Question

A person’s identity is made up of many aspects. Physical features such as sex, height, weight, and skin color are what people notice first – and make immediate, instinctive judgments about.

While other visual factors – including age and health – are often used to identify a person, race and ethnicity tend to present the greatest social challenges for individuals as well as groups.

Post at least three times to this discussion forum, following the guidelines below. Your posts should include responses to any questions asked, as well as replies to classmates.

In your first post:

In your own words, define the terms race and ethnicity. How are race and ethnicity different?

With respect to these definitions, what are your race and your ethnicity? Is your race different from your ethnicity? Please explain your answer.

As you understand them from the reading for this lesson and from your own experience, which one -- race and ethnicity -- is a more accurate determiner of identity? Please explain your answer.

“Intersectionality” is a word used by sociologists to describe how personal identity (race, gender, class, sexuality, etc.) is directly related to cultural exclusion and privilege. Thinking about your racial identity, how does it help or hinder you at work, in school, socially, or otherwise? Please give at least one example to help us understand your experience.

Answer 1

Definition of the term race - A group of people with similar physical characteristics and may have differences and similarities biologically and share certain characteristics in higher frequency than other populations of that species but are not isolated in terms of reproduction.

Example - Hispanic, Latino, African-American, American -Indian, Asian etc.

Ethnicity - It can be defined as a social group that shares a common cultural tradition; religion, language, heritage, ancestory etc. It also refers to what country one hails from.

Example - Arab,Indian

Difference between race and ethnicity :

Race is associated with biology. The populations within the same species express relatively few morphological ( physical appearance ) and genetic differences.Example - black people and white people.

'Ethnicity' term is used for the cultural background of people which includes their customs and traditions, language, religion, heritage, ancestory etc.

Example -Irish people, Vietnamese people.

What are your race and your ehnicity? Is your race different than your ethnicity?

*subjective*

All right so, I am an Indian which is in Asia. We have 29 states in India. Each state representing its own cultural background . I am from Kerala. Kerala is in south part of India. We have a different culture from that of rest of the Asian countries. Different language, religion , skin tone, festivals, tradition , ancestory and more.

So 'Asian' becomes my race and my ethnical background is from India. So yes, my race is different from my ethnicity.

Both race and ethnicity are accurate determiners of identity along with sex, weight, height, skin colour, age and health.

But a more accurate determiner ( if within your own continent) would be ethnicity, and ( if in another continent ) it would have to be race.

Example - If I were to travel in European countries, I would be referred to as an Asian. But if I am travelling within Asia, I would be referred to as an Indian. It may differ in certain scenarios.

It is a basic human nature that we want to be associated to some social group. So we tend to be more attracted to people within our own culture because of the many shared similarities and make our own community in a foreign land. But its not always the case. We live in a social world. In order to socialise, we must extend our scope beyond the community that we associate ourselves with. This is only possible if we break the barriers that prevent us from doing so.

Racism has been a subject of issue in the history of many countries. Though its not as prevalent inthe modern times as it used to be but it still plays a huge role in many aspects of the social world. There are certain sections of society who cannot get past the race culture and use racial slurs to feel good about themselves.

As for me, racial identity has not hindered me at my work socially or otherwise but for a lot of people it has.

For example - When i was in school, boys in my class would use local racial slur to discriminate against a boy who had dark skin colour.

Racism needs to be eradicated completely and acceptance of any racial identity should be embraced so that no one feels excluded socially.