ANTHRO 2A Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Scientific Racism, Ethnic Group, Hypodescent
Document Summary
Race as a subject of analysis: subject as opposed to a unit: Unit = taking individuals and lumping them into groupings. Subject = studying race, not using race to study other things. Ethnicity: common identity based on cultural similarities, ethnic group, expression of ethnic identity is situational. Social race: textbook author distances himself from scientific racists, ethnic groups that are assumed to have a biological basis, cultural categories. Rome: northern european tribes consider themselves modern day romans; romans would have compared themselves to. Assign child to lower ranking race of the parents. Tried to get new birth certificate, race listed as black bc in la you"re considered black if you"re 1/32nd black. Social race as an identity: conflation of perceptions of biology and culture. Ex: white family adopts black baby, need to raise baby in black culture or it won"t be really black .
