Transcript Ethnicity - Solano Community College

Identity, Race, Ethnicity, Gender, Sexuality
• What is ethnicity?
– The sharing of common cultural tradition(s)
• What traditions? Language, religion, etc.
• Physical characteristics?
– Euphemism for race
• Focus may vary between groups
– Jewish: religion
– Amish: folk culture and religion
– Germans/Americans: language
Identity
• Identity – “how we make sense of ourselves” – Rose
• How do we establish identities?
- we construct our identities through experiences, emotions
connections, and rejections.
- An identity is a snapshot of who we are at a point in time
- Identities are fluid, constantly changing, shifting, becoming.
- Identities vary across scales, and affect each other across
scales.
- Identities are also constructed by identifying against (defining
the other and then defining ourselves as “not that.”)
Race –
a categorization of humans based on skin color and other
physical characteristics. Racial categories are social and
political constructions because they are based on ideas
that some biological differences are more important than
others.
Ethnicity
• Race: a biological ancestry
– But biologically we are all the same
– What is race and what is ethnicity
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Asian
Black
Hispanic
White
Genetic transmission of traits
– Skin color, hair type, facial features, shape of head/eyes
Gender
Gender – “a culture’s
assumptions about the
differences between
men and women: their
‘characters,’ the roles
they play in society,
what they represent.”
- Domosh and Seager
• Do we identify more with race or ethnicity?
• Ethnicity is important to a groups (cultures)
survival
• Universities: Ethnic studies not race
studies
What is important to geographers?
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Distribution
Migration/diffusion
Ethnicity vs nationalism
Ethnic conflicts/Power struggles
Ethnic cleansing
Distribution of ethnic groups
• From different scales
– World, country, state, urban area
• Different ethnic groups may be represented more in
urban vs rural areas
• World
– Kurds
– Palestinians
• Country
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Canada (French)
Former Yugoslavia
Guest workers
Palestinians and Israelis
• State
– Florida
• City
– Ethnic mosaic in many large urban areas
Estimated Percentage of U.S. Population
by Race and Ethnicity until 2050
In 2000, the U.S. Census Bureau calculated race and Hispanic
origin separately. Estimates are that by 2050, the “White, nonHispanic population will no longer be the majority.
Highest
Rate of
Residential
Segregation
for African
Americans:
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Migration/Diffusion
• African American experience
– Slave trade
– Support agriculture in the South
– Movements to northern urban areas after labor
demands reduced
– Look to cities for employment
• Detroit, Chicago
• Diffusion as function of segregation
• Chain migration
– Pull of families and extended families
Ethnicity/Nationalism
• Ethnicity: an attachment to cultural traditions
• Nationalism: an attachment to a particular
country (political entity)
• Which is stronger?
• Why an attachment to a country?
– Self-determination
– Rise of nation-states
• Counties aligned closely with an ethnicity
– Japan, Denmark, Israel
• Nation-States
Multiethnic Examples
• Belgium
– Dutch Flemish
– French Walloons
• Russia
– European
– Asian
• Former Yugoslavia
– Serbs, Croats, Albanian, Hungarian, Bosnian
Examples-Continued
• Czechoslovakia
– Velvet revolution
• Czech Republic and Slovakia
– Czech and Slovak
• United Kingdom
– Scots, Welch, N. Ireland
• Kurds in Turkey about 20%
• Ukraine- Orange revolution
– Ukrainians and Russians
Examples - Continued
• Canada
– British and French
• United States
–?
• African states – much the same
• You get the idea: Very multiethnic world
which leads to nationalistic pressures
Ethnic Conflicts
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Ethiopia/Eritrea
India/Pakistan (Kashmir)
Sudan
West Africa
– Senegal
– Sierra Leone
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Rwanda and Burundi
Lebanon
Pakistan
– Kashmir
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Turkey – Kurds
Sri Lanka
– Sinhalese and Tamils
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Indonesia
– From west (Aceh) to east (East Timor)
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Palestinian and Israeli conflict
Why?
• One group feels oppressed
– Political power
– Minority with few rights
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Ethnicity and religion
Control of resources
Territorial disputes
Loss of a controlling figure (Tito)
Ethnic conflicts turn to
• Ethnocentrism: one ethnic group feels
better (superior) to another
• Ethnic cleansing
– Nazi Germany
– Former Yugoslavia
• Balkanization: breakdown of state due to ethnic
conflicts
• Kosovo (Albanians inside Yugoslavia)
– Irredentism:
• Africa
– Borders do not match ethnic
– Transition region between Sub-Saharan
African and the area south of the Sahara
– Legacy of European colonization
Nationalism
• Tie between state and nation strengthens
• Loyalty and devotion to a state
– Flag
– Sports
• Olympics
– Anthems
– Heroes
– Historical events
Sense of Place
• We infuse places with meaning and
feeling, with memories and emotions.
• Our sense of place becomes part of our
identity and our identity affects the ways
we define and experience place.
Sexuality and Space
Where people
with a shared
identity cluster,
how do they
create a space
for
themselves?
Power relationships affect identity and mark
the cultural landscape
Power Relationships
• Power Relationships –
assumptions and structures about who is
in control, who has power over others.
How are power relationships reflected in
cultural landscapes (the visible human
imprint on the landscape)?
Through
power
relationships,
People create
places where they
limit the access of
other peoples.
Belfast, Northern Ireland
How do power relationships factor
into how people are counted?
The U.S. Census undercounts:
- minority populations
- the homeless
The Gross National Income (GNI)
does not count:
- unpaid work of women in the household
- work done by rural women in poorer countries
Women in
Subsaharan
Africa
- populate much of the rural
areas, as men migrate to cities
for work.
- produce 70% of the region’s
food.
- only a small percentage of
women have legal title to their
land.
-Dowry Deaths in India
- murders of brides (often by burning) when a dispute arises over a dowry.
Difficult to “legislate away” the power relationships that lead to dowry deaths
female infanticide is also tied to the disempowerment of women
Terms
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Identity
Race
Gender
Ethnic Cleansing
Ethnicity
Multi-ethnic state
Nationalism