SOCB53H3 Study Guide - Midterm Guide: Sociological Perspectives, Counterpoint, Class Conflict
Document Summary
Explain by referring to a specific discourse that we have studied in class and illustrate using an example from media, class, or your own experience. Race is socially constructed and is a product of knowledge and power. Discourses are a group of statements that are made to represent particular knowledge. Discourses make it possible to look at a topic in a particular way and also limit it from being viewed in certain ways. Discourses operate in relation to power; they are not viewed as being right or wrong but rather as effective or not. Race is just a signifier as there is no real difference between humans but those that are created. An example of the connection between discourse, race and power is of colonialism and. Here the ethnic difference is used to create a power hierarchy. They question the differences in the appearance of black people, suggesting that they look closer to monkeys.
