Race and Racialization

Explain each of the following concepts by discussing examples drawn from lectures and course readingsRepresentationCollective Representation is a term introduced by Emile Durkheim to refer to a symbol having a common intellectual and emotional meaning to the members of a group. Collective representations reflect the history of the group that is the collective experience of a group over time. They include not only symbols in the form of objects but also the basic concepts that determine the way in which one views and relates to the world.Collective representation adds to that which we can learn by our personal experience all that wisdom and science, which the group has accumulated in the course of centuries.Collective representations express collective sentiments and ideas which give the group its unity and unique character. Thus they are an important factor contributing to the solidarity of a society or other social group.MediationMediation in Marxist theory refers to the reconciliation of two opposing forces within a given society (i.e. the cultural and material realms, or the superstructure and base) by a mediating object. Similar to this, within media studies the central mediating factor of a given culture is the medium of communication itself. The popular conception of mediation refers to the reconciliation of two opposing parties by a third, and this is similar to its meaning in both Marxist theory and media studies. For Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, this mediating factor is capital or alternately labor, depending on how one views capitalist society (capital is the dominant mediating factor, but labor is another mediating factor that could overthrow capital as the most important one).To give a concrete example of this, a worker making shows in a show factory is not only producing shoes, but potential exchange value. The shoes are commodities that can be sold for cash. In this way, the value of the labor of the worker is the exchange value of the shows he or she produces minus his or her compensation. At the same time, however, the shoes produced have certain social or cultural values as well. In this way, the worker's labor is mediating between the economic or exchange value of the shoes, and their social and cultural, or symbolic value.Articulation theoryCultural theorist Stuart Hall, Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe have further theorized the complexities of mediation through their development of articulation theory, to describe the ways that certain notions become dominant in a culture, given the relative openness of the social in heavily industrialized nations such as the U.S. This openness results in a "non-necessary belongingness" for the various elements of a given social formation, or an indeterminacy to the way that history, culture, economics, or the material world, and social actors come together to form dominant notions."...the so-called unity of a discourse is really the articulation of different, distinct elements which can be articulated in different ways because they have no necessary "belongingness." The "unity" which matters is a linkage between that articulated discourse and the social forces with which it can, under certain historical conditions, but need to necessarily, be connected. Thus, a theory of articulation is both a way of understanding how ideological elements come, under certain conditions, to cohere together within a discourse, and a way of asking how they do or do not become articulated, at specific conjunctures, to certain political subjects."Under articulation theory mediation becomes a complex, indeterminate process by which social meanings are circulated under the historical conditions of a given culture and social actors take up these meanings or not based on a complex interplay of all the parts of the social whole.

Explain each of the following concepts by discussing examples drawn from lectures and course readingsBiopolitical powerBiopower is a term coined by French scholar, historian, and social theorist Michel Foucault. It relates to the practice of modern nation states and their regulation of their subjects through "an explosion of numerous and diverse techniques for achieving the subjugations of bodies and the control of populations". Foucault first used the term in his lecture courses at the Collège de France, but the term first appeared in print in The Will to Knowledge, Foucault's first volume of The History of Sexuality. In Foucault's work, it has been used to refer to practices of public health, regulation of heredity, and risk regulation, among many other regulatory mechanisms often linked less directly with literal physical health. It is closely related to a term her uses much less frequently, but which subsequent thinkers have taken up independently, biopolitics.BiopoliticsBiopolitics is an intersectional field between biology and politics.While the term is commonly attributed to Rudolf Kjellén in the 1920s who also coined the term geopolitics, it was actually coined by G.W. Harris as early as 1911. In contemporary US political science studies, usage of the term is mostly divided between a poststructuralist group using the meaning assigned by Michel Foucault (denoting social and political power of life) and another group who uses it to denote studies relating biology and political science.French philosopher and social theorist Michel Foucault first discussed his thoughts on biopolitics in his lecture series "Society Must Be Defended" given at the Collége de France from 1975-1976. Foucault's concept of biopolitics is largely derived from his own notion of biopower, and the extension of state power over both the physical and political bodies of a population. While only mentioned briefly in his "Society Must Be Defended" lecturs, his concept of biopolitics has become prominent in social and humanistic sciences.Foucault described biopolitics as "a new technology of power... [that] exists at a different level, on a different scale and [that] has a different bearing area, and makes use of very different instruments." More than a disciplinary mechanism, Foucault's biopolitics acts as a control apparatus exerted over a population as a whole or, as Foucault stated, "a global mass." In the years that followed, Foucault continued to develop his notions of the biopolitical in his "The Birth of Biopolitics" and "The Courage of Truth" lectures.Foucault gave numerous examples of biopolitical control when he first mentioned the concept in 1976. These examples include "ratio of births to deaths, the rate of reproduction, the fertility of a population, and so on." He contrasted this method of social control with political power in the Middle Ages. Whereas the Middle Ages pandemics made death a permanent and perpetual part of life, this has shifted around the end of the 18th century. The development of vaccines and medicines dealing with public hygiene allowed death to be held (and/or withheld) from certain populations. this was the introduction of "more subtle, more rational mechanisms: insurance, individual and collective savings, safety measures, and so on."

Explain each of the following concepts by discussing examples drawn from lectures and course readingsNormalizationNormalization refers to social processes through which ideas and actions come to be seen as 'normal' and become taken-for-granted or 'natural' in everyday life. In sociological theory normalization appears in two forms.First, the concept of normalization is found in the work of Michel Foucault, especially Discipline and Punish, in the context of his account of disciplinary power. As Foucault used the term, normalization involved the construction of an idealized norm of conduct - for example, the way a proper soldier ideally should stand, march, present arms, and so on, as defined in minute detail - and then rewarding or punishing individuals as forming to or deviating from this ideal. In Foucault's account, normalization was one of an ensemble of tactics for exerting the maximum social control with the minimum expenditure of force, which Foucault calls "disciplinary power." Disciplinary power emerged over the course of the 19th century, came to be used extensively in military barracks, hospitals, asylums, schools, factories, offices, and so on, and hence became a crucial aspect of social structure in modern societies.Second, normalization process theory is a middle-range theory used mainly in medical sociology and science and technology studies to provide a framework for understanding the social processes by which new ways of thinking, working and organizing become routinely incorporated in everyday work. Normalization process theory has its roots in empirical studies of technological innovation in healthcare, and especially in the evaluation of complex interventions.MeritocracyA social system that gives the greatest power and highest social positions to people with the most ability. The idea of a meritocracy has served as in ideology through the argument that social inequality results from unequal merit rather than prejudice or discrimination.

Explain each of the following concepts by discussing examples drawn from lectures and course readingsDemocratic racismDespite societal norms of tolerance and diversity, covert "democratic" racism flourishes in Canada on individual and systemic levels. Democratic racism, and ideology that allows the coexistence of both egalitarian values and racist attitudes, beliefs, and behaviours, is often expressed by the dominant group through powerful discourses that shape the social reality for many minority individuals. However, racist discourses, such as blaming the target of racism and denying that racism exists, are often manifested very subtly. Racism becomes invisible, both to the perpetrators and the targets, and systemic inequalities and injustices remain unchallenged.IdeologyAn ideology is a set of cultural beliefs, values, and attitudes that underlie and justify either the status quo or movements to change it. The cultures of every social system has an ideology that serves the explain and justify its own existence as a way of life. Ideology can also underlie movements for social change, which rely on sets of ideas that explain and justify their purpose and methods.Spectacle of OtherHall outlines four arguments about difference which have something to say about how we perceive and relate to difference.1. The linguistic argument that difference is central to making sense of 'black', of 'male' by comparing it with 'female' and so on. Yet, this way of thinking emphasized the opposites - there is a range of greys in between black and white. One may choose to see how black turns gradually into white; or one may choose to see black versus white. One can easily talk about race, ethnicity, gender, in the same way.2. The dialogic argument that difference is central to understanding and communication, because we communication and make sense of things in a dialogue with another person. It is by participating in this dialogue and by confronting the different ideas we have that we make sense of things. So, difference is seen has as central to understanding.3. The anthropological argument that each cultural gives meaning by classifying things. Classification means emphasizing the difference; better said: when you classify something, there is a principle according to which you decide it is different or similar - so it has to go into this class of things or the other. The idea here is that difference is created by those principles of classifications. Though it may look like those principles are 'natural', 'logical' and 'immutable,' they are, in fact, social conventions.The psychoanalytical argument that the 'Other' - different from Self - is central to how we form our identities. Psychologists and psychoanalysts like to point out how, as children, we come to understand ourselves as different from the others in a painful way. Furthermore, for Freud, this process of defining the Self from the Other has a sexual dimension. The drill is well-known: Oedipian complexes for men and identification with mothers for women.

Drawing on course readings and lectures, write an essay outlining some of the major "shifts” in the history of racism from the English Civil War (17th. Century) to contemporary times?Franz Boas - "Race and Progress"Franz Boas's chapter is actually an address by him as the president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1931. Readers are alerted to the fact that given the time in which he made this presentation, some of the terminology used by him is highly problematic. While we much critique his use of the term "race" to refer to different groups of people, such as blacks, whites, Asians, and Northern and Southern Europeans, his arguments against anti-miscegenation hysteria, sometimes referred to as "race mixing" or even "race degeneration" by eugenic stalwarts, reflect an important debate in the scientific community at that time. Referring to studies of populations from a biological perspective, he argues that wherever there have been populations, there has been mingling among groups and that there is no evidence to suggest that this results in degeneration. He further argues that intense inbreeding sometimes results in health problems and that certain changes in human anatomy can result from environmental, cultural, and social conditions as opposed to human selection. Moreover, there is no biological evidence to connect bodily form and its physical and mental functions. In this connection, he discusses briefly the IQ controversy in the USA. He insists that racial hostility has no biological or natural basis, but rather is socially based.Ashley Montagu - "The Concept of Race"The chapter by Ashley Montagu, an address on genetics, makes a case for abandoning the use of the term "race" and suggests using other terms to refer to different groups of people, terms such as "ethnic groups" or "genogroups". Readers can explore whether these words suggested by him are acceptable or not in light of some current writings that assert that even seemingly neutral concepts such as "ethnicity" are subject to social construction and power relations. Nevertheless, Montagu's main argument in favour of throwing out problematic terms to build "the master's house" and searching for new ones is worth considering. First, he critiques the "scientific" approach to making conclusions about human species on the basis of what other animal species do or don't do, because, as he argues, one cannot equate all animal groupings with human groupings, as the latter, unlike the former, are subject to "culture, that is to say, the man-made [sic] part of the environment" in addition to nature. His opposition to the use of "race" in studying populations is based on the fact that the world has a very problematic set of associations and assumptions underlying it, such as those based in race typography; he insists that it is impossible to use the word in any other way.Michael Banton - "The Classification of Races in Europe and North American: 1700-1850"Michael Banton provides a genealogy of the term "race" in Europe. He argues that early writings based in biblical thinking reveal a deep-seated assumption of monogenesis (single origin) and the importance of environmental effects of phenotypical differences, as well as a lack of interest in the classification of "races." Referring to many writers, he demonstrates that although slavery and colonialism were well entrenched by the 17th century, and although racial feelings and structures were the norm, these did not develop into an intellectual ("scientific") tradition of "race typology" until the early to mid-19th century. While earlier the word "race" had been associated with lineage, it later became associated with "variety," "type," or "class" and thus with the theory of polygenesis (separate origins). The latter evolved in some writing to an association with phenotypical, cultural, and even national differences. Banton suggests that although there was no agreement on the meaning of "race" among biologists and anthropologists, and although racial typologists were opposed to imperialism on grounds that "inferior races" could not adapt to Western European ways, the word

Drawing on course readings and lectures, write an essay outlining some of the major "shifts” in the history of racism from the English Civil War (17th. Century) to contemporary times?Gustav JahodaIn his chapter, Gustav Jahoda traces the ways in which respected German and French thinkers of the late 17th and early 18th centuries grappled intellectually with the issue of whether the different races could reasonably be said to belong to different species, and if so, where the "black" race fell between Caucasians and apes. This debate gave rise to nascent theories about how to differentiate between races. In particular, Jahoda explains the ways in which the craniology developed by a French scientist not only because the scientific standard for differentiating between the races, but also was positioned as support for the racial theories about the similarities between the black race and apes.Audrey SmedlyAudrey Smedly argue that if various Western European nations were primarily responsible for the majority of global colonization projects, this was not necessarily a random occurrence. Rather, she argues that these countries possessed several distinctive societal features and prior experiences that made them more likely to attempt to colonize indigenous peoples both economically and culturally. For example, Smedley demonstrates how England's early incorporation of capitalism with its associated ideologies of individualism and its particular brand of Christianity all conspired to form the economic and social bases for their imperial policies. Likewise, Smedly traces the ways in which features of the Inquisition era in Spain - a belief in the heredity character of social status, a hardening of ethnic difference, and the growing intolerance of religious (but also cultural) diversity by the Spanish Catholic Church - served as a moral basis for Spain's colonial policies.Edward SaidEdward Said argued that far from representing a true or accurate depiction of a particular region, "the Orient" instead constituted a systematic regime of representation within which Westerners though about, came to "know," and ultimately attempted to colonize the diversity of indigenous nations in specific geographic spaces. Importantly, Said argues that Westerners' sense of the geographical regions they came to perceive as "the Orient" did not reflect any reality, but instead represented the prejudices and stereotypes that Westerners held about "Orientals." Said argues that over time certain sets of observations about the Orient solidified into natural or taken-for-granted truths (usually depicting the Orient as backward or deficient and Western society as dominant and superior). Said refers to this bedrock of truth that shaped the opinion of the vast majority of Orientalists as "latent Orientalism". Thus, despite the apparent diverse set of views and knowledges produced with respect to the Orient, all writers relied in one way or another on a construction of the Orient as fundamentally different from - and inferior to - "the West."