The material following this cover page is protected by copyright and has beenshared with permission from the copyright holder. This copy may only bedistributed in a password-protected environment such as eCentennial and onlyfor the students enrolled in the course listed.GNED500Learning OUTCOMeSChapter 6LO-1 Understand identity as a social constructionLO-2 Explore the relationship between identity, power,and inequalityLO-3 … Continue reading “a password-protected environment | My Assignment Tutor”
The material following this cover page is protected by copyright and has beenshared with permission from the copyright holder. This copy may only bedistributed in a password-protected environment such as eCentennial and onlyfor the students enrolled in the course listed.GNED500Learning OUTCOMeSChapter 6LO-1 Understand identity as a social constructionLO-2 Explore the relationship between identity, power,and inequalityLO-3 Identify how stereotypes are formed andperpetuatedLO-4 Consider how norms shape the categories ofgender and sexualityLO-5 Examine “race” as a social and historical processrather than a biological factLO-6 Understand identity as a site of contestation andstruggleUnderstanding IdentitySelom Chapman-Nyaho and Alia SomaniPerhaps instead of thinking of identity as an already accomplished fact, whichthe new cultural practices then represent, we should think, instead, of identity as a ‘production’, which is never complete, always in process and alwaysconstituted within, not outside, representation.—Stuart Hall, “Cultural Identity and Diaspora”*IntrOductIOnIdentity is a complex issue. Each one of us will define ourselves differently and eachone of us is unique. Indeed, we have our own fingerprints; if we are students, wemight have our own student number. When we travel, we might be asked to produce our passport—or proof of our uniqueness as individuals. But our identitiesare also shaped by society—its structures and its institutions (the family, the school,the media, the government). This is why we might think of our identity as Stuart* Stuart Hall, (1990). “Cultural identity and diaspora”. In J. Rutherford (Ed.), Identity: Community, Culture, andDifference, Pg. 392-403, London: Lawrence and Wishart.Chapter 6 Understanding Identity 109NEL1. Normative structures refer to the socially accepted patterned behaviour in society or in any particular socialinstitution.Hall does in the epigraph to this chapter: not as “an already accomplished fact”but instead as “a ‘production’, which is never complete, always in process” (1990,p. 395). In this chapter, we will address the complex ways in which our identitiesare shaped and defined. We will ask: What are the categories in which we identifyourselves and where do those categories come from? How do we relate to thosecategories? And, how do they affect the way we see ourselves and others?Our identities are multiple and shifting. They can be understood, for example,in terms of class, sexuality, nationality, ethnicity, age, and (dis)ability. But we arenot solely determined by any one of these things. Our identities are shaped by ourexperiences and our histories; they are responsive to social expectations and thenormative structures1 that govern our society. They are also informed by the storieswe tell about ourselves or the ways in which we choose to present ourselves toothers, all based on our own ideas about how we relate to or fit with the messageswe receive about who we are.the SOcIaL cOnStructIOn Of IdentItyThere are two general frameworks under which different conceptualizations ofidentity are understood: essentialism and social constructionism. According toessentialist theories, identity is innate; it is something with which we are born. Itis the idea that we have some kind of unchanging fundamental self. Identity, thus,lies outside the sphere of culture and politics (O’Brien & Szeman, 2004, p. 170).Social constructionism argues that identity is the product of social structures andculture. Whereas essentialist theories suggest that identity is wholly determinedwithin the individual, social constructionism suggests that identities are shapedby external factors and change over time. They are, in part, determined throughour interactions with social structures, social institutions, and other people. Andthese are all inextricably linked with power. Social constructionism understandsidentity not as a naturally occurring fact but rather as produced and mediated—orconstructed—within the social relations of power and inequality.In order to see how identities are socially constructed, we must understand howsociety functions. More specifically, we must understand the social structures thatmediate our interactions. One component of this social structure is social status.Social status is the position a person has within a society. It is a socially definedcategory within a group or society that often carries certain expectations, rights,and duties (Murray, Linden, & Kendall, 2014, pp. 119–20). For example, “student”is a social status as is “doctor,” “bus driver,” “child-care worker,” and “police officer.”These defined positions carry a certain degree of recognition and have assigned toessentialismA perspective thatassumes that aspectsof our identities areinnate. We are bornwith them and theyremain fundamentallyunchanged throughoutour lives.socialconstructionismA perspective thatargues that ouridentities are theproduct of the interplaybetween individual,cultural, and socialstructures.social statusThe position a personhas within a society’shierarchy.110 Chapter 6 Understanding IdentityNELthem very specific duties. But social status does not just refer to occupations: “husband,” “daughter,” “senior citizen,” and “addict” are also examples of a social status.Social status is usually divided into two categories: achieved status and ascribedstatus. Achieved status is “a position in a hierarchy that has been achieved byvirtue of how well someone performs in some role” (Krahn, Lowe, & Hughes, 2014,p. 129). Achieved statuses would include the recognition one receives for their education, occupation, accomplishments, abilities, and even hobbies. What we noticeabout achieved statuses is that they are usually those over which an individual hassome control. We work towards achieving the recognition that comes with them.Ascribed statuses, on the other hand, are categories assigned to individuals, oftenat birth and cannot easily be changed. They are given to us involuntarily (Murrayet al., 2014, p. 120). Ascribed statuses tend to include things like ethnicity, sex, andage. One thing that is similar about both achieved and ascribed statuses, however,is that society tends to assign roles to these different categories.Roles are the social and behavioural expectations assigned to different statuscategories. When we meet someone on the street, we may make assumptions basedon their appearance and we may group them into categories familiar to us suchas race, class, gender, sexuality, age, ethnicity, nationality, and occupation. Whenwe are asked to fill out an identification form, these same categories are typicallypresented to us. Moreover, we often feel pressure (consciously or unconsciously) toconform to social expectations. Thus, if we are at school where we are categorizedas “students,” we will often behave, dress, and carry ourselves according to certainexpectations. When we go home and we are categorized as “parents” or “children,”our behaviour, dress, attitude, and language might change because the expectations have changed. A role “is the dynamic aspect of a status. Whereas we occupy astatus, we play a role” (Murray et al., 2014, p. 121).Understanding social statuses and roles is important in the social construction of identity because the categories defined by a group or society, as well as thebehavioural expectations that correspond to each category, structure both how wesee ourselves and how we relate to other people. An important part of the socialconstruction of identity is the notion that we learn much of our identity from ourfamilies, communities, educational institutions, and other surroundings. Overtime we also learn, often without even realizing, how to selectively present ourselves to manage other people’s impressions of who we are. We do not, “come intothe world pre-programmed with a sense of self and the knowledge necessary to actand interact appropriately with others” (Shaffir & Pawluch, 2014, p. 51). We cometo understand different social statuses and the roles, or behavioural expectations,associated with them through interactions with others. It is through this knowledgethat we begin to develop a sense of self—an identity. Socialization is “the lifelongprocess of social interaction through which individuals acquire a self-identity andthe physical, mental, and social skills needed for survival in society” (Murray et al.,achieved statusA social status that is aresult of an individual’swork, accomplishments,and/or abilities.ascribed statusA social status assignedto an individual frombirth. It is not chosenand cannot easily bechanged.rolesThe social andbehavioural expectationsassigned to differentstatus categories.socializationThe process, throughinteractions with others,by which we come tounderstand differentsocial statuses and theroles, or behaviouralexpectations.Chapter 6 Understanding Identity 111NEL2014, p. 93). Claiming that we acquire our self-identity through socialization doesnot mean that we are born without any biological or psychological predispositions.Even taking into account that different children are born into certain privilege andopportunities, some children are naturally more expressive, aggressive, or sociablethan others. We are born with certain dispositions, but it is through the social process of learning how to perceive and then express these dispositions that our senseof self—our individual identity—is born. Socialization begins early in our lives.Think of babies: Parents spend a considerable amount of time teaching babies howand when to sleep, eat, and communicate. Potty training is a form of socialization.How quickly individual infants acquire these skills varies, but the end result is thesame. Likewise, children are socialized into behaviours such as honesty, fair play,and safety—behaviours thought to indicate good character. Children also oftenbegin receiving religious instruction or learning cultural traditions at this time.When they are teenagers, young people are encouraged to think about possiblefuture careers and to develop the appropriate work ethic to ensure these careersare attainable. As an example of how socialization channels biological disposition,teenagers are often also taught about the expressions of sexuality deemed appropriate in their families and communities. Socialization and re-socialization occurthroughout our lives.When talking about socialization we can see that our families are the first andperhaps most important agents of socialization. Additionally, through our families we are linked to social statuses like ethnicity, religion, culture, and social class.These statuses often determine the nature of our socialization and the particularsocialization we receive often reaffirms and reproduces our social statuses. Butother institutions also contribute greatly to how we learn and internalize sociallyappropriate behaviour, values, and identities. Schools, for instance, teach specificknowledge and skill, but they also contribute to a child’s self-image and values.Some critical theorists maintain that schools also socialize, or, perhaps more accurately, discipline young people towards a set of values that contribute to future economic productivity, namely: obedience to authority, competition, and monotony.Our friends, or peer groups, also contribute to our socialization by providing asense of belonging and reinforcing specific cultural norms (Murray et al., 2014,p. 98). An example of how influential friends can be in the formation of identitiescan be seen by all the attention paid in the media and society to peer pressure:Individuals must earn their acceptance with their peers by conforming to a givengroup’s norms, attitudes, speech patterns and dress codes. When we conform toour peer group’s expectations, we are rewarded; if we do not conform, we maybe ridiculed or even expelled from the group. Conforming to the demands ofpeers frequently places children and adolescents at cross purposes with theirparents. For example, children are frequently under pressure to obtain certain112 Chapter 6 Understanding IdentityNEL*J. L. Murray, R. Linden & D. Kendall, Sociology in our times (6th ed.). Toronto: Nelson Education, 2014.valued material possessions (such as toys, DVDs, clothing, or athletic shoes);they then pass this pressure on to their parents through emotional pleas topurchase the desired items. (Murray et al., 2014, pp. 99–100)*Peer pressure effectively demonstrates how socialization works to shape our identities. It is not as straightforward as being told how to think of ourselves; rather, certain values and behaviours are sanctioned or rewarded by increased social prestige,while others are either subtly or explicitly discouraged. Over time, we may internalize these ideas to the extent that they seem naturally a part of us.One of the most powerful socializing influences on our identities is the massmedia. In Canada, both children and adults spend thousands of hours every yearwatching television, surfing the Internet, and listening to music. While we haveever more choice in the types and amount of media we consume, as we have seenin Chapter 5, the media sends powerful messages about our values, beliefs, andposition in society.Family, schools, peer groups, and the mass media may be the most influential,but they are by no means the only socializing institutions in our lives. Religiousinstitutions, sports teams, youth groups, support services for people suffering fromaddiction, correctional facilities, and even hospitals contribute to the process ofteaching people how to understand themselves and act in socially acceptable ways.All of these services are designed to assist, support, and teach individuals, but theyalso “socialize clients to behave, think, and feel as prescribed by the institutions”(Shaffir & Pawluch, 2014, p. 68).Socialization is fundamental to an individual’s construction of their identity, butpeople are not simply passive recipients of the messages they receive about whothey are and how they should act. We exert some agency, particularly in the waywe present our identity to others. Statuses provide the socially defined categoriesthrough which we are able to identify ourselves and roles offer the behaviouralexpectations that correspond to each status, but each of us makes choices abouthow we conform to these categories and expectations. Moreover, we tend to selectively present different aspects of our identities in different settings and interactions.Most simply, much of our identity is formed through a process of noticing howothers see us and reflecting on how that corresponds to how we see ourselves andhow we would like to be seen. In the 1930s, sociologist George Herbert Mead theorized this process by drawing a distinction between the ‘Me’ and the ‘I’, claimingthe ‘Me’ is oneself as others see you, whereas the ‘I’ is how one thinks of themselves.According to Mead, the ‘I’ is the source of originality, creativity, and spontaneity.The interaction between the ‘Me’ and the ‘I’ is how an individual develops bothan identity and a social conscience (Craib, 1992, p. 88). Decades earlier, CharlesHorton Cooley referred to the looking-glass self to emphasize how our identitylooking-glass selfThe theory that ourideas about our identityare formed through theway we imagine we areseen by others.Chapter 6 Understanding Identity 113NEL2. Dramaturgical approaches employ the theatre as a metaphor for human interaction. Each individual is anactor and those around her constitute the different audiences whose opinions and impressions must bemanaged. For example, when a student fails a test she may say to her professor that she tried her best anddid not understand the material. But then this same student may later tell her classmates that she hardlystudied. The student does not want the professor to think that she is not working hard, but she also doesnot want her peers to think she is not smart enough to do well. The professor and her classmates constitutedifferent audiences and in both instances she is attempting to manage their impressions. Dramaturgicalanalysts would suggest that impression management is so fundamental to our interactions that it is oftenperformed unconsciously.is derived from the perceptions of others. Through this looking-glass self, Cooleymaintained that we imagine how our personality and appearance seem to otherpeople and how they might judge us. This reflective process, Cooley claimed, ishow we develop our identity or self-concept (Murray et al., 2014, p. 102).Erving Goffman developed the connection between expectations about ourbehaviour—our roles—and our own thinking about our identities, claiming rolescould be thought of as scripts from a play. He coined the term “dramaturgicalapproach”2 to describe how people engage in complex performances in order tomanage the impressions of others (Craib, 1992, p. 89). In his text The Presentationof Self in Everyday Life, Goffman details how we selectively present different aspectsof our identities to different audiences. For example, Goffman wrote about frontstage and back stage behaviour to distinguish the different roles we play whenin public versus when we are in more intimate settings with family and friends. Itis tempting to think of front stage behaviour as fake and the back stage as a placewhere a person can be his or her real self, but Goffman did not necessarily intendit this way. They are both our real selves. In both settings, we imagine how otherpeople perceive us and this affects our behaviour; however, in the back stage we areless consciously anxious about how we might be judged due to the trust and familiarity we have with those closest to us.We are each of us unique. But we are unique within a framework of sociallydefined categories (statuses) each of which have behavioural expectations attached(roles). Our identity, thus, is the process of negotiating these categories, recognizinghow we are perceived by others, and attempting to manage others impressions of usin different social settings.StereOtypeS, dIScrImInatIOn, and InterSectIngIdentItIeSWhile we exert some control in the construction and presentation of our identities, the behavioural expectations that are attached to different statuses often leadsto stereotyping, prejudice, and discrimination. Stereotypes are unfounded andunwarranted generalizations about particular groups of people (Fleras & Elliot,1996). They can be based on race or ethnicity, gender, religion, or other statuses.front stagebehaviourAccording to thedramaturgical approach,the behaviour that weexhibit when in publicor around less familiaracquaintances.back stagebehaviourAccording to thedramaturgical approach,the behaviour that weexhibit only when aloneor around more intimateacquaintances.114 Chapter 6 Understanding IdentityNELprejudicePreconceived negativeopinions aboutindividuals or groups.discriminationAn act that has theintent or effect ofnegatively affectingothers based ongrounds other thanmerit or acquired skills.intersectionalityThe experience, orpotential experience,of multiple forms ofdiscrimination basedon the intersection ofdifferent social statuses.stereotype threatThe effect of negativestereotypes on anindividual’s performanceor behaviour.The notions, for example, that all Chinese people excel at math, all South Asiansare good with technology, all women are emotional, or all Muslims are extremistsrepresent unfounded simplifications about different groups. Furthermore, they areunjustified because they rely on received wisdom or casual observation rather thanactual evidence. Stereotypes often persist because they are subject to confirmationbias. Once a stereotype exists, people selectively notice situations that seem to confirm or reinforce their expectations, thus perpetuating the stereotype.Some stereotypes can seem harmless, but we must be aware of their existenceparticularly when they are linked to prejudice and discrimination. Stereotypes canalso affect the way people view themselves in significant ways. While stereotypesare unfounded because they cannot apply to all or even most members of a particular group, they are not always negative. Stereotypes can be positive, negative, orneutral. Prejudice, on the other hand, “refers to negative, often unconscious, andpreconceived notions about others” (Fleras & Elliot, 1996, p. 67). Prejudice differs from stereotypes insofar as they contain a moral judgment about individualsor groups. To the extent that we judge others negatively without even knowingthem, we are displaying prejudiced attitudes. When people act on stereotypes andprejudiced notions, they are engaging in discrimination. Discrimination is “anyact, whether deliberate or not, that has the intent or the effect of adversely affectingothers on grounds other than merit or acquired skills” (Fleras & Elliot, 1996, p. 69).Unfortunately, all too often, people are treated differently not based on their individual qualities, but based on preconceived notions about who they are.Different groups in all societies are subject to different levels of prejudice anddiscrimination. For example, people can be discriminated against based on statusessuch as gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity, culture, class, caste, shade or skin colour,religion, language, (dis)ability, or body size and shape. The list is extensive. Often,people occupy two or more statuses that are subject to some degree of discrimination. We could be disadvantaged based on gender and ability, or race and sexuality,or any combination of the above. Academics and activists refer to the experienceof discrimination from a number of different directions as intersectionality. Legalscholar, Kimberlé Crenshaw (1989), coined the term. To explain it, she used themetaphor of a collision taking place at an intersection—hence the term intersectionality: “Discrimination, like traffic through an intersection, may flow in one direction and it may flow in another. If an accident happens in an intersection, it canbe caused by cars traveling from any number of directions and, sometimes, fromall of them” (p. 149).Stereotypes can lead to prejudice and discrimination, but another danger is thatthe groups being stereotyped can often start to believe that the negative characterizations of them are true. Stereotype threat refers to “poor performance in the faceof negative stereotypes” (Beilock, 2010, p. 102). To examine how stereotypes canaffect our behaviour and performance, social psychologists have measured howChapter 6 Understanding Identity 115NELawareness of a stereotype can impact how individuals score on standardized tests.In one experiment, groups of Asian female college students were recruited for amath test. However, some groups were given a survey beforehand that highlightedtheir Asian ancestry while the others had a survey that drew attention to the factthat they were women. This test was designed to test the effect of two commonstereotypes. The first, that Asians are naturally good at math and the second, thatwomen are naturally less inclined towards the fields of science, technology, engineering, and math. The threat of stereotypes impacting performance was confirmedwhen the Asian women who were sensitized to their Asian identity scored higheron the test than the Asian women who were sensitized to their gender (Beilock,2010, p. 166).gender IdentItIeS and SexuaLItyIn order to understand gender identities as socially constructed, we have to beginwith a distinction between sex and gender. Sex is a term “used to describe thebiological and anatomical differences between females and males” (Murray et al.,2014, p. 336). Thus, when we talk about the “sex” of an individual, we are usuallyreferring to his or her biological make up as either “male” or “female,” althoughit is important to note that these categories are not always as discrete as they mayappear. Not everyone can be neatly separated into male or female sex categories.Intersex refers to people whose biological sex characteristics are neither typicallymale nor female. Instead, they exhibit elements of both. Whereas sex is linkedto biology, gender refers to the roles of masculinity and femininity that we areexpected to play based on our sex. When we say things like, “Be a man!” or, “Actlike a lady!” we are talking about our gender, not about our biological sex. Genderrefers to the condition of being “masculine” or being “feminine.” Typically, we thinkof the “male” sex as “masculine,” and the “female” sex as “feminine” (Lenton, 2014).Judith Butler, a well-known feminist theorist, however, says that the assumptionthat “gender is the rightful property of sex, that ‘masculine’ belongs to ‘male’ and‘feminine’ belongs to ‘female’” (1993, p. 312) is false. What she means is that eventhough we are born male, for example, we may not feel or act masculine, or eventhough we are born female, we may not feel or act feminine. Butler’s claim is thatgender is not innate: we are not born with a gendered identity. Instead, gender iswhat she calls performative: it is constantly produced and reproduced in the waythat we walk, talk, and act out pre-existing gendered roles. Gender roles are the“attitudes, behaviour, and activities that are socially defined as appropriate for eachsex and are learned through the socialization process” (Murray et al., 2014, p. 306).Most of the time, most of us conform to these expectations. For Butler, this enactment of roles dramatizes the fact that gender is a performance and gendered identisexA term used to describethe biological andanatomical differencesbetween females andmales.intersexA term used to refer topeople whose biologicalsex characteristics donot fit into the typicaldefinitions of male orfemale.genderThe roles of masculinityand femininity that wefeel or are expectedto play—to perform—based on our sex.116 Chapter 6 Understanding IdentityNELties of “masculinity” and “femininity” comprise a set of attitudes, behaviours, andmannerisms that we learn, acquire, and even enact.Thus, we can say that gender, unlike sex, is a social construct and that we aresocialized into gender roles. From a very young age, boys are taught to be boys:they are encouraged to wear blue and play with trucks; while girls are taught to begirls: they are encouraged to wear pink and to play with dolls. Whereas girls areencouraged to be “cute” and “sweet,” boys are encouraged to be “aggressive” and“strong.” It is through our interactions with people (our parents, our friends, ourteachers) and institutions like the media that we learn to do our gender correctly.Those who fail to conform to appropriate gendered roles are often ridiculed andtreated as outsiders. When a little girl acts like a boy, for example, we call her a “tomboy” and assume that she will eventually adopt what we believe is the “appropriate”gendered identity. Similarly, men who are effeminate (rather than masculine) areoften punished for doing their gender wrong. The expectations and norms thatgovern gendered identities can be oppressive for those who fail to conform to them(Butler, 2011).When we talk about gender identities, we need to talk about power. Masculinity is stereotypically associated with the qualities of being strong, rational,independent, intelligent, and aggressive; while femininity, which is framed as itsopposite, is associated with the qualities of being nurturing, emotional, dependent,kind, weak, and submissive. Of course, we must remember that these qualities arenot true; they are constructed. To assume that men are naturally more intelligentthan women, we might all agree, is misguided. But these stereotypes circulate inour society and, more importantly, they have significant consequences: they feedinto gender inequality. In the workplace, therefore, we might find that men occupymore positions of power than women, in part because of the assumption that theyare more capable than their female counterparts. In jobs that involve caring forchildren or the elderly, on the other hand, we will find more female employees.The assumption here is that women are naturally more nurturing than men. Thequalities associated with masculinity tend to be understood as more valuable andmore important than the qualities associated with femininity. For instance, beingrational is more valuable than being emotional, being independent is more valuable than being dependent. Thus, gendered identities and the assumptions we makeabout them can legitimize what we call patriarchy, “a hierarchical system of socialorganization in which cultural, political, and economic structures are controlled bymen” (Murray et al., 2014, p. 308).Sexual preference and orientation, which together constitute our sexuality,are important aspects of our identities. Our sexual behaviour and expressionsare guided by a set of unwritten rules that tell us to whom we should be attractedand how we can express this attraction. Thus, just as we have expectations aboutappropriate gender roles, we also have expectations about appropriate sexual roles.gender inequalityUnequal perceptions,treatment, and status ofgroups based on theirgender category.sexualityAn individual’s sexualpreferences andorientation.Chapter 6 Understanding Identity 117NELFor example, men are expected to be sexually aggressive, women passive. Men arealso granted a wider degree of latitude in terms of desire and number of partners.Whereas women, if they are proper, are expected to pursue love over physicalityand to avoid the appearance of promiscuity (Lenton, 2014, p. 79). Women whoassert themselves sexually are often derogatorily labelled “sluts” but no such labelexists for men. These socially acceptable sexual roles not only work to limit andpolice appropriate sexual behaviours, they also feed into assumptions that womenand men must be naturally attracted to the opposite sex. All too often, we assumethat sexuality is synonymous with heterosexuality. Thus, heterosexuality has tendedto be framed as normal and natural while homosexuality has been perceived as itsopposite: as deviant and unnatural. In fact, until 1974 in North America, homosexuality “was considered a serious psychological disorder” (Lenton, 2014, p. 79). Justas people who fail to perform the socially acceptable gender roles are censured, sotoo are individuals who fail to conform to the socially acceptable sexual roles. Gaysand lesbians are frequently the target of slurs, discrimination, and violence. Sexualand gender identities operate within systems of power that feed into the marginalization and stigmatization of certain groups. But it is important to recognize thatmany have challenged these rigid systems of categorization and conformity. Feminist groups and queer activists have drawn attention to the ways in which genderand sexual roles can be oppressive and in many cases have actively sought to subvert these roles. As we will see in the next section, the construction of identitiesunder relations of unequal power has always prompted struggle and contestation.racIaL and ethnIc IdentItIeSWhat is race? If we asked a group of people to define and list the various races, wewould get many different answers. And yet race is often taken for granted. It seemsobvious to us that there are different races and people can be divided into thembased on their physical characteristics. This is not so easily the case. While there aregenetic and biological differences between individuals and these differences tendto cluster around geographical locations, the concept of race is a social construct,something that anthropologists have called a set of “pseudological rationalizationsbased on a confusion of emotions, prejudiced judgements, and disordered values”(Montagu, 1965, p. 6). Rather than a legitimate biological category, race is a socialstatus that has a significant effect on how we see ourselves, how we see others, andhow we perceive others as seeing us. Race is a classification of humans “based onidentified or perceived characteristics such as colour of skin and informed by historical and geographical context” and while these classifications may be sociallyrather than biologically defined, it has still become an important “basis upon whichgroups are formed, agency is attained, social roles are assigned, and status is conferred” (James, 2010, pp. 50–51, 285). Race is an important aspect of our identities.raceThe “sociallyconstructedclassification of humanbeings based onidentified or perceivedcharacteristics suchas colour of skin andinformed by historicaland geographicalcontext; it is not abiological classification.It is often the basisupon which groupsare formed, agency isattained, social rolesare assigned and statusis conferred” (James,2010, p. 285).118 Chapter 6 Understanding IdentityNELEven to say we do not care about a person’s race demonstrates a recognition thatmany people do care. We must still negotiate these categories as part of our identities.Race represents one of the social statuses, or categories, that is socially constructed but that has a significant influence on our identities. Political and socialfactors, more than biology, provided the categories that were adopted for the designation of different races of people and this was done historically largely to facilitate the domination and subjugation of others. In this way, race is linked to theexercise of power. Because of this, many contemporary writers on race view racialcategories not as things but as sets of social relations. They write about race as aprocess (Gilroy, 1987; Omi & Winant, 1994) and ethnic identities as sets of relations (Comaroff, 1996). Race, as we think of it today, is a fairly recent concept. Raceand ethnicity have their origins in relations of inequality and power and their construction involves struggle and contestation; the making of concrete ethnic identities is found in the minutiae of everyday practice; ethnic identities are powerfuland influential to the extent that they often feel natural; and the conditions thatconstructed this identity are often not the same as those that sustain or continuallyrenew the identification. Racial and ethnic identities are “wrought in the particularities of their ongoing historical construction. The substance of race is essentiallyan act of consciousness which means that it can never be concretely defined ordecided” (Comaroff, 1996, p. 247).The doctrine of racism over alleged inborn differences only really developedduring the late 18th century. While Ancient Egyptians, Jews, Greeks, and Romansrecognized and placed a great deal of importance on differences, they did not havea method of distinction by race. In ancient Greece and Rome distinctions betweenthem and “the barbarians” were based primarily on cultural grounds. While therewas some evidence that certain scholars did suggest that there were inherentbehavioural differences between peoples, these ideas did not rise to any significantdegree of popularity (Montagu, 1965). The idea of race became more popular andinfluential mainly when it became useful for purposes of slavery and colonization(Banton, 1977).When scientists first started classifying humans into different races in the 18thcentury, they did so with the understanding that there were no clear lines betweenthe different racial categories and that these categorizations did not denote anydegree of superiority or inferiority. But this notion of biological difference becamevery useful as an explanation and justification for slavery and colonialism. The original racial classifications were arbitrary. There are no lines where one race wouldend and another would begin (Montagu, 1965, pp. 71, 91–92). This is one of thereasons why most people would have difficulty outlining all of the different racesand deciding who would belong to each. It “is impossible to discuss the issue of racewith any logic or consistency” (Hirschman, 2004, p. 386) unless we recognize it asChapter 6 Understanding Identity 119NELa historical and social construct. While ethnocentrism was a common feature inmost societies, racism and race are relatively modern developments.Before the 15th century there were few if any theories or ideas about race. Peopledisplayed ethnocentrism to the extent that they distinguished between differenttribes and cities and deemed themselves to be superior, but physical differencesbetween different peoples did not seem to be considered a matter of great importance: “There was some tendency to seize upon physical difference as a badge ofinnate mental or temperamental difference, but there was no universal hierarchyof races in the ancient world” (Graves, 2001, p. 15). In ancient Greece, for example,while non-Greeks were considered savage, adopting Greek culture was sufficient toshed barbarian status. There was little evidence for the idea that ancient Hebrews,Greeks, or Romans believed in the innate superiority of any race, and Roman andGreek slavery had no relationship to race (Graves, 2001, pp. 14–20). In fact, AncientGreek and Roman writings portrayed a particularly positive view of Africans: “arespect for their way of life and admiration for their military and political roles inthe Mediterranean world” (Hirschman, 2004, p. 390).Interestingly, views on civility and barbarity often corresponded to whom onewas in opposition to at the time. Julian the Apostate (Roman Emperor Constantine’s successor in 400 CE) described Africans as, “civilized, intelligent, and mildmannered, whereas he saw Aryans and Anglo-Saxons as warlike, barbaric andcruel” (Graves, 2001, p. 20). While humans have always worked on the idea of difference, examining classical writings on diversity indicates no overwhelming racistideology: “The raw materials were indeed present, but the evolution of the racismthat we know today would require social, cultural, and scientific developments originating in the Age of Discovery and its concomitant colonialism” (Graves, 2001,p. 22).Both the Old and New Testaments of the Bible describe interethnic interactionsthat indicated very different conceptions of race and difference. Primarily, ethnicidentity was not absolute. Individuals and groups often moved and changed identities by interacting with and joining other groups. Culture characteristics wereunderstood as external and acquired, and ethnic identity was fluid. Before the riseof capitalism and private property, kinship connections and occupation were theprimary indicators of a person’s identity. Moreover, tracing the history of interethnic interactions reveals that different peoples were not as isolated as commonlysupposed. Marriage between geographically separate groups was pursued for political and economic advantage. Alexander the Great, for instance, encouraged hissoldiers to intermarry and learn other cultures and languages. Studies have shownthe incredible malleability of ethnic identity in Africa. Although slavery was practised in antiquity and slaves were usually outsiders, it was usually not a permanentcondition because people were often set free, reclaimed by their kin, or able topurchase their freedom. The roles of slaves varied widely and many in the MediethnocentrismThe tendency to believeone’s own culture issuperior and evaluate allothers in comparison.120 Chapter 6 Understanding IdentityNEL* Audrey Smedley, “‘Race’ and the construction of human identity,” American Anthropologist, Issue 100 (3), Pg.690-702, 1998.terranean and Muslim world rose to positions of great political power (Smedley,1998).The rise of Christianity and Islam placed a new emphasis on religious communityas the source of identity. But Christians, Muslims, and Jews still lived together inrelative harmony with frequent intermarriage before the Crusades, Spanish Inquisition, and the rise of the Christian kingdoms. Writing of this history, one authorclaimed:What was absent from these different forms of human identity is what we todaywould perceive as classifications into ‘racial’ groups, that is, the organization ofall peoples into a limited number of unequal or ranked categories theoreticallybased on differences in their biophysical traits. There are no ‘racial’ designationsin the literature of the ancients and few references even to such human featuresas skin color. (Smedley, 1998, p. 693)*With the possible exception of indigenous Americans, all of the groups that cameto be characterized as separate races in the 19th and 20th centuries interacted inthe ancient world. Chinese vases were found to be widely distributed in East Africaand the people of the Malagasy Republic are descendents of the mixture of Africanand Asian ancestries. Also, Greek sailors met East Africans long before the Christian era. Ethiopians were often mercenary soldiers in Mediterranean armies andNorthern European slaves (Slavs) “were shipped as far away as Egypt, Syria, SaudiArabia, and the Muslim capital at Baghdad” (Smedley, 1998).Race as the social concept we recognize today did not begin to appear until wellinto the 18th century. In the 18th century, the English began having wider experiences with varied populations, and developed attitudes and beliefs that had notappeared before. These beliefs represented a new kind of understanding and interpretation of human differences. In a break from historical patterns of conquest,English settlers in North America did not assimilate the people, instead keepingthem distanced. But the concept of race as we understand it today was largely dueto attempts by the English to claim and control Irish populations and land. Mostof us today would not think of the Irish as a “race,” but the language of race asdesignating people into separate biological categories was first applied to groupslike the Irish, Southern Italians, and Jews in order to justify the cruel treatmentthey received. The English had had a long history of enmity with the Irish and, as aresult, generated an image of savagery that became a major part of the public consciousness. English descriptions of the Irish at the time referred to them as “humanchimpanzees” and “squalid apes” (Shanklin, 1994, pp. 3–5). The purpose of thesedescriptions was to “prove that Ireland was such a degenerate place that only English domination would enable the inhabitants to become part of the human race”(Shanklin, 1994, p. 5). The contempt for Irish culture and people peaked duringChapter 6 Understanding Identity 121NEL* Audrey Smedley, “‘Race’ and the construction of human identity,” American Anthropologist, Issue 100 (3), Pg.690-702, 1998.the 16th and 17th centuries, corresponding to the time when the English wereexpanding into the New World.The image of human differences based on savagery became so embedded in English thought that it served as the marker for the construction of English identity. Itwas an identity that was brought to the New World and imposed on the indigenouspopulation as soon as they began to resist domination. Eventually, this ideologybegan to take hold in most of Western Europe:English notions of their own superiority were enhanced by their technological,material, and political successes, by their earlier successful split from theCatholic realm, by the early rise of merchant capitalism, the development ofnew forms of wealth, notions about individual freedom, property rights, andself-sufficiency, and by a growing sense of their own uniqueness even amongother Europeans. (Smedley, 1998, p. 694)*In this context, “race” emerged as an important social classification to reflect anexpanded sense of difference and uniqueness.Political and social factors, more than biology, provided the categories that wereadopted for the domination and subjugation of non-Europeans. Different raceswere constructed to categorize the world’s people and, at the time, were based onnothing more than observation and speculation (Gould, 1997). Notions of difference combined with theories of superiority and inferiority justified colonial expansion and exploitation. The concept of race was used to control, marginalize, andoppress large segments of the population. In times and places like the pre-CivilRights era United States or Apartheid South Africa, racial and ethnic identificationsstructured almost all aspects of a person’s life. But we must note that activists, artists, intellectuals, and everyday people have always challenged these designationsand racist ideologies. Racial and ethnic identities that were originally imposed tolegitimate oppression and to mark inferiority have been reclaimed as sources ofpride, political struggle, and community. By rejecting the negative roles ascribedto race and finding inspiration in the histories of social and political struggle andresistance, many have embraced racial and ethnic categories as identities useful fororganizing struggles for social justice.cOncLuSIOnIdentities are fluid rather than static; they are shaped by the social, historical, andideological forces around us. However, as individuals, we also play an importantrole in the process of defining ourselves and in constructing and shaping our ownidentities. Think about the ways in which we might define ourselves on a social networking site like Facebook. The pictures we choose to post, or the status updates we122 Chapter 6 Understanding IdentityNELdecide to write, or the photographs we insist on untagging; these choices reflect thekind of image we want to present to our friends and our family, and perhaps evento the world. The point then is that we as individuals can act as agents in the process of defining and constructing ourselves, even as we are socialized into existingstructures and categories. One way in which we might define ourselves is as globalcitizens. That is, we might think of ourselves not strictly as citizens of a nation butrather as citizens of the world whose duties and responsibilities extend beyond theboundaries of the nation-state. The scholar Anthony Appiah said that the “worldwide web of information—radio, television, telephones, the Internet” means that“we can affect lives everywhere” and “[e]ach person you know about and can affectis someone to whom you have responsibilities.” In order to act as global citizens,therefore, we need to define ourselves and rethink our identities in new ways, waysthat Appiah says “will allow us to live together as the global tribe that we havebecome” (2007, p. xiii).RefeRencesAppiah, A. (2007). Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a world of strangers. New York: W. W. Norton &Company.Banton. M. (1977). The idea of race. London: Tavistock.Beilock, S. (2010). Choke: What the secrets of the brain reveal about getting it right when youhave to. New York: Free Press.Butler, J. (1993). Imitation and gender insubordination. In H. Abelove, M. A. Barale, & D. M.Haoperin (Eds.), Lesbian and gay studies reader (pp. 307–20). New York: Routledge.Butler, J. (2011). Your behavior creates your gender. Retrieved on December 31, 2013, fromhttp://youtu.be/Bo7o2LYATDccritical thinking questions1. Our identities are socially constructed. This means thatwe are not born with particular identities but rather thatwe acquire them through our interactions with society.How is this claim related to your own identity? Whatsocial structures and institutions (the school, the media,parents, and peer groups) have shaped your identityand how?2. How might you or your friends conform to or deviatefrom gendered expectations and assumptions?3. What are the expectations and assumptions attachedto your social status? Do these expectations shift whenyour social status changes?4. Consider an instance in which you or your friends havebeen victims of stereotyping. Did the stereotype affectyou? How did the stereotype imposed upon you conflictwith reality?5. How do you define yourself? Do you define yourself interms of race, class, gender, or sexuality? What aspectsof your identity do you emphasize? What aspects doyou conceal?Chapter 6 Understanding Identity 123NELComaroff, J. L. (1996). Ethnicity, nationalism and the politics of difference in an age ofrevolution. In E. N. Wilmsen & P. McAllister (Eds.), The politics of difference: Ethnicpremises in a world of power (pp. 162–84). Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Craib, I. (1992). Modern social theory (2nd ed.). New York: St. Martin’s Press.Crenshaw, K. (1989). Demarginalizing the intersection of race and sex: A Black feministcritique of antidiscrimination doctrine, feminist theory and antiracist politics. University ofChicago Legal Forum, 139–67.Fleras, A. & Elliot, J. E. (1996). Unequal Relations: An introduction to race, ethnic andAboriginal dynamics in Canada (2nd ed.). Scarborough: Prentice Hall Canada Inc.Gilroy, P. (1987). There ain’t no black in the Union Jack. London, Hutchinson.Goffman, E. (1959). The presentation of self in everyday life. New York: Doubleday.Gould, S. J. (1997). The geometer of race. In E. N. Gates (Ed.), The concept of “race” in naturaland social science (pp. 1–6). New York: Garland Publishing, Inc.Graves, J. L., Jr. (2001). The Emperor’s new clothes: Biological theories of race at the millennium.New Brunswick, NJ: Rutger’s University Press.Hall, S. (1990). Cultural identity and diaspora. In J. Rutherford (Ed.), Identity: Community,culture and difference (pp. 392–403). London: Lawrence and Wishart.Hirschman, C. (2004). The origins and demise of the concept of race. Population andDevelopment Review, 30(3), 385–417.James, C. E. (2010). Seeing ourselves: Exploring race, ethnicity and culture (4th ed.). Toronto:Thomson Educational Publishing.Krahn, H., Lowe, G., & Hughes, K. (2014). Work, industry, and Canadian society (7th ed.).Toronto: Nelson Education Limited.Lenton, R. L. (2014). Gender and sexuality. In R. J. Brym (Ed.), New society (7th ed., pp. 74–99). Toronto: Nelson Education.O’Brien, S., & Szeman, I. (2004). Popular culture: A user’s guide. Toronto: Nelson.Omi, M., & Winant, H. (1994). Racial formation in the United States: From the 1960s to the1990s (2nd ed.). New York: Routledge.Montagu, A. (1965). The idea of race. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.Murray, J. L., Linden, R., & Kendall, D. (2014). Sociology in our times (6th ed.). Toronto: NelsonEducation.Shaffir, W., & Pawluch, D. (2014). Socialization. In R. J. Brym (Ed.), New society (7th ed., pp.50–72). Toronto: Nelson Education.Shanklin, E. (1994). Anthropology and race. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing Company.Smedley, A. (1998). “Race” and the construction of human identity. American Anthropologist,100(3), 690–702.Winant, H. (2004). The new politics of race: Globalism, difference, justice. Minneapolis:University of Minnesota Press.
