrine where inherent biological differences among the various human races determine cultural or individual achievement, with a corollary that one's own race is superior and has the right to rule others.[1]
The term racism is sometimes used to refer to preference for one's own ethnic group (ethnocentrism),[2] fear of difference (xenophobia), views or preferences against interbreeding of the races (miscegenation),[3] and nationalism,[4] regardless of any explicit belief in superiority or inferiority embedded within such views or preferences. Racism has been used in attempts to justify social discrimination, racial segregation and violence, including genocide.
The term racist, when used to describe someone who supports racism, has been a pejorative term since at least the 1940s, and the identification of a group or person as racist is nearly always controversial.
Racism is also used commonly in comedy.
[edit] Definitions of racism
- Further information: Race (historical definitions)
When racism, a belief, is applied in practice, it takes forms such as prejudice, discrimination, segregation or subordination. Racism can more narrowly refer to a system of oppression, such as institutional racism.
Historian Barbara Field argued in "Slavery, Race and Ideology in the United States of America" that racism is a "historical phenomenon" which does not explain racial ideology.[citation needed] She suggests that investigators should consider the term to be an American rhetorical device, with a historical explanation. She suggests that using race as a word with real meaning is a common error akin to superstition. Other scholars, however, say that races do exist, and the concept has significant meaning.
Organizations and institutions that put racism into action discriminate against, and marginalize, a class of people who share a common racial designation. The term racism is usually applied to the dominant group in a society, because it is that group that has the means to oppress others. The term can also apply to any individual or group, regardless of social status or dominance.
Racism can be both overt and covert. Individual racism sometimes consists of overt acts by individuals, which can result in violence or the destruction of property. Institutional racism is often more covert and subtle. It often appears within the operation of established and respected forces in the society, and frequently receives less public condemnation than the overt type.
W.E.B. DuBois argued that racialism is the belief that differences between the races exist, be they biological, social, psychological, or in the realm of the soul. He argued that racism is using this belief to promote the belief that one's particular race is superior to the others.
According to Jared Diamond in his work Guns, Germs and Steel, race is essentially a social and historical construction. It has no real basis in science, nor can it be used to explain why Europe gained the upper hand in world conquests.
[edit] Academic racism
Refers to the tradition of prejudicial study of human societies and cultures, languages and peoples in circles of academia. With regards to African people its basis was formed during slavery and colonialism to remove any form of noble claim from the victims of these systems, thus reducing them and justifying their position as “natural” and a continuation of their historical “worthlessness.” Legendary quotes come from some of Europe's most respected scholars such as, Darwin, David Hume, and Immanuel Kant. David Hume, also said, ‘I am apt to suspect the Negroes to be naturally inferior to the Whites. There scarcely ever was a civilised nation of that complexion, nor even any individual, eminent either in action or in speculation. No ingenious manufacture among them, no arts, no sciences”. In the nineteenth century the German philosopher Hegel simply declared ‘Africa is no historical part of the world.’ This openly racist view, that Africa had no history, was repeated by Hugh Trevor-Roper, Regius Professor of History at Oxford University, as late as 1963.
[edit] Scientific racism
Scientific racism refers to the use of science (or the veneer of science) to justify and support racist beliefs. The use of science to justify racist beliefs goes back at least to the early 18th century, though it gained most of its influence in the mid-19th century. Works like Arthur Gobineau's An Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races (1853-1855) attempted to frame racism within the terms of biological difference among human beings, and with the rise of theories of evolution after the work of Charles Darwin became well-known, it became common to consider some races more evolved than others. These points of view were very common within the scientific community at the time—even Darwin, who was an active abolitionist and considered all humans to be of the same species (against a trend of polygenism popular in anthropology at the time) believed that there were inherent biological differences in the mental capacities of different races. Ideologies such as social Darwinism and eugenics used and reinforced many of these views.
There were also scientists who argued against biological reenforcement of racism, even if they believed that biological races did exist (though some did not). In the sciences of anthropology and biology, though, these were minority positions until the mid-20th century. During the rise of Nazism in Germany, many scientists in Western nations worked to de-bunk the racial theory on which the regime rested its claims of superiority. This, combined with repulsion to Nazi eugenics and the racial motivations behind the Holocaust, lead to a re-orientation of opinion around scientific research into race in the years following World War II. Changes within scientific disciplines—such as the rise of Boasian school of anthropology in the United States—also contributed to this shift. Since then, many of the scientific studies which some claim support racist claims have since been methodologically debunked by scientists with specifically anti-racist agendas, such as Stephen J. Gould. However, Gould himself has been accused by a number of scientists of misrepresenting the positions of those he engages, being politically motivated in his attacks, and being selective in his use of material to those ends.
The status of the concept of biological race remains very controversial within science, though practically no mainstream scientists admit to using scientific data to justify racist beliefs. Some scientists, such as Arthur Jensen and Richard Lynn, have argued that the threat of being labeled as a "scientific racist" has made the scientific study of race and racial differences politically taboo and has stifled true scientific discourse. These charges have surfaced most often during the study of intelligence, IQ, and the concept in psychometrics termed general intelligence factor. Many scientists, though, believe that there is no evidence for typological notions of biological race, nor scientific justifications for racist beliefs.
[edit] Individual racism
[edit] Racial prejudice
This refers to pre-formed personal opinions about individuals on the basis of their race.
[edit] Crypto-racism and aversive racism
Elmar Holenstein uses the term crypto-racism as a synonym what he calls "hidden racism".[5] while blogger Josh Marshall uses it in contrast to "closet racism" (usage example [1]).
Some scholars use the term "aversive racism" to refer to the “subtle, unintentional form of bias that is presumed to characterize a substantial proportion of White liberals” (Son Hing et al, 275).[6]
Because they have internalized liberal egalitarian values, aversive racists are motivated to experience themselves as being nonprejudiced, but at the same time have unconscious, unavoidable racist feelings or judgements of which they’re typically unaware (ibid). Aversive racists will express these racist feelings or judgements in situations where a non-racialized justification to do so exists. "Thus, aversive racists are able to discriminate without acknowledging their prejudice because they excuse or justify their behaviour on‘reasonable’ grounds” (ibid, 290). It's likely that most people living in a liberal democratic, racially-structured society are aversive racists.
[edit] Same-race racism
This can occur where members of one race associate behaviors or appearances of other members of their race as being in relation to another race which is regarded negatively. For example, there have been issues with darker-skinned African-Americans disliking lighter-skinned African-Americans because of their lighter shade of skin, which may be associated with White parentage at some point in their genealogy (but may also not). A form of cultural racism (see above) can also be related to this, where members of a racial group are chastized by members of their own group for co-opting a culture which is perceived to be associated with another race (for example, there exists a stigma in many African-American communities against "acting White").
[edit] Institutional racism
[edit] Racism as official government policy
- Further information: Institutional racism, State racism, and Racial profiling
Institutional racism or structural racial discrimination is racial discrimination by governments, corporations, or other large organizations with the power to influence the lives of many individuals. See Affirmative Action. Nazi Germany's state racism is the most famous example, along with South Africa during the apartheid era. Examples of racism in United States domestic policy include slavery and discrimination against Native Americans.
The practice of racist Jim Crow laws by Southern states was common until the 1964 Civil Rights Act gave the Federal government more enforcement power. During World War II, people of Japanese ancestry who were living on the west coast of the U.S. were imprisoned in internment camps. Other examples of racism in U.S. domestic policy included human experimentation without consent, the most famous case being the Tuskegee Syphilis Study in which Black males infected with syphilis were purposefully not treated in order to study the long-term effects of the disease.
In the 1970s, Ugandan President Idi Amin expelled tens of thousands of ethnic Indians. [2]. Until 2003, Malaysia enforced discriminatory policies limiting access to university education for ethnic Chinese and Indian students who were citizens of Malaysia by birth, and many other policies explicitly favoring bumiputras (Malays) remain in force[citation needed].
Some critics, including Gore Vidal, British MP George Galloway and Ward Churchill, have suggested that British and United States foreign policy in the Middle East is racist. George Galloway has also claimed that Arabs in the Guantanamo Bay detainment camp, Iraqis in the Abu Ghraib prison and other jails, and civilians in Iraq, are not being treated as human beings by the United States[citation needed].
Racial profiling of minorities by law enforcement officials is considered by some people to be a form of racism. Some claim that profiling young Arab males at airports will only lead to increased recruitment by terrorists of old non-Arab females, as well as Arab males who can "pass" as a non-Arab[citation needed]. Some state that this profiling is unnecessary, as it brings about the mistrust of many people[citation needed]. Some critics claim that racial profiling of citizens in the United States is an unconstitutional practice because the government is infringing upon an individual's freedom just on the basis of what a racial group is believed to be more likely to do (in this case, commit terrorism).[citation needed] French philosopher Michel Foucault argued in Discipline and Punish (1975) that such profiling shifts the emphasis from the act itself (the crime) to the person (the "criminal"), and that a general tendency of "disciplinary societies" is to create the psychological category of "delinquent".
Based on the Mandal commission report submitted during 1980, the Indian Government decided to reserve 27% more seats to students from Backwards classes in all educational institutions(Government & Private) and bring the total reservation percentage up to 50%. Subsequent surveys conducted by the Indian Government indicated that Population figures given by Mandal commission is exaggerated.[3] [4] Certain Indian states, such as Tamil Nadu, reserve around 69% of the total seats in educational institutions and Government jobs to students belonging to certain castes.[5].Many analysts and Government surveyssurveys have indicated Other Backward Classes or comparable to Upper Castes in many spheres of life.[6]
In recent years, so called upper castes are able to secure only 2.3 percentage of total seats in professional education as against their population of 13% in states like Tamilnadu[7][8].A person born in a backward caste is eligible for reservation irrespective of their economical or social status. Many politicians, film stars, and rich industrialists also reap reservation benefits.[9]. Accusations have been made that the Indian parliament, has amended [10] the constitution whenever a court judgement was not in favour of reservation decisions
[edit] Economics and racism
Historical economic or social disparity is alleged to be a form of discrimination which is caused by past racism, affecting the present generation through deficits in the formal education and kinds of preparation in the parents' generation, and, through primarily unconscious racist attitudes and actions on members of the general population. (E.g. A member of Race Y, Mary, has her opportunities adversely affected (directly and/or indirectly) by the mistreatment of her ancestors of race Y.)
Some scholars have suggested that capitalism has played a large role in promoting racism especially socioeconomic racism. The Western hemisphere slave trade and colonialist activities were mostly conducted by the earliest capitalist economies ie; Spain, Great Britain, the United States and the Netherlands. [11][12].Critics have pointed out that a slave labor economy was the sometimes considered ultimate form of capitalism because the capitalists made pure profits because they used free labor.[13].
Global apartheid is a phrase used by those who argue that the international economic and political system is racist and is designed so that a white minority internationally accrue more wealth and power and enjoy more human and legal rights than the non-white world majority.
[edit] Racial discrimination
There are differences in treatment of people on the basis of characteristics which may be classified as racial, including skin color and place of birth. This is a concept not unanimously agreed upon. While this usually refers to discrimination against minority racial groups in Western societies, it can also refer to the opposite situation, and in that case is often called reverse discrimination when it is due to affirmative action or other attempts to remedy past or current discrimination against minority racial groups. Many do not consider this racism, but simply a form of discrimination.
Researchers at the University of Chicago (Marianne Bertrand) and Harvard University (Sendhil Mullainathan) found in a 2003 study that there was widespread discrimination in the workplace against job applicants whose names were merely perceived as "sounding black". These applicants were 50% less likely than candidates perceived as having "white-sounding names" to receive callbacks for interviews, no matter their level of previous experience. Results were stronger for higher quality résumés. The researchers view these results as strong evidence of unconscious biases rooted in the United States' long history of discrimination. This is an example of structural racism, because it shows a widespread established belief system. Another example is apartheid in South Africa, and the system of Jim Crow laws in the United States of America. Another source is lending inequities of banks, and so-called redlining.
A number of international treaties have sought to end racial discrimination. The United Nations uses the definition of racial discrimination laid out in the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination and adopted in 1966:
- ...any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on race, color, descent, or national or ethnic origin which has the purpose or effect of nullifying or impairing the recognition, enjoyment or exercise, on an equal footing, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural or any other field of public life.
In 2000, the European Union banned racism along with many other forms of social discrimination: "Article 21 of the charter prohibits discrimination on any ground such as sex, race, color, ethnic or social origin, genetic features, language, religion or belief, political or any other opinion, membership of a national minority, property, disability, age or sexual orientation and also discrimination on the grounds of nationality."[14]
[edit] Reverse racism
- Further information: Reverse discrimination
Reverse racism is a controversial term used to describe attitudes, behaviors, and policies which are racially discriminatory in a manner which is contrary to a historical pattern of racial discrimination. Usually a historically sociopolitically non-dominant race is perceived to benefit at the expense of a historically sociopolitically dominant race.
Affirmative action (sometimes called positive discrimination outside the U.S.) is a government policy or a program of giving preferences to members of particular social groups, including races. Opponents contend that such preferential treatment by the government is a form of institutionalized reverse racism which unfairly discriminates against individuals by racial category. Proponents contend that such preferential treatment promotes racial integration and economic equality of groups which have been affected by racism.
Many opponents of the term reverse racism claim that use of the term itself is pejorative, racist and no more legitimate than any other form of racism. Some believe the term to be used almost exclusively against their racial group, implying that only members of their race are capable of being racists. Many opponents of the concept say that racism is by definition exclusively of the race in power.[citation needed]
A more literal and modern interpretation of the term "reverse racism" refers to the idea of projecting racial bias onto another person's behavior that does not pertain to their own race. For example, saying that a Caucasian who dresses and talks like a rapper is "acting black", is an example of reverse racism; it does not show racial bias against the person in question, but perpetuates racial roles with the sentiment that races are expected to act or dress a specific way. Another example is to automatically assume that one or both members of an interracial couple have a "race fetish" for their significant other's race, rather than assuming the relationship is based on other factors. This is reverse racism due to the projection of a possibly false racial bias onto another person.
[edit] Ideological racism
[edit] Racialism
This is a term often found within white separatist literature, inferring an emphasis in racial origin in social matters. Racism infers an assumption of racial superiority and a harmful intent, whereas separatists sometimes prefer the term racialism, indicating a strong interest in matters of race without a necessary inference of superiority or a desire to be harmful to others. Rather their focus is on racial segregation and white pride. In most English dictionaries currently there is no sharp distinction between "racism" and "racialism".
[edit] Antisemitism
Antisemitism is a specific case of racism targeting the Jews, although scholars argue whether it should be considered a sui generis specie or not.
Scholars distinguish traditional, religious antisemitism, which derives from Christian accusation of the deicide (cleared at the Second Vatican Council in 1965), with 19th-20th centuries racial antisemitism, which ultimately led to the Holocaust in which about 6 million European Jews, 1.5 million of them children, were systematically murdered. See also Holocaust denial.
In Medieval Europe, massive violent attacks against Jews have been recorded since at least the 12th century. In the Middle Ages Iberian peninsula, the system of limpieza de sangre (cleanliness of blood) ostracized New Christians (offspring of Sephardic Jews who were forced to convert to Catholicism) from the rest of society. In Portugal, the legal distinction between New and Old Christians was ended in 1772.
Expelled en masse from England, France, Spain and most other Western European countries at various times, and persecuted in Germany in the 14th century, many Jews accepted Casimir III's invitation to settle in Polish-controlled areas of Eastern Europe.
The traditional measures of keeping the Russian Empire free of Jews failed when the main territory of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was annexed during the Partitions of Poland. As large Jewish populations were taken over by Russia, Catherine II established the Pale of Settlement in 1791. The official segregation of the Russian Jews was compounded by waves of pogroms and oppressive legislation such as the 1882 May Laws and led to mass emigration and political activism.
Modern European antisemitism has its origin in 19th century pseudo-scientific theories that viewed the Jewish people as entirely different from the Aryan, or Indo-European, populations. In this view, Jews are not opposed on account of their religion, but on account of their supposed hereditary or genetic racial characteristics. The growth of nationalism in many countries viewed Jews as a separate and often "alien" nation within the countries in which Jews resided. Such sentiments were exposed in the Dreyfus affair in 1890s France. See also Rootless cosmopolitanism.
The rise of views of the Jews as a malevolent "race" generated antisemitic conspiracy theories that the Jews, as a group, were plotting to control or otherwise influence the world. From the early infamous Russian literary hoax, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, published by the Tsar's secret police, a key element of antisemitic thought has been that Jews influence or control the world.
In a recent incarnation, extremist groups, such as Neo-Nazi parties and Islamist groups, claim that the aim of Zionism is global domination; they call this the Zionist conspiracy and use it to support antisemitism. This position is associated with fascism and Nazism, though it is becoming a tendency within parts of the Left as well, and termed New antisemitism.
[edit] History of racism
- Related article: Racism by country.
[edit] The medieval discourse of race struggle
Although anti-Semitism has a long European history, racism itself is frequently described as a modern phenomenon. In the view of the French intellectual Michel Foucault, the first formulation of racism emerged in the Middle Ages as the "discourse of race struggle", a historical and political discourse which Foucault opposed to the philosophical and juridical discourse of sovereignty.[7] According to Foucault, this first appearance of racism as a theoretical discourse (as opposed to simple xenophobia, which some might argue has existed in all places and times) may be found during the 1688 Glorious Revolution in Great Britain, in Edward Coke or John Lilburne's work.
However, this "discourse of race struggle", as interpreted by Foucault, must be distinguished from 19th century biological racism, also known as race science or scientific racism. Indeed, this medieval discourse has many points of difference with modern racism. First of all, in this "discourse of race struggle", "race" is not considered a biological notion — which would divide humanity into biological groups — but as a historical notion. Moreover, this discourse is opposed to the sovereign's discourse: it is used by the bourgeoisie, the people and the aristocracy as a mean of struggle against the monarchy.
This discourse, which first appeared in Great Britain, was then carried on in France by people such as Boulainvilliers, Nicolas Fréret, and then, during the French Revolution, Sieyès, and afterward Augustin Thierry and Cournot. Boulainvilliers, which created the matrix of such racist discourse in medieval France, conceived the "race" as something closer to the sense of "nation", that is, in his times, "people". Hence, he conceived France as divided between various nations — the unified nation-state is, of course, here an anachronism — which themselves formed different "races". Boulainvilliers opposed the absolute monarchy, who tried to bypass the aristocracy by establishing a direct relationship to the Third Estate. Thus, he created this theory of the French aristocrats as being the descendants of foreign invaders, whom he called the "Franks", while the Third Estate constituted according to him the autochthonous, vanquished Gallo-Romans, who were dominated by the Frankish aristocracy as a consequence of the right of conquest.
Henceforth, medieval racism was opposed to nationalism and the nation-state: the comte de Montlosier, in exile during the French Revolution, who borrowed Boulainvilliers' discourse on the "Nordic race" as being the French aristocracy that invaded the plebeian "Gauls", thus showed his despise for the Third Estate calling it "this new people born of slaves... mixture of all races and of all times". While 19th century racism is related to nationalism (some authors have opposed a "close nationalism", based on racism, etc., towards an "open nationalism", based on the universalist conception of the nation, etc.), medieval racism precisely divides the nation into various non-biological "races", which are the consequences of historical conquests and social conflicts.
[edit] 19th century transformation of medieval discourse
- Further information: Scientific racism
Michel Foucault thus traces the genealogy of modern racism to this medieval "historical and political discourse of race struggle". According to him, it divided itself in the 19th century according to two rival lines: on one hand, it was incorporated by racists, biologists and eugenicists, who gave it the modern sense of "race" and, even more, transformed this popular discourse into a "state racism" (Nazism); on the other hand, Marxists also seized this discourse, transforming the essentialist notion of "race" into the historical notion of "class struggle", defined by socially structured position: capitalist or proletarian.
Thus, biological racism was invented in the 19th century. Arthur de Gobineau's An Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races (1853-55) may be considered as one of the first theorizations of this new racism, founded on an essentialist notion of race, and which would progressively tie itself to nationalism and to the state, creating this new form of nationalism which appeared in the New Imperialism period and, in France, in the midst of the Dreyfus Affair. Hannah Arendt has shown in The Origins of Totalitarianism (1951) the emergence of "continental imperialisms", i.e. pan-Germanism and pan-Slavism, both racist ideologies which would play a decisive role after the 1919 Treaty of Versailles.
Other famous authors include Edouard Drumont, an anti-Semitic French author; Vacher de Lapouge's "anthroposociology"; Herder, who applied race to nationalist theory to develop militant ethnic nationalism; H.S. Chamberlain at the end of the 19th century (a British citizen who naturalized himself as German because of his admiration for the "Aryan race"); Madison Grant, a renowned eugenicist, author of The Passing of the Great Race (1916)... Such authors posited the historical existence of national races such as German and French, branching from basal races supposed to have existed for millennia, such as the Aryan race, and believed political boundaries should mirror these supposed racial ones.
[edit] Ethnic conflicts
- Further information: Ethnicity
Debates over the origins of racism often suffer from a lack of clarity over the term. Many use the term "racism" to refer to more general phenomena, such as xenophobia and ethnocentrism, although scholars attempt to clearly distinguish those phenomena from racism as an ideology or from scientific racism, which has little to do with ordinary xenophobia.
Others conflate recent forms of racism with earlier forms of ethnic and national conflict. In most cases, ethno-national conflict seems to owe to conflict over land and strategic resources. In some cases ethnicity and nationalism were harnessed to rally combatants in wars between great religious empires (for example, the Muslim Turks and the Catholic Austro-Hungarians).
Notions of race and racism often have played central roles in such ethnic conflicts. Historically, when an adversary is identified as "other" based on notions of race or ethnicity (particularly when "other" is construed to mean "inferior"), the means employed by the self-presumed "superior" party to appropriate territory, human chattel, or material wealth often have been more ruthless, more brutal, and less constrained by moral or ethical considerations.
One example of the brutalizing and dehumanizing effects of racism was the attempt to deliberately infect Native Americans with smallpox during Pontiac's Rebellion in 1763, itself a war intended to ethnically cleanse the "other" (Anglo-Americans) from Native American land.
According to historian Daniel Richter, Pontiac's Rebellion saw the emergence on both sides of the conflict of "the novel idea that all Native people were 'Indians,' that all Euro-Americans were 'Whites,' and that all on one side must unite to destroy the other." (Richter, Facing East from Indian Country, p. 208)
In the Western world, racism evolved, twinned with the doctrine of white supremacy, and helped fuel the European exploration, conquest, and colonization of much of the rest of the world -- especially after Christopher Columbus reached the Americas. Basil Davidson insists in his documentary, Africa: Different but Equal, that racism, in fact, only just recently surfaced—as late as the 1800s, due to the need for a justification of slavery in the Americas. The idea of slavery as an "equal-opportunity employer" was denounced with the introduction of Christian theory in the West.
Maintaining that Africans were "subhuman" was the only loophole in the then accepted law that "men are created equal" that would allow for the sustenance of the Triangular Trade. New peoples in the Americas, possible slaves, were encountered, fought, and ultimately subdued, but then due to western diseases, their population decreased innumerably. Through both influences, theories about "race" developed, and these helped many to justify the differences in position and treatment of people whom they categorized as belonging to different races (see Eric Wolf's Europe and the People without History).
Some people like Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda have argued during the Valladolid controversy in the middle of the 16th century, that the Native Americans were natural slaves because they had no "souls". In Asia, the Chinese and Japanese Empires were both strong colonial powers, with the Chinese making colonies and vassal states of much of East Asia throughout history, and the Japanese doing the same in the 19th-20th centuries. In both cases, the Asian imperial powers believed they were ethnically and raciacial prefrences too.
[edit] European colonialism
Authors such as Hannah Arendt, in her 1951 book The Origins of Totalitarianism, have pointed out how the racist ideology ("popular racism") developed at the end of the 19th century helped legitimize the imperialist conquests of foreign territories, and the crimes that accompanied it (such as the Herero and Namaqua Genocide, 1904-1907). Auguste Comte's positivist ideology of necessary social progress as a consequence of scientific progress lead many Europeans to believe in the inherent superiority of the "White Race" over non-whites.
Rudyard Kipling's poem on The White Man's Burden (1899) is one of the most famous illustrations of such belief, though also thought to be a satirical vantage of such imperialism. Racist ideology thus helped legitimize subjugation, slavery and the dismantling of the traditional societies of indigenous peoples, which were thus conceived as humanitarian obligations as a result of these racist rationalizations. Other colonialists recognized the depravity of their actions but persisted for personal gain and there are some Europeans during the time period who objected to the injustices caused by colonialism and lobbied on behalf of aboriginal peoples. Thus, when the so-called "Hottentot Venus" was displayed in England in the beginning of the 19th century, the African Association publicly opposed itself to this shameful exhibition. The same year that Kipling published his poem, Joseph Conrad published Heart of Darkness (1899), a clear criticism of the Congo Free State owned by Leopold II of Belgium.
Human zoos were an important means of bolstering popular racism by connecting it to scientific racism: they were both objects of public curiosity and of anthropology and anthropometry.[8][9] Joice Heth, an African-American slave, was displayed by P.T. Barnum in 1836, a few years after the exhibition of Saartjie Baartman, the "Hottentot Venus", in England. Such exhibitions became common in the New Imperialism period, and remained so until World War II.
Congolese pygmy Ota Benga was displayed in 1906 by eugenicist Madison Grant, head of the Bronx Zoo, as an attempt to illustrate the "missing link" between humans and orangutans: thus, racism was tied to Darwinism, creating a social Darwinism ideology which tried to ground itself in Darwin's scientific discoveries. The 1931 Paris Colonial Exhibition displayed Kanaks from New Caledonia.[10] A "Congolese village" was on display as late as 1958 at the Brussels' World Fair.
[edit] Racism in the United States
[edit] Racism against Native Americans
The Native Americans have faced racism in the United States since the days of Colonial America. Indeed, in 1606, Marc Lescarbot's "The Theatre of Neptune in New France" cast First nations as "Savages" who offer their complete subordination to the colonial masters. While the "Savages" were played by Frenchmen, the audience was composed of people from the Mi'kmaq Nation, setting a disturbing precedent.
The Native Americans were massacred by US forces in the 19th century, which some claim was genocide [15] [16]. US President Andrew Jackson was quoted as saying that" the only good Indian is a dead Indian" [17]. Native Americans continue to face struggles. The Shoshone nation has accused the US government of racism for testing nuclear weapons close to their tribal lands.[18] [19]. [20].
[edit] Slavery in the United States
Contention over the morality and legality of the institution of slavery was one of the cardinal issues which led to the American Civil War. The failed attempt at secession by the Southern United States led to the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which was the official end of legal slavery in the United States.
Emancipated blacks in the United States still had to struggle against institutional racism, forced segregation, violation of voting rights, and even terrorism. The Ku Klux Klan is perhaps the most notorious of these organizations espousing racist ideologies and enforcing discriminatory cultural norms with murderous violence and the threat of murderous violence.
[edit] Religion and Racism
In 19th century]], many U.S. Christians were taught that Africans, as the descendents of Ham, deserved to be slaves. On the other hand, abolition movements were also justified using Christian teaching.
[edit] Discrimination against Japanese-Americans and Italian-Americans during World War II
During the second world war, over 100,000 Japanese-Americans and Japanese-Canadians were forcibly placed in concentration camps where they remained until the end of hostilities with Japan [21][22]. The incident that triggered the surge of anti-Japanese racism was the Japanese Imperial Navy's attack on Pearl Harbor similar to how the events of 9/11 triggered a backlash against Arabs, Iranians and Muslims. Racism differs from country to country.[citation needed]
Tens of thousands of Italian-Americans were put in internment camps during World War II as well. Thousands more were placed under surveillence or had their property repossessed by the government. Joe DiMaggio's father, who lived in San Francisco, had his boat and house confiscated. One official stated that if it had not been for Joe DiMaggio's status as a baseball player, his father would most likely had been sent to an internment camp.
[edit] Racism against Arabs, Iranians, and Middle Easterners
There are reports of a large increase in anti-Arab/anti-Iranian racism in the United States since the September 11 2001 attacks.[23] Racial profiling of people with a Middle Eastern ethnic background was proposed by a New York Congressman on 2006-08-15.[24] In movies and jokes, Arabs and Iranians have been shown as being terrorists and barbarians or as inferior people.[25] . Iraq and Iran were demonized by the US government and this led to hatred towards Arabs and Iranians living in the United States [26] [27] There have been attacks against Arabs and Iranians not only on the basis of their religion (Islam), but on the basis of their ethnicity because numerous Christian Arabs and Iranians have also been racially attacked.[11]
[edit] Racism in Mexico, Central America, and South America
Though not widely known throughout the world, Latin America has a history of racism highly influenced by the colonial attitudes and devastation created by the Spanish conquest in the 16th and 17th centuries. During the conquest, the offspring of Spaniards and Native Americans became distinct and low caste in colonial society. The offspring are now the majority thougout Latin America and in Spanish-speaking countries they are called indios, nacos or mestizos by racists.
Europeans in Latin America during the colonial period intended mestizos to be a serf race to "pure" European colonial overlords in designated fiefdoms (haciendas). A practical example of this practice can be found in the colonial government structure that required the top levels of government to be in the hands of European born individuals, called peninsulares. Middle management fell upon Europeans born in America without American blood, called criollos. Those of mestizo blood were cast in the lowest echelon of society as miners and agricultural workers. However, mestizos with lighter complexion sometimes rose to higher positions. Latin America’s history of exploitation and feudal economic practices contributed to the popularity of Socialist and Communist movements in Latin America throughout the 20th century. The legacy of the fiefdoms is the reason why Latin America is constituted by so many small nations.
See the writings of Alvaro Vargas Llosa for discussion on relationships between development and culture in Latin America. Free trade agreements (like Mercosur) are challenging the need for borders among the nearly identical national cultures. Further, information technology and media consolidation is serving to further unify the Latin America's vast mestizo majority.
[edit] Nazism and Japanese imperialism
The Nazi, and Nazi-resembling regimes which rose to power in Europe and Japan before World War II advocated and implemented policies and attitudes which were racist, xenophobic, and often genocidal. While racism, xenophobia, and genocide were not new, the scope of the acts committed by the German Nazis and the Japanese governments was larger than other examples.
[edit] Allegedly racist groups
- Aryan Nations[28]
- Black Hebrew Israelites[29]
- British National Party[30]
- Christian Identity[31] [32]
- The Creativity Movement (formerly The World Church of the Creator)[33]
- Front National[34]
- Grey Wolves[35][36][37]
- Imperium Europa[38]
- Jewish Defense League
- Kahane Chai
- Ku Klux Klan[39] [40]
- Nation of Aztlán[41][42][43][44]
- The Nation of Gods and Earths
- Nation of Islam
- National Alliance[45]
- National Socialist Japanese Workers and Welfare Party
- New Zealand National Front[46]
- Patriotic Youth League[47]
- Posse Comitatus[48]
- Stormfront.org
- White Aryan Resistance[49]
- New Black Panthers
[edit] References
- ^ Error on call to Template:cite web: Parameters url and title must be specified.
- ^ {{cite web |url=http://www.hawaii.edu/cpis/psi/gender/gender_colonialism.html | title = Document equating ethnocentrism with racism
- ^ Document equating views against miscegenation with racism.
- ^ {{cite web| url = http://www.experiencefestival.com/nationalism_-_racism| title = Document equating nationalism with racism
- ^ Document describing crypto-racism as hidden racism. A Dozen Rules of Thumb for Avoiding Intercultural Misunderstandings. Forum For Intercultural Philosophy.
- ^ Leanne S. Son Hing, Greg A. Chung-Yan, Robert Grunfeld, Lori K. Robichaud, and Mark P. Zanna.“Exploring the Discrepancy Between Implicit and Explicit Prejudice: A Test of Aversive Racism Theory” in Social Motivation: Conscious and Unconscious Processes. Joseph P. Forgas, Kipling D. Williams, Simon M. Laham,eds. Cambridge University Press. 2004.
- ^ Michel Foucault, Society Must Be Defended (1976-77)
- ^ On A Neglected Aspect Of Western Racism, Kurt Jonassohn, December 2000
- ^ "Human zoos - Racist theme parks for Europe's colonialists", Le Monde Diplomatique, August 2000. (English); "Ces zoos humains de la République coloniale", Le Monde diplomatique, August 2000. (French) (available to everyone)
- ^ The Colonial Exhibition of May 1931 (PDF) by Michael G. Vann, History Dept., Santa Clara University, USA
- ^ Attacks on Arab Americans (PBS)
[edit] Bibliography
- Barkan, Elazar (1992), The Retreat of Scientific Racism : Changing Concepts of Race in Britain and the United States between the World Wars, Cambridge University Press, New York, NY.
- Dain, Bruce (2002), A Hideous Monster of the Mind : American Race Theory in the Early Republic, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA. (18th century US racial theory)
- Diamond, Jared (1999), "Guns, Germs, and Steel", W.W. Norton, New York, NY.
- Lévi-Strauss, Claude (1952), Race and History, (UNESCO).
- Rocchio, Vincent F. (2000), Reel Racism : Confronting Hollywood's Construction of Afro-American Culture, Westview Press.
- Stokes, DaShanne (forthcoming), Legalized Segregation and the Denial of Religious Freedom, URL.
- Stoler, Ann Laura (1997), "Racial Histories and Their Regimes of Truth", Political Power and Social Theory 11 (1997), 183–206. (historiography of race and racism)
- Taguieff, Pierre-André (1987), La Force du préjugé : Essai sur le racisme et ses doubles, Tel Gallimard, La Découverte.
[edit] See also
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[edit] External links
- Does race exist? argument for the biological concept of race
- Does race exist? argument against the existence of race as a biological entity
- Race in-depth website about race
- Race - the power of illusion argument that while race is a biological fiction, racism permeates the structure of society
- Race Denial: The Power of a Delusion detailed critique seeking to refute the film
- Racism and human rights Racism from Global Issues
- Institute for Race Relations
- Eagle feather law details racism in religion law regarding eagle feathers for Native and non-Native Americans
- The Mis-portrayal of Darwin as a Racist Refutes claims that Darwin was a racist
- Racism brief summary of the root causes of racism
