{"id":190,"date":"2016-04-30T04:26:10","date_gmt":"2016-04-30T04:26:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/introductiontosociology-waymaker\/?post_type=chapter&#038;p=190"},"modified":"2024-04-25T15:28:44","modified_gmt":"2024-04-25T15:28:44","slug":"racial-ethnic-and-minority-groups","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-introductiontosociology\/chapter\/racial-ethnic-and-minority-groups\/","title":{"raw":"Racial, Ethnic, and Minority Groups","rendered":"Racial, Ethnic, and Minority Groups"},"content":{"raw":"<div class=\"textbox learning-objectives\">\r\n<h3>Learning Outcomes<\/h3>\r\n<ul>\r\n \t<li>Explain the difference between race and ethnicity<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Describe minority groups and scapegoat theory<\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\n<\/div>\r\nWhile many students first entering a sociology classroom are accustomed to conflating,\u00a0or using interchangeably, the terms \u201crace,\u201d \u201cethnicity,\u201d and \u201cminority group,\u201d these three terms have distinct meanings for sociologists.\u00a0If you recall some terms discussed in the module on social interaction, race is one example of a\u00a0<strong>social construct. <\/strong>According to the\u00a0Thomas Theorem, once individuals define situations as real, they become real in their consequences. For this reason, assumptions based on race can have materially and politically real effects. In this section, we will discuss these complex terms as both social constructs and as lived realities.\r\n\r\nFollowing the shooting of Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1968,\u00a0elementary school teacher <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Jane_Elliott\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Jane Elliot<\/a> sought to teach her white elementary students in rural Iowa about racism. She convinced\u00a0her third grade students that students with brown eyes\u00a0were superior to\u00a0blue eyed students\u00a0with\u00a0a (false) scientific explanation saying that more melanin meant greater intelligence. The students quickly exhibited discriminatory behaviors against their peers, and antagonisms between groups were further exacerbated by Elliot's new classroom policies for dominant and subordinate groups based on eye color.\r\n\r\nOften referred to as the \"Blue Eyes, Brown Eyes\" exercise,\u00a0Jane Elliott's\u00a0experiment allows us to see how once students in her classroom began to define the situation as real, the consequences of being brown eyed and blue eyed became real. She received national attention and was heavily criticized, especially by people in Riceville, Iowa (population 840), with many saying the experiment was cruel to her all-white class. Elliot replied,\u00a0\u201cWhy are we so worried about the fragile egos of white children who experience a couple of hours of made-up racism one day when Blacks experience real racism every day of their lives?\u201d[footnote]Bloom, S. 2015. \"Lesson of a Lifetime.\" Smithsonian Magazine. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.smithsonianmag.com\/science-nature\/lesson-of-a-lifetime-72754306\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">https:\/\/www.smithsonianmag.com\/science-nature\/lesson-of-a-lifetime-72754306\/<\/a>. [\/footnote]\r\n<h2>What is Race?<\/h2>\r\n<section id=\"fs-id1382386\"><span style=\"color: #333333;\">Biological anthropologists\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><span style=\"color: #333333;\">examine race through an evolutionary lens in which all Anatomically Modern Humans (AMHs) came from a common origin in Africa and had dark skin due to proximity to the equator and as a natural defense against the sun's rays. The relative darkness or fairness of skin is an evolutionary adaptation to the available sunlight in different regions of the world, and all scientists agree that there is no biological basis for racial differences.<\/span><\/span>\r\n<p id=\"import-auto-id1161344\">Social science organizations including the American Association of Anthropologists, the American Sociological Association, and the American Psychological Association have all taken an official position rejecting the biological explanations of race. Over time, the typology of race that developed\u00a0based on phenotype or physical characteristics\u00a0has fallen into disuse in social and behavioral sciences (although examining melanin is still important in natural sciences), and the <strong><span id=\"import-auto-id3081454\">social construction of race<\/span><\/strong> has become the primary lens through which sociologists examine race.\u00a0<strong>Race\u00a0<\/strong>is a socially constructed category that produces real effects on the actors who are racialized [footnote]Bonilla-Silva, E. 2003. Racism without Racists. Lanham: Rownman &amp; Littlefield Publishers, Inc.[\/footnote]\u00a0and\u00a0refers to\u00a0physical differences that a particular society considers significant,\u00a0such as skin color.\u00a0In other words, a physical marker such as skin color, eye shape,\u00a0hair type, or cheekbone shape, when paired with some other element(s) of social significance, could become a social cue for inclusion\u00a0or exclusion in a certain group.<\/p>\r\nUsing the sociological imagination, we can delve into how racial categories were arbitrarily assigned, based on pseudoscience, and subsequently used to justify racist practices (Omi and Winant 1994; Graves 2003). Elliot's classroom exercise is not too far from what happened in American history. Science and religion were both used to create and justify racial categories and racist ideologies. The \"One Drop Rule,\" which states that someone is Black if they have \"one drop\" of African blood is uniquely American (no other country defines race in this way) and a way to illustrate the social construction of race. For example, many people who appeared white and could \"pass\" as such in a social setting, could not pass in a legal sense because of the rule of hypodescent, which meant that racially mixed people were automatically assigned the minority group status. There were strict prohibitions against miscegenation (or mixed offspring) in spite of centuries of white men raping enslaved Black women. During slavery, this allowed intergenerational slavery to persist irrespective of skin color, and after slavery was abolished, segregationist Jim Crow laws were applied to many mixed-race Americans.\r\n\r\n<\/section><section id=\"fs-id1382386\">\r\n<div class=\"textbox key-takeaways\">\r\n<h3>Further Research<\/h3>\r\nExplore aspects of race and ethnicity at this <a href=\"http:\/\/www.pbs.org\/race\/001_WhatIsRace\/001_00-home.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">PBS site, \u201cWhat Is Race?\u201d<\/a> and the following sections from the site:\r\n<ul>\r\n \t<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/race\/000_About\/002_04-background.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Background readings<\/a><\/li>\r\n \t<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/race\/000_About\/002_03-godeeper.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Go deeper: race timeline<\/a><\/li>\r\n \t<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/race\/000_About\/002_05-godeeper.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Go deeper: me, my race, and I<\/a><\/li>\r\n \t<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/race\/000_About\/002_06-godeeper.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Go deeper: where my race lives<\/a><\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\nPlease note that the activities on the site may not be active anymore due to the flash plugin requirement, but the information is still relevant.\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/section><span style=\"font-size: 1rem; text-align: initial;\">Historically, the concept of race has changed across cultures and eras, and has eventually become less connected with ancestral and familial ties, and more concerned with superficial physical characteristics. In the past, theorists developed categories of race based on various geographic regions, ethnicities, skin colors, and more. Their labels for racial groups have connoted regions or skin tones, for example.<\/span>\r\n\r\n<section id=\"fs-id1382386\">\r\n<p id=\"fs-idm883787328\" class=\" \">German physician, zoologist, and anthropologist Johann Friedrich Blumenbach (1752-1840) introduced one of the famous groupings by studying human skulls. Blumenbach divided humans into five races (MacCord 2014):<\/p>\r\n\r\n<ul id=\"import-auto-id129169600\">\r\n \t<li>Caucasian or White race: people of European, Middle Eastern, and North African origin<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Ethiopian or Black race: people of sub-Saharan Africans origin (sometimes spelled Aethiopian)<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Malayan or Brown race: people of Southeast Asian origin and Pacific Islanders<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Mongolian or Yellow race: people of all East Asian and some Central Asian origin<\/li>\r\n \t<li>American or Red race: people of North American origin or American Indians<\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\n<p id=\"import-auto-id1161344\" class=\" \">Over time, descriptions of race like Blumenbach's have fallen into disuse, and the\u00a0<span id=\"term284\" data-type=\"term\">social construction of race<\/span>\u00a0is a more accepted way of understanding racial categories. Social science organizations including the American Association of Anthropologists, the American Sociological Association, and the American Psychological Association have all officially rejected explanations of race like those listed above. Research in this school of thought suggests that race is not biologically identifiable and that previous racial categories were based on pseudoscience; they were often used to justify racist practices (Omi and Winant 1994; Graves 2003). For example, some people used to think that genetics of race determined intelligence. While this idea was mostly put to rest in the later 20th Century, it resurged several times in the past 50 years, including the widely read and cited 1994 book,\u00a0<em data-effect=\"italics\">The Bell Curve<\/em>. Researchers have since provided substantial evidence that refutes a biological-racial basis for intelligence, including the widespread closing of IQ gaps as Black people gained more access to education (Dickens 2006). This research and other confirming studies indicate that any generally lower IQ among a racial group was more about\u00a0<em data-effect=\"italics\">nurture<\/em>\u00a0than\u00a0<em data-effect=\"italics\">nature<\/em>, to put it into the terms of the Socialization chapter.<\/p>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idm613486816\" class=\" \">While many of the historical considerations of race have been corrected in favor of more accurate and sensitive descriptions, some of the older terms remain. For example, it is generally unacceptable and insulting to refer to Asian people or Native American people with color-based terminology, but it is acceptable to refer to White and Black people in that way. In 2020, a number of publications announced that they would begin capitalizing the names of races, though not everyone used the same approach (Seipel 2020). This practice comes nearly a hundred years after sociologist and leader W.E.B. Du Bois drove newsrooms to capitalize \"Negro,\" the widely used term at the time. And, finally, some members of racial groups (or ethnic groups, which are described below) \"reclaim\" terms previously used to insult them (Rao 2018). These examples are more evidence of the social construction of race, and our evolving relationships among people and groups.<\/p>\r\n<p id=\"import-auto-id3623356\">The social construction of race is further reflected in the way names for racial categories change over time. It\u2019s worth noting that race, in this sense, is also a system of labeling that provides a source of identity; specific labels fall in and out of favor during different social eras. For example, the category \"negroid,\u201d popular in the nineteenth century, evolved into the term \u201cnegro\u201d by the 1960s, and then this term fell from use and was replaced with \u201cAfrican American.\u201d This latter term was intended to celebrate the multiple identities that a Black person might hold, but the word choice is a poor one, as it lumps together a large variety of ethnic groups regardless of geographical origin.<\/p>\r\n<span style=\"color: #333333;\">For example, Jamaicans, Haitians, and other dark-skinned Caribbean groups living in the U.S. are Black but they are not African American. Calling any person with dark skin African American highlights the importance of language while at the same time illustrating the challenges of racial categorization. We do not refer to Lupita Nyong'o (Nakia in\u00a0<em>Black Panther\u00a0<\/em>2018), who has Kenyan parents but was born in Mexico City and has dual citizenship in Kenya and Mexico, as African American. The U.S. Census includes \"Black\" or \"African American\" as a racial category to include \"any person having origins in any of the Black racial groups of Africa.\"[footnote]\"Race,\" U.S. Census. last updated Jan. 23, 2018. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.census.gov\/topics\/population\/race\/about.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">https:\/\/www.census.gov\/topics\/population\/race\/about.html<\/a>.[\/footnote].\u00a0<\/span>\r\n\r\n<span style=\"color: #333333;\">If race is a social construction, doesn't collecting information on artificial racial categories through the U.S. Census perpetuate the notion of biologically distinct racial categories? Why do we continue to categorize Americans based on race? Collecting information on race informs policy decisions related to civil rights, including voting and redistricting procedures at the state level; furthermore, \"race data also are used to promote equal employment opportunities and to assess racial disparities in health and environmental risks\" (U.S. Census 2018).\u00a0<\/span>\r\n\r\n<\/section><section id=\"fs-id1382386\">\r\n<h2>What is Ethnicity?<\/h2>\r\n<\/section><section>\r\n<p id=\"import-auto-id2364915\" class=\" \">Ethnicity is sometimes used interchangeably with race, but they are very different concepts.\u00a0<strong><span id=\"term285\" data-type=\"term\">Ethnicity<\/span><\/strong>\u00a0is based on shared culture\u2014the practices, norms, values, and beliefs of a group that might include shared language, religion, and traditions, among other commonalities. Like race, the term ethnicity is difficult to describe and its meaning has changed over time. Ethnicity continues to be an identification method that individuals and institutions use today\u2014whether through the census, diversity initiatives, nondiscrimination laws, or simply in personal day-to-day relations.<\/p>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idm384266896\" class=\" \">In some cases, ethnicity is incorrectly used as a synonym for national origin, but those constructions are technically different. National origin (itself sometimes confused with nationality) has to do with the geographic and political associations with a person's birthplace or residence. But people from a nation can be of a wide range of ethnicities, often unknown to people outside of the region, which leads to misconceptions. For example, someone in the United States may, with no ill-intent, refer to all Vietnamese people as an ethnic group. But Vietnam is home to 54 formally recognized ethnic groups.<\/p>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idm339222160\" class=\" \">Adding to the complexity: Sometimes, either to build bridges between ethnic groups, promote civil rights, gain recognition, or other reasons, diverse but closely associated ethnic groups may develop a \"pan-ethnic\" group. For example, the various ethnic groups and national origins of people from Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, and adjoining nations, who may share cultural, linguistic, or other values, may group themselves together in a collective identity. If they do so, they may not seek to erase their individual ethnicities, but finding the correct description and association can be challenging and depend on context. The large number of people who make up the Asian American community may embrace their collective identity in the context of the United States. However, that embrace may depend on people's ages, and may be expressed differently when speaking to different populations (Park 2008). For example, someone who identifies as Asian American while at home in Houston may not refer to themselves as such when they visit extended family in Japan. In a similar manner, a grouping of people from Mexico, Central America and South America\u2014often referred to as Latinx, Latina, or Latino\u2014may be embraced by some and rejected by others in the group (Martinez 2019).<\/p>\r\nIndividuals may be identified or self-identify with ethnicities in complex, even contradictory, ways. For example, ethnic groups such as Irish, Italian American, Russian, Jewish, and Serbian might all be groups whose members are predominantly included in the \u201cwhite\u201d racial category.\u00a0Depending on when they immigrated to the United States, many of these ethnic whites were treated as minority groups and were not afforded the same status as the White Anglo Saxon Protestants (WASPs), who were typically the privileged whites throughout American history. For example, Irish immigrants were \"white\" in appearance and spoke English, but they were also predominantly Catholic, and this made them suspect in terms of their prospective allegiance to the Pope in preference to the United States government. Italian immigrants were often olive-skinned, Catholic, and did not speak English, all of which made them seem even more foreign and, perhaps, unassimilable.\r\n\r\nIf we consider the British or the French as ethnicities with a common culture and geographic boundary, we see many ethnic groups within each country. Both countries have struggled with national identity as globalization and immigration, often originating in formerly colonized nations, change their demographics. For example, France won the 2018 World Cup with the help of star player Kylian Mbappe, a teenager born in Paris, whose father is from Cameroon and whose mother is Algerian.\r\n<div class=\"textbox exercises\">\r\n<h3>Ethnicities and the Census<\/h3>\r\nRead more about Latino opinions about the census data and identity in the article\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/hispanic\/2012\/04\/04\/when-labels-dont-fit-hispanics-and-their-views-of-identity\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\"When Labels Don't Fit: Hispanics and Their Views of Identity\"<\/a> from the Pew Research Center.\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/section><section>Ethnicity, like<span style=\"color: #333333;\"> race, continues to be an identification method that individuals and institutions use today\u2014whether through the U.S. Census, affirmative action initiatives, nondiscrimination laws, or simply in personal day-to-day relations.\u00a0We celebrate ethnicity in the United States through a variety of holidays (i.e., St. Patrick's Day), enjoying different types of cuisine, and through popular cultural forms such as film, television, and music.\u00a0<\/span>\r\n<div class=\"textbox examples\">\r\n<h3>Watch It<\/h3>\r\nReview the ideas presented in this section about race and ethnicity in the following Khan Academy video.\r\n\r\n<iframe src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube-nocookie.com\/embed\/4WIiConeatM?rel=0&amp;showinfo=0\" width=\"800\" height=\"470\" frameborder=\"0\"><span style=\"width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;\" class=\"mce_SELRES_start\">\ufeff<\/span><\/iframe>\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/section><section id=\"fs-id1306134\">\r\n<div class=\"textbox tryit\">\r\n<h3>Try It<\/h3>\r\nhttps:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/8802f1b3-b40d-443c-86ec-164b718a4d3b\r\n\r\nhttps:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/28dd30af-36f9-4144-9942-2e83be8eda03\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n<h2>What are Minority Groups?<\/h2>\r\n<p id=\"import-auto-id2095138\">Sociologist Louis Wirth (1945) defined a <strong><span id=\"import-auto-id2653190\">minority group<\/span><\/strong> as \u201cany group of people who, because of their physical or cultural characteristics, are singled out from the others in the society in which they live for differential and unequal treatment, and who therefore regard themselves as objects of collective discrimination.\u201d According to Charles Wagley and Marvin Harris (1958), a minority group is distinguished by five characteristics:<\/p>\r\n\r\n<ol>\r\n \t<li>unequal treatment and less power over their lives<\/li>\r\n \t<li>distinguishing physical or cultural traits like skin color or language<\/li>\r\n \t<li>involuntary membership in the group<\/li>\r\n \t<li>awareness of subordination<\/li>\r\n \t<li>high rate of in-group marriage<\/li>\r\n<\/ol>\r\nAdditional examples of minority groups might include the LGBTQ community, religious practitioners whose faith is not widely practiced where they live, and people with disabilities.\r\n\r\n<strong>Subordinate group<\/strong> can be used interchangeably with the term minority, while the term <strong><span id=\"import-auto-id1555353\">dominant group<\/span><\/strong> is often substituted for the group that\u2019s in the majority. These definitions correlate to the concept that the dominant group is that which holds the most power in a given society, while subordinate groups are those who lack power by comparison.\r\n\r\nWhen we hear the word \"minority\" we often think of a group with a smaller number of members than the dominant group, but in some cases the \"minority\" is not a numerical minority. Women have been treated as a minority group\u00a0even though they outnumber men in the U.S. What differentiates a minority group is that its members are disadvantaged in some way by the dominant group, such as when women are paid less than men for the same job even though they may have similar qualifications and levels of experience as their male co-workers. Consider apartheid in South Africa, in which a numerical majority (the Black inhabitants of the country) were exploited and oppressed by the politically dominant white minority.\r\n\r\nIn the contemporary United States, the elderly might be considered a minority group due to a diminished status that results from popular prejudice and discrimination against them. Ten percent of nursing home staff admitted to physically abusing an elderly person in the past year, and 40 percent admitted to committing psychological abuse (World Health Organization 2011).\r\n<p id=\"import-auto-id1306663\"><strong><span id=\"import-auto-id2105932\">Scapegoat theory<\/span><\/strong>, developed initially from\u00a0psychologist John Dollard\u2019s (1939) Frustration-Aggression theory, suggests that the dominant group will displace its unfocused aggression onto a subordinate group. History has shown us many examples of the scapegoating of a subordinate group. An example from the last century is the way Adolf Hitler was able to blame the Jewish population for Germany\u2019s social and economic problems. In the United States, recent immigrants have frequently been the scapegoat for the nation\u2019s\u2014or an individual\u2019s\u2014woes. Many states have enacted laws to disenfranchise immigrants; these laws are popular because they let the dominant group scapegoat a subordinate group.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<h2>Multiple Identities<\/h2>\r\n[caption id=\"attachment_8820\" align=\"alignright\" width=\"200\"]<img class=\"size-medium wp-image-8820\" src=\"https:\/\/s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/courses-images\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2034\/2016\/04\/14155201\/Tiger_Woods-200x300.jpg\" alt=\"A photo of golfer Tiger Woods holding his golf club up in the air on the golf course after hitting a golf ball\" width=\"200\" height=\"300\" \/> Figure 1. Golfer Tiger Woods has Chinese, Thai, African American, Native American, and Dutch heritage. Individuals with multiple ethnic backgrounds are becoming more common. (Credit: familymwr\/flickr)[\/caption]\r\n\r\nPrior to the twentieth century, racial intermarriage (referred to as miscegenation) was extremely rare, and in many places, illegal. In the later part of the twentieth century and in the twenty-first century,\u00a0attitudes have changed for the better. While the sexual subordination of slaves did result in children of mixed race, these children were usually considered Black, and therefore, property. There was no concept of multiple racial identities, with the possible exception of the Creole. Creole society developed in the port city of New Orleans, where a mixed-race culture grew from French and African inhabitants. Unlike in other parts of the country, \u201cCreoles of color\u201d had greater social, economic, and educational opportunities than most African Americans.\r\n\r\nIncreasingly during the modern era, the removal of miscegenation laws and a trend toward equal rights and legal protection against racism have steadily reduced the social stigma attached to racial exogamy (exogamy refers to marriage outside a person\u2019s core social unit). It is now common for the children of racially mixed parents to acknowledge and celebrate their various ethnic identities. Golfer Tiger Woods, for instance, has Chinese, Thai, African American, Native American, and Dutch heritage; he jokingly refers to his ethnicity as \u201cCablinasian,\u201d a term he coined to combine several of his ethnic backgrounds. While this is the trend, it is not yet evident in all aspects of our society. For example, the U.S. Census only recently added more nuanced additional categories such as non-white Hispanic. A growing number of people chose multiple races to describe themselves on the 2020 Census, indicating that individuals have multiple identities.\r\n<div class=\"textbox exercises\">\r\n<h3>Exercises<\/h3>\r\nTake a look at the interactive\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/interactive\/2021\/us\/census-race-ethnicity-map\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">dot map<\/a>\u00a0created by CNN based on the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.census.gov\/newsroom\/press-releases\/2021\/population-changes-nations-diversity.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">2020 Census Statistics that highlights population changes and racial and ethnic diversity<\/a>. When interacting with the map, you can move around the area and zoom in or zoom out.\u00a0Each dot represents 150, 300 or 900 people in each race or ethnicity group, depending on the zoom level.\r\n\r\nThe Esri Demographics team also created a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.arcgis.com\/home\/item.html?id=30d2e10d4d694b3eb4dc4d2e58dbb5a5\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">dot map<\/a> displaying the population of race or ethnicity in an area, based on the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.census.gov\/programs-surveys\/decennial-census\/about\/rdo\/summary-files.html#P1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">U.S. Census Bureau's 2020 P.L. 94-171<\/a> data.\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/section><section id=\"fs-id1169033105847\" class=\"short-answer\">\r\n<div class=\"textbox learning-objectives\">\r\n<h3>Think It Over<\/h3>\r\n<div class=\"exercise\">\r\n<div id=\"fs-id800121\" class=\"problem\">\r\n<ul>\r\n \t<li id=\"import-auto-id1506356\">Why do you think the term \u201cminority\u201d has persisted when the word \u201csubordinate\u201d is more descriptive?<\/li>\r\n \t<li>How do you describe your ethnicity? Do you include your family\u2019s country of origin? Do you consider yourself multiethnic? How does your ethnicity compare to that of the people you spend most of your time with?<\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<div class=\"textbox tryit\">\r\n<h3>Try It<\/h3>\r\nhttps:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/e7fbb979-54e3-4761-9f7f-becef6a63217\r\n\r\nhttps:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/9a64398d-a23f-495d-8c65-9940c27681e3\r\n\r\nhttps:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/e99d464c-8bca-4d91-ae11-d44a0b787659\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n<div class=\"textbox key-takeaways\">\r\n<h3>glossary<\/h3>\r\n<dl id=\"import-auto-id2633294\" class=\"definition\">\r\n \t<dt>dominant group:<\/dt>\r\n \t<dd>a group of people who have more power in a society than any of the subordinate groups<\/dd>\r\n<\/dl>\r\n<dl id=\"import-auto-id1752232\" class=\"definition\">\r\n \t<dt>ethnicity:<\/dt>\r\n \t<dd id=\"fs-id2669468\">shared culture, which may include heritage, language, religion, and more<\/dd>\r\n<\/dl>\r\n<dl id=\"import-auto-id853059\" class=\"definition\">\r\n \t<dt>minority group:<\/dt>\r\n \t<dd>any group of people who are singled out from the others for differential and unequal treatment<\/dd>\r\n<\/dl>\r\n<dl>\r\n \t<dt>race:<\/dt>\r\n \t<dd>a socially constructed category that produces real effects on the actors who are racially categorized<\/dd>\r\n<\/dl>\r\n<dl>\r\n \t<dt>scapegoat theory:<\/dt>\r\n \t<dd>a theory that suggests that the dominant group will displace its unfocused aggression onto a subordinate group<\/dd>\r\n<\/dl>\r\n<dl id=\"import-auto-id1357883\" class=\"definition\">\r\n \t<dt>social construction of race:<\/dt>\r\n \t<dd id=\"fs-id2287273\">the school of thought that race is not biologically identifiable<\/dd>\r\n<\/dl>\r\n<dl id=\"import-auto-id3057151\" class=\"definition\">\r\n \t<dt>subordinate group:<\/dt>\r\n \t<dd id=\"fs-id2638860\">a group of people who have less power than the dominant group<\/dd>\r\n<\/dl>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/section>","rendered":"<div class=\"textbox learning-objectives\">\n<h3>Learning Outcomes<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>Explain the difference between race and ethnicity<\/li>\n<li>Describe minority groups and scapegoat theory<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<p>While many students first entering a sociology classroom are accustomed to conflating,\u00a0or using interchangeably, the terms \u201crace,\u201d \u201cethnicity,\u201d and \u201cminority group,\u201d these three terms have distinct meanings for sociologists.\u00a0If you recall some terms discussed in the module on social interaction, race is one example of a\u00a0<strong>social construct. <\/strong>According to the\u00a0Thomas Theorem, once individuals define situations as real, they become real in their consequences. For this reason, assumptions based on race can have materially and politically real effects. In this section, we will discuss these complex terms as both social constructs and as lived realities.<\/p>\n<p>Following the shooting of Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1968,\u00a0elementary school teacher <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Jane_Elliott\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Jane Elliot<\/a> sought to teach her white elementary students in rural Iowa about racism. She convinced\u00a0her third grade students that students with brown eyes\u00a0were superior to\u00a0blue eyed students\u00a0with\u00a0a (false) scientific explanation saying that more melanin meant greater intelligence. The students quickly exhibited discriminatory behaviors against their peers, and antagonisms between groups were further exacerbated by Elliot&#8217;s new classroom policies for dominant and subordinate groups based on eye color.<\/p>\n<p>Often referred to as the &#8220;Blue Eyes, Brown Eyes&#8221; exercise,\u00a0Jane Elliott&#8217;s\u00a0experiment allows us to see how once students in her classroom began to define the situation as real, the consequences of being brown eyed and blue eyed became real. She received national attention and was heavily criticized, especially by people in Riceville, Iowa (population 840), with many saying the experiment was cruel to her all-white class. Elliot replied,\u00a0\u201cWhy are we so worried about the fragile egos of white children who experience a couple of hours of made-up racism one day when Blacks experience real racism every day of their lives?\u201d<a class=\"footnote\" title=\"Bloom, S. 2015. &quot;Lesson of a Lifetime.&quot; Smithsonian Magazine. https:\/\/www.smithsonianmag.com\/science-nature\/lesson-of-a-lifetime-72754306\/.\" id=\"return-footnote-190-1\" href=\"#footnote-190-1\" aria-label=\"Footnote 1\"><sup class=\"footnote\">[1]<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n<h2>What is Race?<\/h2>\n<section id=\"fs-id1382386\"><span style=\"color: #333333;\">Biological anthropologists\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><span style=\"color: #333333;\">examine race through an evolutionary lens in which all Anatomically Modern Humans (AMHs) came from a common origin in Africa and had dark skin due to proximity to the equator and as a natural defense against the sun&#8217;s rays. The relative darkness or fairness of skin is an evolutionary adaptation to the available sunlight in different regions of the world, and all scientists agree that there is no biological basis for racial differences.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p id=\"import-auto-id1161344\">Social science organizations including the American Association of Anthropologists, the American Sociological Association, and the American Psychological Association have all taken an official position rejecting the biological explanations of race. Over time, the typology of race that developed\u00a0based on phenotype or physical characteristics\u00a0has fallen into disuse in social and behavioral sciences (although examining melanin is still important in natural sciences), and the <strong><span id=\"import-auto-id3081454\">social construction of race<\/span><\/strong> has become the primary lens through which sociologists examine race.\u00a0<strong>Race\u00a0<\/strong>is a socially constructed category that produces real effects on the actors who are racialized <a class=\"footnote\" title=\"Bonilla-Silva, E. 2003. Racism without Racists. Lanham: Rownman &amp; Littlefield Publishers, Inc.\" id=\"return-footnote-190-2\" href=\"#footnote-190-2\" aria-label=\"Footnote 2\"><sup class=\"footnote\">[2]<\/sup><\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0refers to\u00a0physical differences that a particular society considers significant,\u00a0such as skin color.\u00a0In other words, a physical marker such as skin color, eye shape,\u00a0hair type, or cheekbone shape, when paired with some other element(s) of social significance, could become a social cue for inclusion\u00a0or exclusion in a certain group.<\/p>\n<p>Using the sociological imagination, we can delve into how racial categories were arbitrarily assigned, based on pseudoscience, and subsequently used to justify racist practices (Omi and Winant 1994; Graves 2003). Elliot&#8217;s classroom exercise is not too far from what happened in American history. Science and religion were both used to create and justify racial categories and racist ideologies. The &#8220;One Drop Rule,&#8221; which states that someone is Black if they have &#8220;one drop&#8221; of African blood is uniquely American (no other country defines race in this way) and a way to illustrate the social construction of race. For example, many people who appeared white and could &#8220;pass&#8221; as such in a social setting, could not pass in a legal sense because of the rule of hypodescent, which meant that racially mixed people were automatically assigned the minority group status. There were strict prohibitions against miscegenation (or mixed offspring) in spite of centuries of white men raping enslaved Black women. During slavery, this allowed intergenerational slavery to persist irrespective of skin color, and after slavery was abolished, segregationist Jim Crow laws were applied to many mixed-race Americans.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"fs-id1382386\">\n<div class=\"textbox key-takeaways\">\n<h3>Further Research<\/h3>\n<p>Explore aspects of race and ethnicity at this <a href=\"http:\/\/www.pbs.org\/race\/001_WhatIsRace\/001_00-home.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">PBS site, \u201cWhat Is Race?\u201d<\/a> and the following sections from the site:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/race\/000_About\/002_04-background.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Background readings<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/race\/000_About\/002_03-godeeper.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Go deeper: race timeline<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/race\/000_About\/002_05-godeeper.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Go deeper: me, my race, and I<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/race\/000_About\/002_06-godeeper.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Go deeper: where my race lives<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Please note that the activities on the site may not be active anymore due to the flash plugin requirement, but the information is still relevant.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 1rem; text-align: initial;\">Historically, the concept of race has changed across cultures and eras, and has eventually become less connected with ancestral and familial ties, and more concerned with superficial physical characteristics. In the past, theorists developed categories of race based on various geographic regions, ethnicities, skin colors, and more. Their labels for racial groups have connoted regions or skin tones, for example.<\/span><\/p>\n<section id=\"fs-id1382386\">\n<p id=\"fs-idm883787328\" class=\"\">German physician, zoologist, and anthropologist Johann Friedrich Blumenbach (1752-1840) introduced one of the famous groupings by studying human skulls. Blumenbach divided humans into five races (MacCord 2014):<\/p>\n<ul id=\"import-auto-id129169600\">\n<li>Caucasian or White race: people of European, Middle Eastern, and North African origin<\/li>\n<li>Ethiopian or Black race: people of sub-Saharan Africans origin (sometimes spelled Aethiopian)<\/li>\n<li>Malayan or Brown race: people of Southeast Asian origin and Pacific Islanders<\/li>\n<li>Mongolian or Yellow race: people of all East Asian and some Central Asian origin<\/li>\n<li>American or Red race: people of North American origin or American Indians<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p id=\"import-auto-id1161344\" class=\"\">Over time, descriptions of race like Blumenbach&#8217;s have fallen into disuse, and the\u00a0<span id=\"term284\" data-type=\"term\">social construction of race<\/span>\u00a0is a more accepted way of understanding racial categories. Social science organizations including the American Association of Anthropologists, the American Sociological Association, and the American Psychological Association have all officially rejected explanations of race like those listed above. Research in this school of thought suggests that race is not biologically identifiable and that previous racial categories were based on pseudoscience; they were often used to justify racist practices (Omi and Winant 1994; Graves 2003). For example, some people used to think that genetics of race determined intelligence. While this idea was mostly put to rest in the later 20th Century, it resurged several times in the past 50 years, including the widely read and cited 1994 book,\u00a0<em data-effect=\"italics\">The Bell Curve<\/em>. Researchers have since provided substantial evidence that refutes a biological-racial basis for intelligence, including the widespread closing of IQ gaps as Black people gained more access to education (Dickens 2006). This research and other confirming studies indicate that any generally lower IQ among a racial group was more about\u00a0<em data-effect=\"italics\">nurture<\/em>\u00a0than\u00a0<em data-effect=\"italics\">nature<\/em>, to put it into the terms of the Socialization chapter.<\/p>\n<p id=\"fs-idm613486816\" class=\"\">While many of the historical considerations of race have been corrected in favor of more accurate and sensitive descriptions, some of the older terms remain. For example, it is generally unacceptable and insulting to refer to Asian people or Native American people with color-based terminology, but it is acceptable to refer to White and Black people in that way. In 2020, a number of publications announced that they would begin capitalizing the names of races, though not everyone used the same approach (Seipel 2020). This practice comes nearly a hundred years after sociologist and leader W.E.B. Du Bois drove newsrooms to capitalize &#8220;Negro,&#8221; the widely used term at the time. And, finally, some members of racial groups (or ethnic groups, which are described below) &#8220;reclaim&#8221; terms previously used to insult them (Rao 2018). These examples are more evidence of the social construction of race, and our evolving relationships among people and groups.<\/p>\n<p id=\"import-auto-id3623356\">The social construction of race is further reflected in the way names for racial categories change over time. It\u2019s worth noting that race, in this sense, is also a system of labeling that provides a source of identity; specific labels fall in and out of favor during different social eras. For example, the category &#8220;negroid,\u201d popular in the nineteenth century, evolved into the term \u201cnegro\u201d by the 1960s, and then this term fell from use and was replaced with \u201cAfrican American.\u201d This latter term was intended to celebrate the multiple identities that a Black person might hold, but the word choice is a poor one, as it lumps together a large variety of ethnic groups regardless of geographical origin.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #333333;\">For example, Jamaicans, Haitians, and other dark-skinned Caribbean groups living in the U.S. are Black but they are not African American. Calling any person with dark skin African American highlights the importance of language while at the same time illustrating the challenges of racial categorization. We do not refer to Lupita Nyong&#8217;o (Nakia in\u00a0<em>Black Panther\u00a0<\/em>2018), who has Kenyan parents but was born in Mexico City and has dual citizenship in Kenya and Mexico, as African American. The U.S. Census includes &#8220;Black&#8221; or &#8220;African American&#8221; as a racial category to include &#8220;any person having origins in any of the Black racial groups of Africa.&#8221;<a class=\"footnote\" title=\"&quot;Race,&quot; U.S. Census. last updated Jan. 23, 2018. https:\/\/www.census.gov\/topics\/population\/race\/about.html.\" id=\"return-footnote-190-3\" href=\"#footnote-190-3\" aria-label=\"Footnote 3\"><sup class=\"footnote\">[3]<\/sup><\/a>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #333333;\">If race is a social construction, doesn&#8217;t collecting information on artificial racial categories through the U.S. Census perpetuate the notion of biologically distinct racial categories? Why do we continue to categorize Americans based on race? Collecting information on race informs policy decisions related to civil rights, including voting and redistricting procedures at the state level; furthermore, &#8220;race data also are used to promote equal employment opportunities and to assess racial disparities in health and environmental risks&#8221; (U.S. Census 2018).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"fs-id1382386\">\n<h2>What is Ethnicity?<\/h2>\n<\/section>\n<section>\n<p id=\"import-auto-id2364915\" class=\"\">Ethnicity is sometimes used interchangeably with race, but they are very different concepts.\u00a0<strong><span id=\"term285\" data-type=\"term\">Ethnicity<\/span><\/strong>\u00a0is based on shared culture\u2014the practices, norms, values, and beliefs of a group that might include shared language, religion, and traditions, among other commonalities. Like race, the term ethnicity is difficult to describe and its meaning has changed over time. Ethnicity continues to be an identification method that individuals and institutions use today\u2014whether through the census, diversity initiatives, nondiscrimination laws, or simply in personal day-to-day relations.<\/p>\n<p id=\"fs-idm384266896\" class=\"\">In some cases, ethnicity is incorrectly used as a synonym for national origin, but those constructions are technically different. National origin (itself sometimes confused with nationality) has to do with the geographic and political associations with a person&#8217;s birthplace or residence. But people from a nation can be of a wide range of ethnicities, often unknown to people outside of the region, which leads to misconceptions. For example, someone in the United States may, with no ill-intent, refer to all Vietnamese people as an ethnic group. But Vietnam is home to 54 formally recognized ethnic groups.<\/p>\n<p id=\"fs-idm339222160\" class=\"\">Adding to the complexity: Sometimes, either to build bridges between ethnic groups, promote civil rights, gain recognition, or other reasons, diverse but closely associated ethnic groups may develop a &#8220;pan-ethnic&#8221; group. For example, the various ethnic groups and national origins of people from Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, and adjoining nations, who may share cultural, linguistic, or other values, may group themselves together in a collective identity. If they do so, they may not seek to erase their individual ethnicities, but finding the correct description and association can be challenging and depend on context. The large number of people who make up the Asian American community may embrace their collective identity in the context of the United States. However, that embrace may depend on people&#8217;s ages, and may be expressed differently when speaking to different populations (Park 2008). For example, someone who identifies as Asian American while at home in Houston may not refer to themselves as such when they visit extended family in Japan. In a similar manner, a grouping of people from Mexico, Central America and South America\u2014often referred to as Latinx, Latina, or Latino\u2014may be embraced by some and rejected by others in the group (Martinez 2019).<\/p>\n<p>Individuals may be identified or self-identify with ethnicities in complex, even contradictory, ways. For example, ethnic groups such as Irish, Italian American, Russian, Jewish, and Serbian might all be groups whose members are predominantly included in the \u201cwhite\u201d racial category.\u00a0Depending on when they immigrated to the United States, many of these ethnic whites were treated as minority groups and were not afforded the same status as the White Anglo Saxon Protestants (WASPs), who were typically the privileged whites throughout American history. For example, Irish immigrants were &#8220;white&#8221; in appearance and spoke English, but they were also predominantly Catholic, and this made them suspect in terms of their prospective allegiance to the Pope in preference to the United States government. Italian immigrants were often olive-skinned, Catholic, and did not speak English, all of which made them seem even more foreign and, perhaps, unassimilable.<\/p>\n<p>If we consider the British or the French as ethnicities with a common culture and geographic boundary, we see many ethnic groups within each country. Both countries have struggled with national identity as globalization and immigration, often originating in formerly colonized nations, change their demographics. For example, France won the 2018 World Cup with the help of star player Kylian Mbappe, a teenager born in Paris, whose father is from Cameroon and whose mother is Algerian.<\/p>\n<div class=\"textbox exercises\">\n<h3>Ethnicities and the Census<\/h3>\n<p>Read more about Latino opinions about the census data and identity in the article\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/hispanic\/2012\/04\/04\/when-labels-dont-fit-hispanics-and-their-views-of-identity\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">&#8220;When Labels Don&#8217;t Fit: Hispanics and Their Views of Identity&#8221;<\/a> from the Pew Research Center.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<section>Ethnicity, like<span style=\"color: #333333;\"> race, continues to be an identification method that individuals and institutions use today\u2014whether through the U.S. Census, affirmative action initiatives, nondiscrimination laws, or simply in personal day-to-day relations.\u00a0We celebrate ethnicity in the United States through a variety of holidays (i.e., St. Patrick&#8217;s Day), enjoying different types of cuisine, and through popular cultural forms such as film, television, and music.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"textbox examples\">\n<h3>Watch It<\/h3>\n<p>Review the ideas presented in this section about race and ethnicity in the following Khan Academy video.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube-nocookie.com\/embed\/4WIiConeatM?rel=0&amp;showinfo=0\" width=\"800\" height=\"470\" frameborder=\"0\"><span style=\"width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;\" class=\"mce_SELRES_start\">\ufeff<\/span><\/iframe><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"fs-id1306134\">\n<div class=\"textbox tryit\">\n<h3>Try It<\/h3>\n<p>\t<iframe id=\"assessment_practice_8802f1b3-b40d-443c-86ec-164b718a4d3b\" class=\"resizable\" src=\"https:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/8802f1b3-b40d-443c-86ec-164b718a4d3b?iframe_resize_id=assessment_practice_id_8802f1b3-b40d-443c-86ec-164b718a4d3b\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none;width:100%;height:100%;min-height:300px;\"><br \/>\n\t<\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>\t<iframe id=\"assessment_practice_28dd30af-36f9-4144-9942-2e83be8eda03\" class=\"resizable\" src=\"https:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/28dd30af-36f9-4144-9942-2e83be8eda03?iframe_resize_id=assessment_practice_id_28dd30af-36f9-4144-9942-2e83be8eda03\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none;width:100%;height:100%;min-height:300px;\"><br \/>\n\t<\/iframe><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<h2>What are Minority Groups?<\/h2>\n<p id=\"import-auto-id2095138\">Sociologist Louis Wirth (1945) defined a <strong><span id=\"import-auto-id2653190\">minority group<\/span><\/strong> as \u201cany group of people who, because of their physical or cultural characteristics, are singled out from the others in the society in which they live for differential and unequal treatment, and who therefore regard themselves as objects of collective discrimination.\u201d According to Charles Wagley and Marvin Harris (1958), a minority group is distinguished by five characteristics:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>unequal treatment and less power over their lives<\/li>\n<li>distinguishing physical or cultural traits like skin color or language<\/li>\n<li>involuntary membership in the group<\/li>\n<li>awareness of subordination<\/li>\n<li>high rate of in-group marriage<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>Additional examples of minority groups might include the LGBTQ community, religious practitioners whose faith is not widely practiced where they live, and people with disabilities.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Subordinate group<\/strong> can be used interchangeably with the term minority, while the term <strong><span id=\"import-auto-id1555353\">dominant group<\/span><\/strong> is often substituted for the group that\u2019s in the majority. These definitions correlate to the concept that the dominant group is that which holds the most power in a given society, while subordinate groups are those who lack power by comparison.<\/p>\n<p>When we hear the word &#8220;minority&#8221; we often think of a group with a smaller number of members than the dominant group, but in some cases the &#8220;minority&#8221; is not a numerical minority. Women have been treated as a minority group\u00a0even though they outnumber men in the U.S. What differentiates a minority group is that its members are disadvantaged in some way by the dominant group, such as when women are paid less than men for the same job even though they may have similar qualifications and levels of experience as their male co-workers. Consider apartheid in South Africa, in which a numerical majority (the Black inhabitants of the country) were exploited and oppressed by the politically dominant white minority.<\/p>\n<p>In the contemporary United States, the elderly might be considered a minority group due to a diminished status that results from popular prejudice and discrimination against them. Ten percent of nursing home staff admitted to physically abusing an elderly person in the past year, and 40 percent admitted to committing psychological abuse (World Health Organization 2011).<\/p>\n<p id=\"import-auto-id1306663\"><strong><span id=\"import-auto-id2105932\">Scapegoat theory<\/span><\/strong>, developed initially from\u00a0psychologist John Dollard\u2019s (1939) Frustration-Aggression theory, suggests that the dominant group will displace its unfocused aggression onto a subordinate group. History has shown us many examples of the scapegoating of a subordinate group. An example from the last century is the way Adolf Hitler was able to blame the Jewish population for Germany\u2019s social and economic problems. In the United States, recent immigrants have frequently been the scapegoat for the nation\u2019s\u2014or an individual\u2019s\u2014woes. Many states have enacted laws to disenfranchise immigrants; these laws are popular because they let the dominant group scapegoat a subordinate group.<\/p>\n<h2>Multiple Identities<\/h2>\n<div id=\"attachment_8820\" style=\"width: 210px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-8820\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-8820\" src=\"https:\/\/s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/courses-images\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2034\/2016\/04\/14155201\/Tiger_Woods-200x300.jpg\" alt=\"A photo of golfer Tiger Woods holding his golf club up in the air on the golf course after hitting a golf ball\" width=\"200\" height=\"300\" \/><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-8820\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Figure 1. Golfer Tiger Woods has Chinese, Thai, African American, Native American, and Dutch heritage. Individuals with multiple ethnic backgrounds are becoming more common. (Credit: familymwr\/flickr)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Prior to the twentieth century, racial intermarriage (referred to as miscegenation) was extremely rare, and in many places, illegal. In the later part of the twentieth century and in the twenty-first century,\u00a0attitudes have changed for the better. While the sexual subordination of slaves did result in children of mixed race, these children were usually considered Black, and therefore, property. There was no concept of multiple racial identities, with the possible exception of the Creole. Creole society developed in the port city of New Orleans, where a mixed-race culture grew from French and African inhabitants. Unlike in other parts of the country, \u201cCreoles of color\u201d had greater social, economic, and educational opportunities than most African Americans.<\/p>\n<p>Increasingly during the modern era, the removal of miscegenation laws and a trend toward equal rights and legal protection against racism have steadily reduced the social stigma attached to racial exogamy (exogamy refers to marriage outside a person\u2019s core social unit). It is now common for the children of racially mixed parents to acknowledge and celebrate their various ethnic identities. Golfer Tiger Woods, for instance, has Chinese, Thai, African American, Native American, and Dutch heritage; he jokingly refers to his ethnicity as \u201cCablinasian,\u201d a term he coined to combine several of his ethnic backgrounds. While this is the trend, it is not yet evident in all aspects of our society. For example, the U.S. Census only recently added more nuanced additional categories such as non-white Hispanic. A growing number of people chose multiple races to describe themselves on the 2020 Census, indicating that individuals have multiple identities.<\/p>\n<div class=\"textbox exercises\">\n<h3>Exercises<\/h3>\n<p>Take a look at the interactive\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/interactive\/2021\/us\/census-race-ethnicity-map\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">dot map<\/a>\u00a0created by CNN based on the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.census.gov\/newsroom\/press-releases\/2021\/population-changes-nations-diversity.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">2020 Census Statistics that highlights population changes and racial and ethnic diversity<\/a>. When interacting with the map, you can move around the area and zoom in or zoom out.\u00a0Each dot represents 150, 300 or 900 people in each race or ethnicity group, depending on the zoom level.<\/p>\n<p>The Esri Demographics team also created a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.arcgis.com\/home\/item.html?id=30d2e10d4d694b3eb4dc4d2e58dbb5a5\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">dot map<\/a> displaying the population of race or ethnicity in an area, based on the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.census.gov\/programs-surveys\/decennial-census\/about\/rdo\/summary-files.html#P1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">U.S. Census Bureau&#8217;s 2020 P.L. 94-171<\/a> data.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"fs-id1169033105847\" class=\"short-answer\">\n<div class=\"textbox learning-objectives\">\n<h3>Think It Over<\/h3>\n<div class=\"exercise\">\n<div id=\"fs-id800121\" class=\"problem\">\n<ul>\n<li id=\"import-auto-id1506356\">Why do you think the term \u201cminority\u201d has persisted when the word \u201csubordinate\u201d is more descriptive?<\/li>\n<li>How do you describe your ethnicity? Do you include your family\u2019s country of origin? Do you consider yourself multiethnic? How does your ethnicity compare to that of the people you spend most of your time with?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"textbox tryit\">\n<h3>Try It<\/h3>\n<p>\t<iframe id=\"assessment_practice_e7fbb979-54e3-4761-9f7f-becef6a63217\" class=\"resizable\" src=\"https:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/e7fbb979-54e3-4761-9f7f-becef6a63217?iframe_resize_id=assessment_practice_id_e7fbb979-54e3-4761-9f7f-becef6a63217\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none;width:100%;height:100%;min-height:300px;\"><br \/>\n\t<\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>\t<iframe id=\"assessment_practice_9a64398d-a23f-495d-8c65-9940c27681e3\" class=\"resizable\" src=\"https:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/9a64398d-a23f-495d-8c65-9940c27681e3?iframe_resize_id=assessment_practice_id_9a64398d-a23f-495d-8c65-9940c27681e3\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none;width:100%;height:100%;min-height:300px;\"><br \/>\n\t<\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>\t<iframe id=\"assessment_practice_e99d464c-8bca-4d91-ae11-d44a0b787659\" class=\"resizable\" src=\"https:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/e99d464c-8bca-4d91-ae11-d44a0b787659?iframe_resize_id=assessment_practice_id_e99d464c-8bca-4d91-ae11-d44a0b787659\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none;width:100%;height:100%;min-height:300px;\"><br \/>\n\t<\/iframe><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"textbox key-takeaways\">\n<h3>glossary<\/h3>\n<dl id=\"import-auto-id2633294\" class=\"definition\">\n<dt>dominant group:<\/dt>\n<dd>a group of people who have more power in a society than any of the subordinate groups<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n<dl id=\"import-auto-id1752232\" class=\"definition\">\n<dt>ethnicity:<\/dt>\n<dd id=\"fs-id2669468\">shared culture, which may include heritage, language, religion, and more<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n<dl id=\"import-auto-id853059\" class=\"definition\">\n<dt>minority group:<\/dt>\n<dd>any group of people who are singled out from the others for differential and unequal treatment<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n<dl>\n<dt>race:<\/dt>\n<dd>a socially constructed category that produces real effects on the actors who are racially categorized<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n<dl>\n<dt>scapegoat theory:<\/dt>\n<dd>a theory that suggests that the dominant group will displace its unfocused aggression onto a subordinate group<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n<dl id=\"import-auto-id1357883\" class=\"definition\">\n<dt>social construction of race:<\/dt>\n<dd id=\"fs-id2287273\">the school of thought that race is not biologically identifiable<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n<dl id=\"import-auto-id3057151\" class=\"definition\">\n<dt>subordinate group:<\/dt>\n<dd id=\"fs-id2638860\">a group of people who have less power than the dominant group<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n\t\t\t <section class=\"citations-section\" role=\"contentinfo\">\n\t\t\t <h3>Candela Citations<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t\t <div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t <div id=\"citation-list-190\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t <div class=\"licensing\"><div class=\"license-attribution-dropdown-subheading\">CC licensed content, Shared previously<\/div><ul class=\"citation-list\"><li>Racial, Ethnic, and Minority Groups. <strong>Authored by<\/strong>: OpenStax CNX. <strong>Located at<\/strong>: <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/cnx.org\/contents\/AgQDEnLI@10.1:pVynETUs@2\/Racial-Ethnic-and-Minority-Groups\">https:\/\/cnx.org\/contents\/AgQDEnLI@10.1:pVynETUs@2\/Racial-Ethnic-and-Minority-Groups<\/a>. <strong>License<\/strong>: <em><a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"license\" href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/\">CC BY: Attribution<\/a><\/em>. <strong>License Terms<\/strong>: Download for free at http:\/\/cnx.org\/contents\/02040312-72c8-441e-a685-20e9333f3e1d@3.49<\/li><li>Racial, Ethnic, and Minority Groups. <strong>Provided by<\/strong>: OpenStax. <strong>Located at<\/strong>: <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/openstax.org\/books\/introduction-sociology-3e\/pages\/11-1-racial-ethnic-and-minority-groups\">https:\/\/openstax.org\/books\/introduction-sociology-3e\/pages\/11-1-racial-ethnic-and-minority-groups<\/a>. <strong>Project<\/strong>: Sociology 3e. <strong>License<\/strong>: <em><a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"license\" href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/\">CC BY: Attribution<\/a><\/em>. <strong>License Terms<\/strong>: Access for free at https:\/\/openstax.org\/books\/introduction-sociology-3e\/pages\/11-1-racial-ethnic-and-minority-groups<\/li><\/ul><div class=\"license-attribution-dropdown-subheading\">All rights reserved content<\/div><ul class=\"citation-list\"><li>Demographic structure of society- race and ethnicity. <strong>Authored by<\/strong>: Sydney Brown. <strong>Provided by<\/strong>: Khan Academy. <strong>Located at<\/strong>: <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=4WIiConeatM\">https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=4WIiConeatM<\/a>. <strong>License<\/strong>: <em>Other<\/em>. <strong>License Terms<\/strong>: Standard YouTube License<\/li><\/ul><\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t <\/div>\n\t\t\t <\/section><hr class=\"before-footnotes clear\" \/><div class=\"footnotes\"><ol><li id=\"footnote-190-1\">Bloom, S. 2015. \"Lesson of a Lifetime.\" Smithsonian Magazine. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.smithsonianmag.com\/science-nature\/lesson-of-a-lifetime-72754306\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">https:\/\/www.smithsonianmag.com\/science-nature\/lesson-of-a-lifetime-72754306\/<\/a>.  <a href=\"#return-footnote-190-1\" class=\"return-footnote\" aria-label=\"Return to footnote 1\">&crarr;<\/a><\/li><li id=\"footnote-190-2\">Bonilla-Silva, E. 2003. Racism without Racists. Lanham: Rownman &amp; Littlefield Publishers, Inc. <a href=\"#return-footnote-190-2\" class=\"return-footnote\" aria-label=\"Return to footnote 2\">&crarr;<\/a><\/li><li id=\"footnote-190-3\">\"Race,\" U.S. Census. last updated Jan. 23, 2018. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.census.gov\/topics\/population\/race\/about.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">https:\/\/www.census.gov\/topics\/population\/race\/about.html<\/a>. <a href=\"#return-footnote-190-3\" class=\"return-footnote\" aria-label=\"Return to footnote 3\">&crarr;<\/a><\/li><\/ol><\/div>","protected":false},"author":29,"menu_order":3,"template":"","meta":{"_candela_citation":"[{\"type\":\"cc\",\"description\":\"Racial, Ethnic, and Minority Groups\",\"author\":\"OpenStax CNX\",\"organization\":\"\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/cnx.org\/contents\/AgQDEnLI@10.1:pVynETUs@2\/Racial-Ethnic-and-Minority-Groups\",\"project\":\"\",\"license\":\"cc-by\",\"license_terms\":\"Download for free at http:\/\/cnx.org\/contents\/02040312-72c8-441e-a685-20e9333f3e1d@3.49\"},{\"type\":\"copyrighted_video\",\"description\":\"Demographic structure of society- race and ethnicity\",\"author\":\"Sydney Brown\",\"organization\":\"Khan Academy\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=4WIiConeatM\",\"project\":\"\",\"license\":\"other\",\"license_terms\":\"Standard YouTube License\"},{\"type\":\"cc\",\"description\":\"Racial, Ethnic, and Minority Groups\",\"author\":\"\",\"organization\":\"OpenStax\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/openstax.org\/books\/introduction-sociology-3e\/pages\/11-1-racial-ethnic-and-minority-groups\",\"project\":\"Sociology 3e\",\"license\":\"cc-by\",\"license_terms\":\"Access for free at https:\/\/openstax.org\/books\/introduction-sociology-3e\/pages\/11-1-racial-ethnic-and-minority-groups\"}]","CANDELA_OUTCOMES_GUID":"680da681-6aee-4a0f-9505-a86bc90c45a9, 1788e657-f6c5-4f49-86cd-d8651e8a3f9c, 08a583d2-7207-42fc-bede-5adb24eede66","pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-190","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry"],"part":578,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-introductiontosociology\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/190","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-introductiontosociology\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-introductiontosociology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-introductiontosociology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/29"}],"version-history":[{"count":64,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-introductiontosociology\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/190\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9485,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-introductiontosociology\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/190\/revisions\/9485"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-introductiontosociology\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/578"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-introductiontosociology\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/190\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-introductiontosociology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=190"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-introductiontosociology\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=190"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-introductiontosociology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=190"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-introductiontosociology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=190"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}