SOCY 1021 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Nuremberg Trials, Scientific Racism
Document Summary
Lack of understanding of native american power structure was a contributing factor to colonists" inability to gain control, thus contributing to the rise of slavery. Slavery as a cultural construct brought about by historical processes (which have since changed over time) Demise of scientific racism after the end of world war ii (post-holocaust and nuremberg trials) Discredited academically; racist legislation endures through the 1960s (where it is challenged by the civil rights movement and the civil rights act is passed) and arguably until the present (despite its loss of appeal) The contemporary scientific understanding of race is as a social construct. Race is constructed in, by, and for societies. Understandings of race don"t transfer between societies. Race varies across time and space (ie. the different categorizations of jews, italians, and mexicans at different times in us history; history determines classification; think also about the potential inclusion of the citizenship question on the census)
