Question:
How the concept of race has developed over the course of American history using critical concepts and primary sources that we have studied in this unit.
Answer:
Thesis statement
Race is a concept that is societally constructed and is based on the ideology of people who view human population in groups. This depicts that other people are more special than others are on the ground of their external physical features and geographic origin (loc, 2016). The concept of race thus become meaningful in the American social life development since establishment of the country, however, for so many people this is usually limited to biological significance. Racial variations are because of vulnerability to psychological, behavioral, environmental and material risk factors and resources.
Notion of Race
According to Roderick Ferguson (2016), it is important to look at the notion of freedom of power when discussing development of race in America. This is what bring about racial difference with regard to academic, monetary, community identity and the body. In the United States for example, when one looks at the political and economic formation from the 60s, race has always shaped the way citizenship and labor is organized. He adds that race has for years provided a platform where human differentiation, citizen exclusion and civil violence is inscribed (Ferguson, 2016). This means that race is usually looked at in terms of subjectivity and helps locate different identities.
Minority figure
When one looks at the notion by Ferguson, it is no different what race has come to be in the modern American states. With the recent events such as the shooting of African American by the police and identification of drug related crimes to particular race. It can be said that the notion of race in the United States is still a major concern for the current and upcoming governments. Such types of insights that give a rise to movements which counter nations based forms of racial politics that seem to play in the forefront of America even with the 2016 upcoming presidential elections. Also according to Walter Johnson’s essay on slavery (2011), we find that race is more than a way of identifying a culture or making political coalitions against state oppression or capitalist exploitation of the minority. It is also a way of categorizing sense of belong and exclusion from the social and economic front of the country.
According to the writer, America itself sponsored auctioning of slaves and monitored the trade. He discusses the thousands of slaves who would be exhibited in New Orleans market as a way of building the southern slave economy. This clearly indicate the number of views taken by 19th century Americans on slaves and the broader system of slavery in to the heart of American social and economic sphere. For this reason, race played a part in the development of the minority towards the American dream.
Inclusion and exclusion
With regard to the above findings, it should be stated that the notion of race has always been the center point of inclusion and exclusion. The way the a particular community or people of particular physical features were treated by the early united states leadership, has continued to affect inclusion and exclusion of in to different departments, achievements and development of the country (vam, 2016). The political class will always determine the countries social and economic development, most of which, race plays a very huge part.
References
Ferguson, R. A., 2016. Race. [Online]
Available at: http://keywords.nyupress.org/american-cultural-studies/essay/race/
[Accessed 23 September 2016].
Johnson, W., 2011. Outline and Summary of Walter Johnson’s Soul by Soul: Life Inside the Antebellum Slave Market (Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, England: Harvard University Press, 1999). [Online]
Available at: https://allenmendenhallblog.com/2011/04/09/outline-and-summary-of-walter-johnson%E2%80%99s-soul-by-soul-life-inside-the-antebellum-slave-market-cambridge-massachusetts-and-london-england-harvard-university-press-1999/
[Accessed 23 September 2016].
loc, 2016. Interviews with todays Immigrants. [Online]
Available at: http://www.loc.gov/teachers/classroommaterials/presentationsandactivities/presentations/immigration/interv/toc.php
[Accessed 23 September 2016].
vam, 2016. powerdressing:Zoot Suit. [Online]
Available at: http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/p/powerdressing-zoot-suits/
[Accessed 23 September 2016].
