Race and Ethnicity
Definition and Application
The Social Roots of Racism
 Physical markers are used to distinguish
groups and create inequality based on
race.
 Different social conditions among
superordinates and subordinates create
behavioral differences between them.

The Social Roots of Racism
 Perceptions of behavioral differences
get embedded in culture as racial
stereotypes.
 Racial stereotypes reinforce the use of
physical markers to distinguish
groups.
Key Questions
• What constitutes an ethnic group?
• How do we define, identify and locate
an ethnic group?
• What is the significance of ethnicity
in Canadian society?
Ethnic groups
• Ethnic groups can be identified by their
cultural distinctiveness.
• There is general agreement that culture
is the principally identifiable
characteristic
Culture Defined
1. Systems of ideals and ideas,
2. Ways of thinking
3. Plans or recipes for behaving
in any group of people,
4. Passed down from generation
to generation."
Minority Status
• Ethnic groups are often
referred to as cultural
minorities.
Minority situation
• Integration and Suicide
• Durkhiem, for example, noted that
when a group is in a minority
situation the elements of group life
become more pronounced. =Less
chance of Suicide
Cultural Bonds
• Some common bonds that unify ethnic
groups include:
• Language, religion, folkways and
mores, styles of dress,
foods,occupational specialization, social
values, aesthetic standards
•
Theodorson and
Theodorson
1975
Modern Dictionary of Sociology
define ethnicity as a group with•
1. A common culture
•
2. A sense of identity which exists
as a sub- group in a larger society.
•
3.
Differential
of
cultural
characteristics from members of the
host society.
•
What is an ethnic identity
• A. An ethnic group shares a common
ancestry
• B. An ethnic group shares common
norms, values and traditions (insiders)
• C. An ethnic group is considered to be a
group by those who do not share the first
two elements (outsiders)
Heterogenious/Homogenious
Contexts
• Ethnicity then becomes more
significant in North America
than Europe. Why?
• Because in Europe, ethnicity is
usually not a sub-group of the
larger society.
• Nation and ethnicity are less
differentiated in a culturally
homogeneous societies.
• Ie. French in France, Italian in
Italy
Prejudice
Prejudice refers to an
unsubstantiated negative
prejudgement of individuals or
groups because of their
ETHNICITY, race or RELIGION
Discrimination
• Discrimination is the exclusion of
individuals or groups from full
participation in society because of their
ethnicity, race or religion
• Prejudice (an attitude) and
discrimination (behaviour) are usually
linked, but they are distinct
phenomena.
Forms of Discrimination in
Canada
Overt, Structural and Covert
1. Blatant or Overt•
• To arbitrarily deny opportunities to
members of ethnic groups whose
qualifications are equal to members of
the dominant group.
2. Structural Discrimination
•
The impersonal `perhaps’
unintentional operation of the
Canadian social system.
• Unequal reward and opportunities
3. Legislative discrimination
• -Phased out after WW2 I.e Internment
camps
• Yet until mid 1960's, some of Canadian
immigration laws were racist.
• E.g. policies regarding aboriginal
peoples
have
historically
been
paternalistic.
4. Cultural Discrimination • Operates
through
the
expectations of the dominant
culture and its attempts at
conformity in public life.
Cultural Discrimination
• Those groups whose attributes
(symbols, artificates, cultural
practices) that deviate most
markedly from the dominant
group are the most severely
discriminated against
Cultural Discrimination
• Ethnic groups that approximate the
dominant ethno-cultural model in
appearance, religion, lifestyle symbols
etc. the more open and accessible are
the institutions of society.
Myths About Immigrants
•
•
•
•
•
Taking over the country
Uneducated
Stealing Jobs
Uncultured
Not to be trusted
South/Asians Toronto
• -Immigrants from South/Asia are
taking over the country.
• -people from Asia -East Indian,
Pakistan, China, Korea ect. are
overrunning the country pretty soon
there will be no white folk.
• Xenophobia
Xenophobia
• Xenophobia is a fear or contempt of that
which is foreign or unknown, especially of
strangers or foreign people.
•
The term is typically used to describe a fear or
dislike of foreigners or of people significantly
different from oneself.
Myths
• -Immigrants
are
uneducatedNOimmigrants are more likely
than non-immigrants to have
a university education.
Daniel Bell 1975
•
1.
2.
3.
Canada is one and at same time:
Uni-cultural
Bi-cultural
Multicultural
Canada
• Multidimensional in terms of ethnic
patterns:
• Uni-cultural-British, Anglo Saxon
Dominance 1763
• Bicultural-French and English Charter
groups 1963-1968
• Multicultural-since 1972 Official..
Canadian Uniculturalism
• Canada was never a melting pot:
Anglo Dominance combined with racism
and nativism.
• Postwar immigration, however,
went far to change this.
BR and Fr. Origins
• Of this population of about 22.4 million,
nearly one-half (46%), or
about 10.3 million, reported only British
Isles, French and/or Canadian ethnic or
cultural origins.
British ancestry.
• The largest proportion - 21% of the
total population aged 15 years and
older - was comprised of those of only
British ancestry.
Other Europeans.
• The next largest proportion of Canada's
population was comprised of the
descendants of other Europeans.
• About 4.3 million people, or about onefifth (19%) of those aged 15 and over,
had only European ancestry (other
than British and French origins).
Non-European descent
• People of non-European descent
accounted for 13% of the population
aged 15 and over, or 2.9 million.
Mixed ethnic heritages
• In addition, 22% of the population
aged 15 and over, or 4.9 million,
reported other mixed ethnic heritages,
or did not know their ethnic ancestry.
Canada Ethnic History in Brief
• Contact 1608-1763
•
•
•
•
350,000 Natives vs. 5000 Europeans
Wilderness, Fur Trade
Champlain, ie. Penetang
Some trade, much claiming
Pre-Confederation
Two Solitudes
• Plains of Abraham
• La Survivance
• Upper Canada 55% English and 35%
French. Lower Canada 85% French 15%
English.
Post-Confederation/Western
Settlement
• 1867-1939
• Anglo-centric Orange Order
predominant.
• Influx of Russian, Ukranian, Chinese
• Chinese, Italian, Jewish in urban centers
• prejudice and discrimination
Post World War Two
• Restrictions lifted
• More Italian, Jewish, Greek, Northern
European
• Italians 731,000, Germans 1.3 million,
385,000 Scand.
• Diversity in Population/Conformity and
Assimilation gov’t policy
Establishing the Mosaic
•
•
•
•
1960’s
Introduction of the Points System
Immigration less Anglo-centric
Bi & Bi Commission, Multicultural
Official in 1972.
Refocusing current
• Refocusing the Cultural Mosaic
• Three levels of immigration -points,
family reunification, refugee status
• Increasing numbers of visible minorities
South Asia, Caribbean and Asia
• 250,000 immigrants per year
Immigration
• Immigration is an important way of
attempting
to
understand
majority/minority relations in a country.
Anthony Richmond
• Enhanced by the increasing amount of
immigrants since WW2 (Richmond,1982)
• Canada has been described as a salad bowl
• Immigrants are working hard to carve
out their place...
Acculturation not assimilation
• .To adjust to Canada's two
dominate groups. French and
English.
• These groups serve as
reference groups to many
immigrant groups.
Assimilation and Acculturation
•
The two ends of the continuum of what
happens to ethnic groups are:
1. . Assimilation
2. Acculturation
3 ... Maintenance of group identity and
cohesion within the larger society. (ethnic
ghetto)
Vertical Mosaic
• John Porter (1965) -Uniculturalism
• A controversial thesis-Canada’s emphasis
on cultural pluralism hinders minority
groups
• Creates `ethnic ghetto cultures’ restricting
mobility…
• A functionalist thesis…
Revisionists
• Include Peter S. Li
• Gordon Darroch
• Ethnic communities carve out their own
occupational avenues for success.
• Canada is primarily a class societyMarxist thesis.
Subtle discrimination
• Examples of this subtle discrimination
included being passed over for
promotion, assigned unpleasant tasks,
being stereotyped, and being excluded
from the "inner circle" of the workplace
Evelyn Kallen (1974)
• KALLEN, Evelyn and KELNER,
Merrijoy. 1983. Ethnicity, Opportunity
..... “Toronto: Polite Racism and
Marshmallow Politics,” Currents:
Readings in Race ...
Polite Racism
• Visible minority men and
women still face "polite"
racism when job hunting.
Covert Racism
• Racism is more covert today- US and
Canada.
• Focus group participants said that
racism is a "hidden thing" in the
workplace, and many were convinced
that they had been victims of subtle
forms of racism.
Subtle discrimination
•
1.
2.
3.
4.
Examples included:
Passed over for promotion,
Assigned unpleasant tasks,
Being stereotyped,
Being excluded from the "inner circle"
of the workplace
Polite racists.
• They maintain a number of fixed ideas
about people, usually based on some
insufficient or erroneous information
such as Asians are passive, Chinese are bad
drivers, Jews are Greedy, Native people are
lazy.
Polite racists. (Kallen, 1974)
• A study conducted in 1978 showed that
people are 16 somewhat racist and 33
percent somewhat racist. 51 percent of
management in 199 large companies
(N=50) held negative views of people of
colour. (Henry and Ginsberg, 1978)
Trudeau claimed in 1971
Although there are two official
languages, there is no official culture."
• Since 1971, 200 million dollars has
been spent promoting multicultural
ideals, social integration and racial
harmony
Trudeau Quote
• "There cannot be one policy for
Canadians of British origin or French
origins, another for originals and yet a
third for all others.” (1971)
R.C.B.B. 1963-1969
• The Royal Commission on Bi-lingualism
and Bi-culturalism revealed the growth of a
new current in Canada by the `other
Canadians'.
• Multicultural Act-an afterthought?
surprised to see that I'm black
because I sound like the
average guy on the telephone.
• They've said 'Oh, the job has
• Ethnic Origin Total Responses Percentage
just
been
filled,'
or
during
the
Canadian
8,806,275
30.9%
• English
6,832,095say that
23.9%I'm
interview they'll
• French
5,597,845
19.6%
overqualified
or
ask
me
• Scottish
4,260,840
14.9%
questions 4,260,
like 840
'Are you
sure
• Irish
13.2%
• you
Germanwant to
2,757,140
9.7%type
work at this
• Iitalian
1,207,475
4.2%
of job?'
• Aboriginal
1,101,955
3.9%
Assimilation vs. Cultural
Distinctiveness
• The two ends of the continuum of what happens to
ethnic groups are:
•
•
1. Assimilation
•
•
2. Maintenance of group identity and
cohesion within the
•
larger society.
•
•
The cultural pluralist
• Today we will look at some theoretical
concepts that relate to the struggle of
cultural pluralism
• Many immigrants who favour maintenance
of their own identity have no desire to adopt
the lifestyle of the host country.
•
Reference Groups-assimilation
vs. distinctiveness
• Very often they view the host country in terms of
expediency and look forward to making money
and going home.
• With these groups, the reference group is drawn
from their own ethnic history and not from the
dominant culture.
• Immigrant groups who favour assimilation, on
the other hand, look to the host or dominant
culture as reference groups.
Minorities in Transition
• The culture of a minority group in transition
is referred to as a hybrid culture.
•
• Containing norms that are traditional as
well as some values of the dominant
culture.
Canadian Family
• The Canadian Family in an Urban
Setting
•
• Elkin (1964) suggests that there is not one
Canadian Family.
• It is too heterogeneous, with its diverse
ethnic religious and occupational groupings.
•
Italian Family
• In Italy, the family is a source of moral authority
and community values.
• A person's worth is determined by his/her ability
to promote the economic prosperity of the family
and to preserve the chastity of women in the
family.
•
Italian Canadians in Toronto
• The first handful arrived in the 1880's and
1890's settling in the Ward area bounded by
Young and University college and Queen
they lived in ramschackled housing.
• They were often a transient group working
for the railway or mining in Ontario bush.
Formative Stage
• Numbers grew as they formed networks for
incoming Italians to pass on information
about housing, and financial aid in case of
sickness and death.
Population• The numbers were about 14,000 in 1913.
•
Maintenance Stage
• During the Second World War about 500 were
rounded up and interned in Toronto. Times were
very difficult for the Italian community until
following the war when the "enemy alien"
designation had been lifted in 1947.
• Throughout the Second World War many Italians
were inturned and lost their posessions.
• In the 1950's the Italian community began
to grow such that protests by unionists,
politicians and the general public were
made to stem the tide of immigration.
•
• Through the 1960's the Italian community
was largely responsible for building the
infra-structure of Toronto.
• As a result, the group has moved northward
to suburbs like North York. The star claims
that " more recent neighbourhoods of choice
in bedroom communities like Woodbridge
"symbolize a collective distancing from
there humble beginnings".
•
Italians Now Urban
• The majority of Italian Canadians are found in
urban centres like Toronto and Montreal. The
small number of works on Italians are
contradictory.
•
• On the one hand, Jansen(1971) found that Italian
immigrants in Toronto were ocupationally,
residentially and linguistically segregated and
had minumal contacts beyond their primary
groups.
• Similar patterns were reported by Boissevain
(1976)
Socialization
• The contradictions may be partly the product of
differential socialization practices between Italian
males and females.
• There "stricter, more protective practices towards
females."
•
• It is also reported that first generation Italians
have unrealistically high expectations for their
children which often leads to conflict.
• Sturino reports that gradually Italians will see a
blending of old and new family patterns.
Familiaria
• "At three levels of kinship of nuclear family,
family circle, and kindred, elements from a
peasant past were merged with an urban present.
The kinship patterns can neither be referred to as
Canadian nor Italian".
•
• Sturino sees the emergence of an entirely new
family form which represents a departure from
concepts used to describe some other ethnic
groups like stability and change.
Institutional Completeness
• The circumstances for Italians in Montreal have
been very different from those of the Jewish
community.
• Large scale immigration for Italians took place
following WW2.
•
• Second only to British as a minority in the
province.
• Despite some institutional completeness there has
been some question of the cohesiveness of Italians
• Ukrainian Canadians
•
•
• Hobart examined attitudes towards family size,
marital roles, and childbearing among a sample of
three generations in Edmonton and surrounding
rural communties.
•
• The pattern of the first generation closely reflects
the native country while the third generation
closely approximates the ideal typical English-
Myths
• -Immigrants come over and sap the
welfare system. NOT. Immigrants are only
slightly less likely to participate in the labour
force 76.4 compared to 77.7%.
• -However, among young people-able bodiedimmigrants had a higher labour force
participation rate at 95.3% compared to 94.8
among non-immigrants.
• Immigrant men earn more than nonimmigrant men although the same is not true
for women.
there, I get the feeling they are
surprised to see that I'm black
because I sound like the
average
guy
on
the
telephone.
•
thePercentage
job has
• They've
Ethnic Originsaid
Total'Oh,
Responses
Canadian
8,806,275
30.9% the
just
been filled,'
or during
• English
6,832,095
23.9%
interview they'll
• French
5,597,845say that
19.6%I'm
• Scottish
4,260,840or ask
14.9%
overqualified
me
• Irish
4,260, 840
13.2%
questions
like
'Are
you
sure
• German
2,757,140
9.7%
• you
Iitalianwant to
1,207,475
4.2%type
work at this
• Aboriginal
1,101,955
3.9%
of job?'