A Race Around the World: Cross-cultural comparisons of race

As students enter, please look over Omi and Winant's Racial Formation.


What are the important claims in the Omi and Winant article "Racial Formation?"

Racial Formation by Omi and Winant

What does it mean to be “one-thirty second black”? 

Do you think one-thirty second black should mean someone is considered black?  If so, why?  If not, why not, and what should be the demarcation for being considered black?

  

What does polygenesis mean?  What are the ways Europeans would treat people differently based on idea of polygenesis – list at least 3.

What does “hypo-descent” mean?

 How does the classification of race differ in Brazil?

What does “passing” mean? 

The book by Omi and Winant called "Racial Formation" provides a detailed explanation of how race is formed through a social construction.  Here is a video of Omi and Winant explaining their seminal work:


If "race" is not biological then it is a social construction.  There is no way to separate humans biologically, physically or scientifically into distinct racial groups.  If there was, then racial groups would be the same all over the world.  They would fit into the scientific classification system such as kingdom, order, phylum etc...  But instead, each culture has its own racial types.  The system of classification in each country is based on the country's social, cultural and political history.  In sum,

• Racial categories vary around the world.
• The categories are formed in each country because of the local social, cultural and political history.

How does Omi and Winant provide evidence for these claims?


If race varies around the world based on the social, cultural and political histories of each country, what are some examples?

Race in Japan

For example, when I was in Japan, I asked some Japanese friends what races were in Japan and they said "nihon-jin and gai-jin," Which means "Japanese people and foreign people.  In other words, the Japanese think that there are Japanese people in the world and then there is everyone else.  And then I pressed him further and I said, " But aren't there different groups within Japanese culture?"

My friend finally said, " Ahh yes... there were ancient Japanese who settled the islands from the north and there were ancient Japanese who settled the islands from the south, and you know how to tell who came from where?  Earwax." That's right, earwax! He explained that some Japanese have dry flaky earwax and others have wet greasy earwax.  That determines where your ancestors came from and a different biological group that you are a part of- essentially a different race.  But that makes no sense to us because in the US we never think of earwax as part of race.

Race in Mexico

Here are the racial groups in Mexico:

1. Mestizo: Spanish father and Indian mother
2. Castizo: Spanish father and Mestizo mother
3. Espomolo: Spanish mother and Castizo father
4. Mulatto: Spanish and black African
5. Moor: Spanish and Mulatto
6. Albino: Spanish father and Moor mother
7. Throwback: Spanish father and Albino mother
8. Wolf: Throwback father and Indian mother
9. Zambiago: Wolf father and Indian mother
10. Cambujo: Zambiago father and Indian mother
11. Alvarazado: Cambujo father and Mulatto mother
12. Borquino: Alvarazado father and Mulatto mother
13. Coyote: Borquino father and Mulatto mother
14. Chamizo: Coyote father and Mulatto mother
15. Coyote-Mestizo: Cahmizo father and Mestizo mother
16. Ahi Tan Estas: Coyote-Mestizo father and Mulatto mother

Race in Brazil

In Brazil, although the Brazilian census defines the races as:
branco (white), pardo (multiracial), preto (black), amarelos (Asians), caboclos (indigenous and white mixed), indigenous

However, Brazilians are far more conscious of physical variations.  For example, in 1976, the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) conducted a study to ask people to identify their own skin color.  Here are the 134 terms, listed in alphabetical order:

Acastanhada (cashewlike tint; caramel colored)
Agalegada
Alva (pure white)
Alva-escura (dark or off-white)
Alverenta (or aliviero, "shadow in the water")
Alvarinta (tinted or bleached white)
Alva-rosada (or jamote, roseate, white with pink highlights)
Alvinha (bleached; white-washed)
Amarela (yellow)
Amarelada (yellowish)
Amarela-quemada (burnt yellow or ochre)
Amarelosa (yellowed)
Amorenada (tannish)
Avermelhada (reddish, with blood vessels showing through the skin)
Azul (bluish)
Azul-marinho (deep bluish)
Baiano (ebony)
Bem-branca (very white)
Bem-clara (translucent)
Bem-morena (very dusky)
Branca (white)
Branca-avermelhada (peach white)
Branca-melada (honey toned)
Branca-morena (darkish white)
Branca-p�lida (pallid)
Branca-queimada (sunburned white)
Branca-sardenta (white with brown spots)
Branca-suja (dirty white)
Branqui�a (a white variation)
Branquinha (whitish)
Bronze (bronze)
Bronzeada (bronzed tan)
Bugrezinha-escura (Indian characteristics)
Burro-quanto-foge ("burro running away," implying racial mixture of unknown origin)
Cabocla (mixture of white, Negro and Indian)
Cabo-Verde (black; Cape Verdean)
Caf� (coffee)
Caf�-com-leite (coffee with milk)
Canela (cinnamon)
Canelada (tawny)
Cast�o (thistle colored)
Castanha (cashew)
Castanha-clara (clear, cashewlike)
Castanha-escura (dark, cashewlike)
Chocolate (chocolate brown)
Clara (light)
Clarinha (very light)
Cobre (copper hued)
Corado (ruddy)
Cor-de-caf� (tint of coffee)
Cor-de-canela (tint of cinnamon)
Cor-de-cuia (tea colored)
Cor-de-leite (milky)
Cor-de-oro (golden)
Cor-de-rosa (pink)
Cor-firma ("no doubt about it")
Crioula (little servant or slave; African)
Encerada (waxy)
Enxofrada (pallid yellow; jaundiced)
Esbranquecimento (mostly white)
Escura (dark)
Escurinha (semidark)
Fogoio (florid; flushed)
Galega (see agalegada above)
Galegada (see agalegada above)
Jambo (like a fruit the deep-red color of a blood orange)
Laranja (orange)
Lil�s (lily)
Loira (blond hair and white skin)
Loira-clara (pale blond)
Loura (blond)
Lourinha (flaxen)
Malaia (from Malabar)
Marinheira (dark greyish)
Marrom (brown)
Meio-amerela (mid-yellow)
Meio-branca (mid-white)
Meio-morena (mid-tan)
Meio-preta (mid-Negro)
Melada (honey colored)
Mesti�a (mixture of white and Indian)
Miscigena��o (mixed --- literally "miscegenated")
Mista (mixed)
Morena (tan)
Morena-bem-chegada (very tan)
Morena-bronzeada (bronzed tan)
Morena-canelada (cinnamonlike brunette)
Morena-castanha (cashewlike tan)
Morena clara (light tan)
Morena-cor-de-canela (cinnamon-hued brunette)
Morena-jambo (dark red)
Morenada (mocha)
Morena-escura (dark tan)
Morena-fechada (very dark, almost mulatta)
Moren�o (very dusky tan)
Morena-parda (brown-hued tan)
Morena-roxa (purplish-tan)
Morena-ruiva (reddish-tan)
Morena-trigueira (wheat colored)
Moreninha (toffeelike)
Mulatta (mixture of white and Negro)
Mulatinha (lighter-skinned white-Negro)
Negra (negro)
Negrota (Negro with a corpulent vody)
P�lida (pale)
Para�ba (like the color of marupa wood)
Parda (dark brown)
Parda-clara (lighter-skinned person of mixed race)
Polaca (Polish features; prostitute)
Pouco-clara (not very clear)
Pouco-morena (dusky)
Preta (black)
Pretinha (black of a lighter hue)
Puxa-para-branca (more like a white than a mulatta)
Quase-negra (almost Negro)
Queimada (burnt)
Queimada-de-praia (suntanned)
Queimada-de-sol (sunburned)
Regular (regular; nondescript)
Retinta ("layered" dark skin)
Rosa (roseate)
Rosada (high pink)
Rosa-queimada (burnished rose)
Roxa (purplish)
Ruiva (strawberry blond)
Russo (Russian; see also polaca)
Sapecada (burnished red)
Sarar� (mulatta with reddish kinky hair, aquiline nose)
Sara�ba (or saraiva: like a white meringue)
Tostada (toasted)
Trigueira (wheat colored)
Turva (opaque)
Verde (greenish)
Vermelha (reddish)

Can a plane ride change your race?

Looking at the distinctions in Japan, Mexico and Brazil might not make sense to us because we view race so differently.  However, all of this is evidence that race is a social construction.   Read the passage below and then answer the questions after.

4.  Answer individually:   Did the girl’s race change?  Why or why not?

 5.  As a group discuss, each student share his/her answer to this question.  Change or add to your thoughts above as needed.  Then as a group decide on one answer: Yes or NO?

 

Here is a link to different censuses around the world.

Click on the link and then note in your packet which race you would be in the other countries around the world.
When you are finished, which countries were you a different race than how you identify yourself in the U.S.?


Here is a link to a survey of who is white around the world.

 And here is a global dialogue about race.

Global Systems of Racial Construction; Race is socially constructed differently around the world.

                        F&S 217-222

                        What is some evidence from around the world that race is a social construct?

Why would a plane ride change your race?

What evidence is there that race is constructed differently depending on where you are?

Take Your Marks, Race!

HW:  please read Racial Formation, an excerpt from the book by Omi and Winant.  Be ready to answer questions about it and discuss it.

Before beginning please answer based on what you know already.

1.  What is race?  Define it.  What determines what race a person is?

2. How many races are there? Name them (or as many as you can).

3.  Have you ever thought about what it means to be white?  Does discussing race make you uncomfortable?

Warning:  Sociology sometimes "makes the familiar strange."  It sheds light on areas of our life that we never questioned before.  This can be an eye-opening experience that is sometimes difficult to accept.  Remember that we are like fish in water never having to question or notice the water.  This lesson may do that to you.  Trust me and trust the process, but don't be afraid to ask questions.  I know that the topic of race can be triggering, but I am willing to help you understand and I want our classroom to be a safe space for understanding.

What is Robin DiAngelo's White Fragility?
 Robin DiAngelo has been teaching about race and racism for over 20 years and in that time, she has realized that whites have difficulty in discussing race and racism.  She examines the difficulty that whites have in discussing race and racism in her book called White Fragility.  Her website explains her work;

White people in North America live in a social environment that protects and insulates them from race-based stress. This insulated environment of racial protection builds white expectations for racial comfort while at the same time lowering the ability to tolerate racial stress. Although white racial insulation is somewhat mediated by social class (with poor and working class urban whites being generally less racially insulated than suburban or rural whites), the larger social environment insulates and protects whites as a group through institutions, cultural representations, media, school textbooks, movies, advertising, and dominant discourses. Racial stress results from an interruption to what is racially familiar. In turn, whites are often at a loss for how to respond in constructive ways., as we have not had to build the cognitive or affective skills or develop the stamina that that would allow for constructive engagement across racial divides. leading to what I refer to as White Fragility. White Fragility is a state in which even a minimum amount of racial stress becomes intolerable, triggering a range of defensive moves. These moves include the outward display of emotions such as anger, fear, and guilt, and behaviors such as argumentation, silence, and leaving the stress-inducing situation. These behaviors, in turn, function to reinstate white racial equilibrium. This book explicates the dynamics of White Fragility and how we might build our capacity in the on-going work towards racial justice.

NY Times examines Di Angelo's work.

The anatomy and biology of race

Now, let's consult the biology and anatomy textbooks and find out the answers to the above questions.

This is the beginning of our unit on race.  Before we begin, it is important to define what we mean by "race" as well as some of the other terms that get confused with "race".  In the United States, we are so familiar with the idea of "race" that we use it all the time but never really stop to examine what it is.  If you were asked to identify the race of students in our room, I bet you would be able to say what "race" they are, but can you say what exactly "race" is? 

What is racial hegemony?


Racial categories are hegemonic assumptions in the United States.  They are so ingrained in us that we never question them.  What constitutes different races?  Think about what traits people use to classify humans into "races."  If you lined people up from all over the world, they would resemble a spectrum instead of distinct groups.  People cannot be grouped distinctly into "races" in a scientific, biological way.  If you tried to separate them based on a trait, the categories you create would be arbitrary and subjective.  For example, we will examine skin color below.  You will see that skin color is not discretely divided into biological groups.  But before we do that, let's operationalize some terms related to identity.

Operationalizing terms - Define each of the following terms.

Nationality is the country where someone is a citizen.  For example, if your passport is from the U.S. then your nationality is the United States, often referred to as "American".

Ethnicity is a group of people linked by a common culture, ancestry and often associated with a geographic location.  For example, one might say that Italians are an ethnic group.  But ethnicity doesn't have to apply to a country, it can be a group like Assyrians, Amish or Southern U.S. citizens.


Heritage is where a person's ancestors can be traced to.

Genotype is an individual's specific combination of genes that makes up their DNA.

Phenotype is the observable characteristics that an individual manifests from their genotype interacting with the environment.

Race is a socially constructed idea that humans can be separated into distinct and discrete groups based on their biology.  For example, one society might say that there are 3 races in the world: Asian, African and white.  The belief is that people can be separated into groups based on their biological traits such as, skin color, hair, eyes, nose, genes, etc...



Traits and race; Humans look different, why is that not race?

Yes, humans have different phenotypes such as dark skin or curly hair.  These phenotypes do come from different genetic combinations, but these combinations are not divisible into distinct groups.  Instead, the divisions we create are arbitrary divisions. If you lined up all of the people in the world according to a trait, the divisions would be less obvious. It would look more like a spectrum that changes gradually blending into one another.  For example, think about skin color, one of the most obvious phenotypes in the U.S. and often the default for socially constructing race.  See this evidence about why skin color does not differentiate into discrete groups:

From the American Anthropological Association, The Human Spectrum activity shows that deciding how to categorize people is arbitrary.

 


From a post on the soc images blog, this artist created a palette of colors showing that human skin is much more of a spectrum than distinct groups.  See this post for more about the artist and the project, including a Ted Talk.
Where would you divide up this palette into different races?

For an explanation on the biology of skin color, the article "Skin Deep" by Nina Jablonski and George Chaplin from Scientific American  explains the science behind skin color and how around the world, skin color would look more like a spectrum than distinct groups.  The map below from the article explains the correlation between UV light intensity and skin color.  Going back to our metaphor about the traits, do you see how the trait of skin color is a spectrum rather than distinct groups?

Nina Jablonski explains the significance of skin color in her Ted Talk here.


Before moving on, questions?

Questions about traits and why they cannot be used to categorize people into distinct races?


Other phenotypes besides skin color are also not discrete

Click here to go to the Race; Power of Illusion website to see why there is no way of biologically separating people into "races"  based on physical appearance (including skin color, nose shape and head size), geographic origins or genetic similarities.

Race essentialism - an erroneous and persistent theory

During the 1800s and for nearly a century afterward, scientists, including anthropologists and biologists, erroneously concluded that humans evolved from three distinct groups of hominids.  Known as the "essentialist theory", this incorrectly posits that each group started as a "pure race" in three separate locations: Mongolia, Caucasia, and Nigeria.   Eventually, the groups intermixed but some individuals stayed more pure based on less mixing.  Using the scientific data that is available to us now, biologists, doctors, anthropologists, and sociologists know that this is not true.  Instead of evolving separately, all humans began in Africa and gradually spread out across the globe.  However, some people still promote essentialist race theory.

From Harvard University's School of Biomedical Sciences, this explains more detail how genes work and why they can't be used to categorize people scientifically into"races".

Anatomy Class.  The idea that people can't be categorized biologically into races is difficult to accept and process because race is so ingrained in our society that we never question it.  It gets validation from many places, including our very own anatomy classes! (until 2018) (click here for a clarification of the anatomy forensic lesson).

Bill Nye explains why there is no way to define race biologically.

A 2017 article from the NY Times explains that the latest evidence from genetics is that there is not a connection between genes and race.

Jefferson Fish also explains how race doesn't make sense in the article titled "Mixed Blood" from Psychology Today, 1995.

For more info you can checkout the April 22, 2005 episode of Odyssey, a radio program that used to air on Chicago Public Radio. This episode about the genetics of race and if you listen carefully to the caller segment, you can hear a very interesting high school sociology teacher commenting. [Listen the program here (the good part is after 35:26)]

This article from Slate explains why ancestry kits do not explain race.