SOCI 312 Study Guide - Final Guide: Civil Rights Act Of 1964, Ethnic Conflict, Linda Gordon
Document Summary
[however] it can also be reconstructed ? (p. 281) It means that if a race begins to move up economically then they will rise socially. From the reading: however, because skin color is socially constructed, it can also be reconstructed. Thus, when the descendants of the european immigrants began to move up economically and socially, their skins apparently began to look lighter to the whites who had come to america before them. When enough of these descendants became visibly middle class, their skin was seen as fully white. The biological skin color of the second and third generations had not changed, but it was socially blanched or whitened. The process probably began in earnest just before the great depression and resumed after world war ii. As the cultural and other differences of the original european immigrants disappeared, their descendants became known as white ethnics. Meaning of race: has changed dramatically over time.
