Chapter 10: Racial and Ethnic Relations

Race an ethnicity are two very separate things. Both will be described in more detail below, along with discrimination and prejudice. People today need to learn that race should not be the first thing people see when they meet someone new. People need to learn to stop discriminating others. Even though we seem to know that it is wrong to discriminate and to judge others, we still do it.

A race is a category of people who share inherited physical characteristics and whom others see as being a distinct group. The set of cultural characteristics that distinguishes one group from another group is called ethnicity. People who share a common sense of identity are known as an ethnic group. A minority group is a group of peo

ple who, because of their physical characteristics or cultural practices, are singled out and unequally treated.

Discrimination is the denial of equal treatment to individuals based on their group membership. Prejudice is an unsupported generalization about a category of people. Legal discrimination is upheld by law. Institutionalized discrimination is an outgrowth of the structure of a society. A steroptype is an over simplified, exaggerated, or unfavorable generalization about a group of people. A self-fulfilling prophecy is a prediction that results in behavior that makes the prediction come true. Racism is the belief that one's own race or ethnic group is better than another. The sociological explanation of discrimination and prejudice focuses on the social environment. Some people explain discrimination and prejudice by psychological explanations. The practice of placing the blame for one's troubles in an innocent individual or group is called scapegoating. According to economic explanations, prejudice and discrimination arise out of competition for scarce resources. Cultural pluralism allows each group within society to keep its unique cultural identity. The blending of culturally distinct groups into a single group with common culture and identity is called assimilation. Legal protection is when the law protects the minority group. Policies that physically separate a minority group from the dominant group are referred to as segregation. De jure segregation is based on laws. Segregation based on informal norms is called de facto segregation. Subjugation is the maintaining if control over a group through force. Slavery is the ownership of one person by another. Population transfer is when the dominant part of society relocates the minority group to another area. When the goal of extermination is the intentional destruction of the entire targeted population, it is referred to as genocide. Ethnic cleansing involves removing a group from a particular area through terror, expulsion, and mass murder.

African Americans are one of the minority groups in the United States. They compromise more than 12 percent of the population. Hispanics are another minority group. The 2000 census shows that the United States us home to more than 35 million Hispanics. Asian Americans are yet another minority group in the United States. Also by the 2000 census, the figure of 7 million Asian Americans grew to 10 million. American Indians are still, another minority group, in the United States. In 2000 the American Indian population was approximately 2.5 million. White ethnics are the minority group composed of people from Ireland, Italy, France, Poland, and Greece. Today there are many white ethnics but not as many as the other minority groups.

As we can see, race and ethnicity are two different things. Discrimination is very bad, along with prejudice. We can see that the United States contains many different minority groups, some of which are discriminated. As much as we know it is wrong, we still discriminate, as said before.