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Race And Ethnicity As A Social Construct Essay

482 Words2 Pages

Race and ethnicity are both extensive and intensive issues in the society globally. While both race and ethnicity are social constructs with positive and negative implications for the society, it should be noted that individual identities both for races and ethnicities are characteristically different for different societies. Perhaps more importantly, it is clear that what an individual considers to be their race or ethnicity in one part of the world could be different in another part. According to Conley (2017 p. 326), race is defined as a group of individuals with a shared set of values and characteristics and are believed to share a distinct bloodline. Cornell and Hartmann 2007 p 19), defines ethnicity as a society sharing a common ancestry with a distinctively similar historical past that defines their culture. Even though we identify ourselves as White, Black, or Asian, I have learned that this notions are the problems …show more content…

By taking this course, this fact has resulted to more questions than answers. The very fact that racism is a social construct that has devolved from the concepts of race and ethnicity does not perhaps signify the reality of the world. For people who have grown up in the same neighborhoods, attending the same schools, and partaking in the same activities, where does the hatred come from? Benedict (1945) defined racism as a natural selection of determining the superior race and subsequently the inferior race. However, biologically, human beings are characteristically the similar. The exposure to issues regarding racism, has become an eye opener towards the realities of the world. However, I believe the issue surrounding races has nothing to do with the individual races and ethnicities but the hate depicted by a few individuals in the

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