ANTH 2 Chapter Notes - Chapter 5: Eugenics, Pseudoscience, Intersectionality
Document Summary
Race: a flawed system of classification with no biological basis, that uses certain physical characteristics to divide the human population into supposedly discrete groups. Racism: individual thoughts and actions and institutional patterns and policies that create unequal access to power, privilege, resources, and opportunities based on imagined differences among groups. Do biologically separate races exist: many of us were enculturated to believe that race refers to distinct physical characteristics that mark individuals as clearly belonging in one group and not another. White supremacy: the belief that whites are biologically different from and superior to people of other races. Whiteness: a culturally constructed concept originating in 1691 virginia designed to establish clear boundaries of who is white and who is not, a process central to the formation of us racial stratification: rule of hypodescent. Imposition of the rule of hypodescent has been key to drawing and maintaining boundaries between the races since the days of slavery.
