SOC 205 Lecture Notes - Lecture 11: The Sociological Imagination, Biological Determinism, Social Forces
Document Summary
The attempt to separate races according to innate, genetic properties. People still assume racial groups are genetically different. There is more genetic variation within racial groups than between them. Racial difference does not exist on the genetic level (there are biological differences, but not nearly as much as people believe) Physical traits vary among people classified as racially similar. Dominant category that with which all other categories are compared and contrasted. Racial domination normalized: produces and reproduces many cultural, political, economic, and social advantages and privileges for white people and withholds such advantages and privileges from nonwhite people. White is presented as simply normal or neutral. Symbolic category, based on phenotype or ancestry and constructed according to specific social and historical contexts, that is misrecognized as a natural category. A shared lifestyle informed by cultural, historical, religious, and/or national affiliations. Membership in a specific politically delineated territory controlled by a government. Race, ethnicity, and nationality are overlapping symbolic categories.
