ANTH 101 Intro to Cultural Anthropology

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ANTH 101Intro to Cultural Anthropology
Race Ethnicity What is Ethnicity? Race as a
Biological / Cultural Concept How Does Race
Differ from Culture to Culture? Race in the USA,
Japan, Brazil Mestizaje Status Privilege
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A Roman Philosophy of Race

• Country, not race, made a person inferior.
• Rome was in the center of their world
• Northerners were too light, southerners were
  too dark.
• Romans thought their olive skin was just right.

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An Ethiopian Philosophy of Race

• God undercooked one batch of people.
• They were doughy and pale, were thrown to the
  north.
• God overcooked another batch of people.
• They were burnt, were thrown to the south.
• God tried once more, and the last batch the
  Ethiopians was perfect!

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Hispanics and Race in the New York Times,
5/29/1992

• What does Hispanic mean?
• 1st article - Hispanics could be of any race
• 2nd article Hispanics in the 92 LA riots were
  questioned on the basis of their race

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4. Does White Caucasian? (Wikipedia.org)

• Caucasus Mtn. peoples are considered inferior in
  Russia.
• Whiteness has changed over time.
• Modern day Caucasians are Europeans, Middle
  Easterners
• But only Europeans are White
• 19th c. America only English were White (not
  Irish, Germans, etc.)
• Are whites in Latin America (ex. Argentina,
  Uruguay and Mexico) white in the US?

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Scienctific ViewRace without Color

• Most scientists believe there is no biological
  basis for human races
• Jared Diamond you need a concordance of
  variations for biological races.
• Some species do have unique biological races
• Ex. warbler subspecies

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Yellow-Rumped Warbler Races of North America
Warbler Race 3
Warbler Race 2
Warbler Race 1
Texture 3
Texture 2
Texture 1
Feather texture
Beak shape 3
Beak shape 2
Beak shape 1
Beak shape
Eye color 3
Eye color 2
Eye color 1
Eye color
Feather color 3
Feather color 2
Feather color 1
Feather color
Claw 3
Claw 2
Claw 1
Shape of claws
Blood type 3
Blood type 2
Blood type 1
Blood type
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• That concordance of variations exists in
  warblers, but not humans
• There is at most 0.1 difference in genetics
  between any two of these persons.
• When skin color and physical features are the
  criteria, the racial lines look familiar.
• But the races change completely when skin and
  physical features arent the criteria.

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Ex. 1 Race by Resistance

• Genetic resistance to a disease (ex. malaria)
  can determine race.
• The malaria-resistant race includes
• tropical Africans (sickle-cell)
• Arabia (sickle-cell)
• Southern India (sickle-cell)
• Mediterranean Europe (favism)
• Middle East (favism)

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Ex. 2 Race by Digestion

• A geographically variable trait (ex. lactose
  tolerance) can determine race.
• Most humans cannot digest lactose.
• Members of the smaller lactose-tolerant race
  include
• Most Northern Central Europeans
• Some East Africans
• Some South Asians.

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Ex. 3 Race by Fingerprints

• Fingerprints can also be used to create races.
• One race includes most Europeans, most Africans
  and East Asians,
• A second race includes most Asians, American
  Indians and Australian aborigines,
• A third race includes the Khoisans of southern
  Africa, and some Central Europeans

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Ex. 4 Race by Genetic Distinctness

• Genetic distinctness how closely related
  ancient populations are to each other can
  classify races, with
• the Khoisan of Southern Africa in their own race
• all other Sub-Saharan African peoples comprising
  five or six different races
• everyone else in the world forming a single race

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How Race Differs from Culture to Culture

• Different societies define race differently, for
  example, in
• the USA
• Japan
• Brazil

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Race in the USA

• Usually ascribed (given) at birth
• Your race will never change in the US
• We like one race for every person!
• Census first allows Americans to check off more
  than one box for race in 2000

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Hypodescent

• Multiracial person is lumped with the most
  oppressed race / group in his or her heritage.
• 50 white / 50 black black
• 1/32 black (one great-great-great grandparent)
  legally black (some states)
• 1/16 American Indian legally an Indian
  (Federal law)

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• What about
• Tiger Woods (four races)?
• Mariah Carey (half Afro-Brazilian, half Irish)?
• Barack Obama (half Euro-American, half Kenyan)
• Susie Gillory Phipps, (white Louisiana woman
  whose birth certificate labeled her colored)

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Whats My Race?

• Irish immigrants were not considered white by
  white Americans in the 19th century
• A Japanese immigrant in the 1900s demanded to be
  called white based on his skin color.
• A Punjabi Indian immigrant in the 1920s demanded
  to be called white because Northern Indians were
  scientifically Aryan.

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Race in Japan

• Race by opposition to others anyone who is not
  us is not a member of our race.
• Assimilation is highly encouraged (as with US
  immigrants).
• If you are not pure Japanese, you are
  biologically different and inferior.

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• Many groups face discrimination in Japan
• Koreans / Chinese
• Okinawans
• Ainu
• burakumin
• Burakumin are biologically the same as pure
  Japanese, but have ancestors who dealt in unclean
  jobs
• Treated as a separate race! (eta, ??)

???
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Race in Brazil

• Race is by phenotype based on your outward
  appearance. But is superficial
• Your race can change weekly, unlike in the US!
• Up to 500 races documented in Brazil.
• One Brazilian village had 70 races in it!

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• Discrimination in Brazil is based on
  socioeconomics and class
• Often, but not always in sync with skin color.
• It is possible to change your race by moving up
  the social class ladder.

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Race in Other Parts of Latin America

• Mestizaje Spanish for mixedness
• Basis of national identity in Mexico
• mixture of indigenous and white races to form a
  new race
• Mestizo label can be achieved in Peru (but looked
  down upon by both indios and those born mestizo).

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Status Ascribed and Achieved

• A status is any position that you occupy in your
  culture.
• Status is either ascribed (given) at birth /
  other times, or achieved later in life.
• Some statuses rank you lower in society than
  others you have more privileges with a higher
  status.
• Trappings of status
• Status Symbols
• Master Statuses
• Status Inconsistency

Microsoft Image
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Whats My Status?

• Are the following ascribed or achieved?
• Father
• Sister
• Wife
• Teacher
• High school graduate
• African-American
• Lesbian
• Ph.D.
• Woman
• How many are master statuses?

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White Privilege (Peggy McIntosh)

• McIntosh Whites are privileged by race
• Take part in a racist system they dont know
  about and cant see
• Easier to see the racism if you are oppressed,
  not privileged, by the system.
• A privileged person is racist if (s)he tries to
  keep the privilege system in place.

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Ex. School Segregation before Brown v. BOE of
Topeka, Kansas (1954)
Required by law
No law in place
Optional / limited segregation
Forbidden by law
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Other Types of Privilege

• McIntosh used male privilege to explore white
  privilege.
• McIntosh is white and female.
• But, many types of privilege exist, such as
• Class
• Language
• Religion
• Ethnicity
• Physical Ability
• Age
• Sexual Orientation
• Etc.
• There are few people in the US that arent
  oppressed in some way, according to McIntosh.

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Implications of a Raceless World

• Anthropologists believe race exists, but only as
  a social construct.
• Just saying there is no race wont stop racism.
• Where does this leave
• affirmative action?
• racial profiling?
• English-only movements?

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Redefining Race in 21st Century America

• In the US, the clear racial lines are not clear
  anymore.
• 1860 3 racial categories
• 1967 Anti-miscegenation laws struck down
• Loving v. Virginia allowed interracial marriage
  throughout the Southern US
• 2000 30 racial categories, with 11 Hispanic
  subcategories
• Today 3 majority-minority states DC
• The old labels cant capture the shifting
  subtleties of blood, culture and identity

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Ex. 1 Up from Jim Crow

• Birmingham, AL once the most segregated city
  in America
• Changing face of Birmingham?
• Blacks, whites mix in public
• Small but growing Latino population
• Race is still on our minds all the time

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Ex. 2 Brown against Brown

• Anti-Mexicano discrimination from Chicanos?
• Mixing of Mexicanos and Chicanos
• Americanization of Chicanos
• Still strong sense of obligation
• Discrimination vs. indígenas?
• Do Americans look down upon immigrants from the
  Old Country?

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Ex. 3 Tomorrowland, Today

• Northern California as the microcosm of the
  future?
• Major success for Chinese-American, South
  Asian-American entrepreneurs.
• Is there still a glass ceiling?

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Ex. 4 We Have the Power

• Issues facing black professional women in the
  21st century?
• Is the African-American community at a
  crossroads?
• What issues do they face as women? As
  African-Americans?

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Ex. 5 Berkeleys New Colors

• UC Berkeleys reaction to Prop 209
• Surging Asian-American enrollment
• Plunging enrollment of African-Americans,
  Hispanics, Native Americans
• Today minority enrollment still low at Berkeley

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Ex. 6 Love without Borders

• Interracial and interethnic marriage
• 1998 1.3M racially mixed marriages in the US
• Inter-ethnic marriages fall under the radar
• Build on shared heritage without losing
  cherished traditions

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Ex. 7 Whats White, Anyway?

• Boundaries of whiteness have expanded, but
• specialness of whiteness has eroded.
• Who is white has changed over the past two
  centuries.