ANT 2000 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Samuel Wharton, Louis Agassiz, Indian Removal Act
Document Summary
Race & racism (video = race: the power of an illusion ) Race = isn"t about the way you look; it"s about people assigning a meaning to the way you look. People should realize race is a socially constructed idea, not an inherent fact of science. Tj helped write the declaration of independence, yet he owned slaves himself. Argued that tj was the first person to define/give a theory about race. Basically africa = ideal labor source because could always just get more, also already knew how to grow rice and tobacco, also couldn"t blend into society like native americans. White people are not going to be complicit with the system unless they benefited somehow; in this case, prestige and status. Gave idea that black = automatically associated with africa; then became normal to assume a person"s color automatically meant a certain status or power, part of the problem because became too normal.