Theory the History of Race Essay

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In order to get beyond such shallow viewpoints, they need to merely use such differences as the starting point for their conception of people from other ethnicities, and actually get beyond that bring about an improvement in interracial relations.

As such, it is extremely interesting to note how sociological concepts of standpoint theory and systems of privilege typify many of the responses that Christenson had to opinions and statements voiced by other men in the video. For the most part, Christenson's responses either contained an element of ignorance or outright disbelief to many of the social barriers and misconceptions that the men of color spoke about. These proclivities of Christenson can widely be rationalized via standpoint theory, which poses the notion that people's system of beliefs is greatly affected by the social group they are a part of. Moreover, this theorem places a fair amount of emphasis on hegemony, a term that refers to power existent between groups of people and which provides a degree of authority and social prominence between those groups. Due to the social position Christenson occupies, that of a white male in a society in which white males represent the historical majority, this position greatly influences Christenson's regard for men of other social standings. Systems of privilege are also influenced by standpoint theory indirectly, particularly if a person is part of a social class in which they have a substantial amount of hegemony. Hegemony is what ultimately allows for systems of privilege, which is manifest in unequal treatment among people of different social statuses. In that sense, Christenson is both a recipient of and a victim of systems of privilege, since as a privileged person in this country he is ultimately circumscribed in his view of others due to the lack of cognizance he has of how they are treated. These two notions severely underscore the need for people to get beyond basic physical differences as the sole basis of perception between the races, so that true harmony can exist in the U.S.

David Meyer's article actually provides a fair amount of evidence for this thesis that is of an empirical nature.

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He alludes to the fact that different races and ethnicities cannot all simply get along because of facets of privilege that have to do with human nature. In one of the scientific tests he references within this article, he explains how people tend to follow those who are in authority, and also display the tendency to not desire to deviate from the norm. Doing so within the social context of interracial relations, for instance, would require regarding people with less power and privilege in a manner in which there is social equality -- which is a character trait that is not generally part of human nature, which tends to follow an established tradition. Meyer's article implies that nice people would rather go along and do what everybody else is doing, adhering to any authority figures along the way, that deviate and actually think for themselves and treat people differently as a result. This article denotes all the more reason why it is important to merely use the differences in various ethnic groups as a starting point for the nature of interracial relations.

In summary, there is a plentiful amount of evidence that denotes that there are pronounced differences afforded to people of different social standings. Privilege theory and standpoint theory indicate that these differences can account for the bulk of the way that people view and, ultimately, treat other people. Johnson's first two chapters in his manuscript confirm the degree of privilege afforded to those of historical majority groups in the U.S. Meyers' indicates that people will tend to conform to such unfair treatment of others -- unless they make a conscious decision to only use ethnic differences as a starting point, not ending point, for the basis of treatment between races......

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