Reaching the end of racism does not necessarily mean that the recognition of different races must also come to an end. In the essay, "The Conservation of Races," W.E.B. Dubois expressed that he believed African Americans should hold on to their identities. He believed that Blacks should not assimilate into American culture but rather they should separate themselves and establish their own institutions, such as the Negro Academy for example. During the time period which this essay was written I feel it was necessary and also mandatory for African Americans to separate since segregation was in full swing. I also feel that if African Americans did not separate they would not have been able to hold on to their identities. So I do agree with this part of Dubois's essay. If African Americans had fully assimilated into American culture many of the contributions the race has given would not have ever existed.For a group to hold on to its race as part of its identity is not necessarily racist.
In class the question was posed about whether eliminating racism required a colorblind society. The answer is, no it does not. There is a strong necessity for groups to identify with their race and for other groups to recognize other races exist. Not to do so would mean completely ignoring history. To ignore race would also take away a person's identity. When someone asks me to describe myself one of the first things I say is that I am an African American female. To say that I am an African American means something specific yet special. It means I am a part of a group with a history and a story of which I am proud. The same applies to everyone else as well.
Everyone identifies himself according to which race he belongs. Our race is our identity. If the end of racism meant ignoring race completely, there would be no such thing as diversity, which is something on which we pride ourselves.We believe that diversity helps us to learn about one another. Even at Rhodes we strive to have diverse campus in order to prepare us for our futures. We have to be able to cooperate with people who are different from us if we want to survive in this world. None of us are made the same. As stated in class, if we do not recognize race in order to distinguish ourselves there will just be something else we use in order to identify ourselves because we know and love that fact that all of us are different. Our race is who we are; it is what makes us unique. Without my race, who am I? Who are you? I am not a racist but my race is my identity.
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I agree with the main blog that diversity is something we, as a country, take pride in, so without race, diversity would be a difficult concept to establish. Other countries admire America because of the diversity present here. Most countries do not have so many people with different nationalities or races living in their one country but thats the unique part about U.S . Ironically, America's most admired factor which is race happens to be one of the main causes of conflict in the U.S. Even though race causes conflict it shouldn't be eliminated, because by eliminating race each person's identity would be removed as would America's identity as a country based on diversity.
ReplyDeleteI'm writing such a long reaction this entry, that I think I'm going to post most of it as its own blog entry. Here's the section stood the most on its own:
ReplyDelete"If the end of racism meant ignoring race completely, there would be no such thing as diversity..."
This doesn't follow. Race and diversity are not perfectly interchangeable terms. Race is a subcategory of diversity, not another name for diversity (although we do sloppy use our language sometimes to create this impression). Other categories that we'd likely count toward diversity are gender, nationality, geographic origin, economic class, sexual orientation, etc. Those things either have nothing to do with or are only tangentially related to race.
With that being said, I think you hit the nail on the head about what diversity ultimately comes to, when you wrote, "We believe that diversity helps us to learn about one another." Diversity appears to be wrapped up in the notion of pluralities of experience. That different groups experience and view the world in different ways in practice. And to borrow from William James, the idea that we each have 'vital secrets' to potentially offer to one another. Part of the idea, then, is that diversity helps to keep us from making unjust, false, or stupid opinions, insofar as our opinions deal with the significance of lives alien to our own.
I agree with J Johnson that race is something to be proud in and helps us to identify ourselves as being a part of something. We as humans feel it necessary to group things, including ourselves.
ReplyDeleteI also agree with B Blake that diversity and race are not interchangeable terms. I believe that a lot of people from the north would consider themselves different from people in the south.
Race is not the ONLY thing that defines a person. To say so would take away from everything else that makes us who we are. Keeping that in mind race is a part, not the whole, but a part of who we are and something we should cherish and take pride in.