Racism, Filologia, Filologia
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Akademia Polonijna
Wydział Interdyscyplinarny
Instytut Języków, Literatury i Kultury
Katedra Językoznawstwa
Przedmiot:
FL-1000 – Język angielski
Racism
Anna Stoermer
Częstochowa 2012
Contents
The concept of racism
Types of racism
Most known examples of racism
The concept of racism
One of the first writers to make extended use of word “racism” was Ruth
Benedict in a book “Race and Racism” (1940). She writes that:
“Racism is the dogma that one ethnic group is condemned by nature to
congenital inferiority and another group is destined to congenital superiority”
1
.
Social scientists have followed this lead in viewing racism as essentially a
doctrine. The point of is found in the assertions: (a) that people’s culture and
psychological characteristics are genetically determined; and (b) that the genetic
determinants are grouped in patterns that can be identified with human races in
the old morphological sense that envisaged the existence of pure races.
Race relation textbooks and sociological reference works do not define
racism, but some of authorities define it differently. Those are Shibutani and
Kwan who speak about racism as an ideology; Van den Berghe calls it a set of
beliefs, saying:
“Only when group differences in physical traits are considered a determinant of
social behaviour and moral or intellectual qualities can we properly speak of
racism”
2
.
Definition of hers was based on the view that race refers to a group that is
socially defined on the basis of physical criteria. A similar concept, often
confused with race, is ethnic group which too is socially defined, but on the
basis of cultural criteria. Because cultural differences often accompany physical
differences, there is a strong tendency to lump physical and cultural differences
under the term “race”. Stated simply, preferences for (or belief in the superiority
of) one’s own racial group might be called racism; while preference for one’s
own ethnic group might be called ethnocentrism. Both of these terms are
frequently used.
1
Ruth Benedict,
Race and Racism,
London 1983 Routledge & Kegan Paul plc, p. 97
2
Van den Berghe, Pierre L., Race and Racism: a comparative perspective, New York 1978 by Wiley, p.
23
However, racism defined as a set of beliefs or attitudes represents little
advance over the concept of race prejudice. The significant factor of ingroup
preference, whether racially or ethnically based, is the power that the ingroup
has over an outgroup. Therefore racism will be broadly defined as follows:
“Prejudice or discrimination by one group toward others perceived as a
different “race”, plus the power to enforce it. Groups may be almost identical
physiologically, yet be divided against each other on the basis of culture,
language, religion, nationality, or any combination of the above.”
To understand racism is to understand more than the simple facts of slavery,
segregation, discrimination or prejudice. To understand racism is also to
understand differences in cultural heritage, the categorical suppression of the
subordinate culture as well as the imposition of the dominant culture’s values on
members of minority cultures.
Types of racism
Racial discrimination (racialism)
– as stated in dictionary of race and ethnic
relations (p. 273-4) it is the active or behavioural expression of racism and is
aimed at denying members of certain groups’ equal access to scarce and valued
resources. It goes beyond thinking unfavourably about groups or holding
negative beliefs about them: it involves putting them into action. Often, racism
are mutually reinforcing in a self-fulfilling way because, by denying designated
groups access to resources and services, one creates conditions under which
those groups can often do no more than confirm the very stereotypes that
inspired the original racist belief.
Racial discrimination operates on group basis: it works on the perceived
attributes and deficiencies of groups, not individualized characteristics.
Members of groups are denied opportunities or rewards for reasons unrelated to
their capabilities, industry, and general merit: they are judged solely on their
membership of an identifiable group, which is erroneously thought to have a
racial basis.
The racial discrimination may range from the use of derogatory labels, such
as “kike” or “nigger”, to the denial of access to such institutional spheres as
housing, education, justice, political participation, and so on. The actions may be
intentional, or unintentional. The use of terms racialist and racial discrimination
has diminished in recent years as racism and institutional racism have come into
popular use as expression of both thought and action. Institutional racism is now
used widely to describe the discriminatory nature and operations, however
unwitting, of large-scale organizations or entire societies. A pedant would insist
that the correct term should be institutional racial discrimination, or institutional
racism.
Individual
– a racist individual is one who considers that black people as a
group are inferior to whites because of physical traits. He further believes that
these physical traits are determinants of social behaviour and moral or
intellectual qualities, and ultimately presumes that this inferiority is a legitimate
basis for inferior social treatment of black people in American society.
A far more subtle form of racism concerns the analysis and interpretation of
black culture. This individual correctly perceives cultural differences between
blacks and whites, but evaluates the white expressions positively and the black
expression negatively. The negative evaluation of black culture is almost always
based on either (a) the assumed unsuccessful attempt to copy or reproduce white
culture forms, or (b) the pathological reactions to an oppressive status in
American society. Congruent with these evaluations, all racially distinctive
black expressions are assumed to be lower-class expressions.
This view does not accord any legitimate, positive, distinctive cultural
expression to middle- and upper-class black people. These blacks are assumed to
be just like whites in every detail. This view produces statements like the
following from van den Berghe:
“Beyond the specific stigma of skin pigmentation and its numerous social and
psychological consequences, Negro Americans have virtually nothing more in
common than they do with any other Americans; and stigmatization itself, of
course, is far from being a Negro monopoly.”
3
3
Van den Berghe,
Race and Racism: A comparative Perspective,
New York: Willey: 1967, p. 94
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