SOCIAL DIFFERENCE
Race and Ethnicity
Anthropology of Social Difference
► What
is the basis for the recognition of
difference within and between social
groups? – what is the role of culture?
► What
is the relationship of recognized social
differences to political power and inequality?
– what are the processes of society? (social
stratification)
CULTURE & SOCIETY
► Geertz
(1973) on culture -- "a historically
transmitted pattern of meanings embodied in
symbols, a system of inherited conceptions
expressed in symbolic forms by means of which
men communicate, perpetuate, and develop their
knowledge about and attitudes toward life“
► Geertz on society – “the pattern of social
interaction”
► Culture & society – “capable of wide range of
modes of integration”
Geertz on Society and Culture
Again…
► Culture
– logico-meaningful integration
 A unity of style, of logical implication, of
meaning and value
 Fabric of meaning
► Society




– causal-functional integration
Kind of integration one finds in an organism
All parts united in a single causal web
Keep the system going
Actually existing network of social relations
Social Differences & Society
► shift
from homogeneous kin based societies
(mechanic) to heterogeneous societies of
associations (organic) involves increased
social differentiation
► Increased
differentiation & integration =
INCREASED SOCIAL STRATIFICATION
(social differences)
Society & Social Stratification
► inequality
in society
► the unequal distribution of goods and services,
rights and obligations, power and prestige
► all attributes of positions in society, not attributes
of individuals
► Stratified society is:
 when a society exhibits stratification it means that there
are significant breaks in the distribution of goods
services, rights obligations power prestige
► as
a result of which are formed collectivities or
groups we call strata
Stratification & Society
► Integration
and equilibrium
► Society is a system of action
► stratification is a generalized aspect of the
structure of all social systems
► Social Strata emerge from the process of
differentiation and evaluation in the form of
social statuses, differences, and classes
Stratification & Social Power
► Power
– domination and the process of
legitimization by which a dominant status group
becomes accepted as dominant
► pre-industrial
society – power based on traditional
respect or allegiance to charismatic leaders
► industrial
society – power based on legality,
consensus on the rules and procedures concerning
the selection and limits of power
3 TYPES OF SOCIETIES
► egalitarian
societies - no social groups having
greater access to economic resources, power, or
prestige - usually foragers
► rank societies - do not have unequal access to
economic resources or to power, but they do
contain social groups having unequal access to
prestige
► class societies - unequal access to all 3
advantages, economic resources, power, prestige
 open & closed class systems - the extent to which
mobility occurs allowing people to pass through
inequalities
Understanding Social Differences:
Status
► status
- ascribed & achieved
► ascribed status - social positions that people
hold by virtue of birth
 sex, age, family relationships, birth into class or
caste
► achieved
status - social positions attained as a
result of individual action
► shift from homogenous kin based societies to
heterogeneous society of associations involves
growth in importance of achieved status
Race & Society
► There
are no biological human races
► Racial social stratification is built upon idea that
social differences are linked with hereditary
characteristics which differ between races
 As indicated by perceived physical differences and
cloaked in the language of biology
► social
races – groups assumed to have a biological
basis but social constructed
► Racism – systematic social and political bias based
on idea of race
► Operates as a form of class
American Anthropological Assoc.
statement on race
► “Evidence
from the analysis of genetics (e.g.,
DNA) indicates that most physical variation, about
94%, lies within so-called racial groups.
► Conventional geographic ‘racial’ groupings differ
from one another only in about 6% of their
genes….
► ‘Race’ thus evolved as a world view, a body of
prejudgments that distorts our ideas about human
differences and group behavior….
► The ‘racial’ world view was invented to assign
some groups to perpetual low status, while others
were permitted access to privilege, power, and
wealth”
Race: A Brief History
Distribution of Human Skin Color
before 1400 A.D.
Race & Age of Discovery
►
►
Race did not exist until the European expansion and
exploration beginning 1500
ancient Greeks -- first among civilized nations
around the Mediterranean
 did not link physical appearance and cultural attainment.
►
►
►
Ancient Greeks granted civilized status to the Nile
Valley Nubians who were among the darkest
skinned people they knew
did not grant it to European barbarians to the north
who were lighter skinned than they were
People were divided on the basis of religion, class
or language or status
Europe & Race before Age of
Discovery
► up
until 14th cent. in Europe cultural &
social evolution based on the idea of
progress from kinbased societies to civil
society through governance & law
► after 16th cent. in Europe dispositions of
blood distinguished the character of
difference (racist notions of social & cultural
evolution)
After 1500
►
►
European
exploration –
increased
contact with
other human
societies
exploration
turned to
conquest and
Ethnocentric
feeling of
European
superiority
The Enlightenment: 17th & 18th
Century Europe
► race
used interchangeably with type,
variety, people, nation, generation &
species
► race
equated with “breeding stock”
► 1700s
– Enlightenment science
 social phenomena and the world’s peoples
into natural schemes
Formal Human Classification
Linneaus Systemae Naturae, 1758
► Europeaeus
 White; muscular; hair – long, flowing;
eyes blue
► Americanus
 Reddish; erect; hair – black, straight, thick; wide
nostrils
► Asiaticus
 Sallow (yellow); hair black; eyes dark
► Africanus
 Black; hair – black, frizzled; skin silky; nose flat;
lips tumid
1795 Johann Friedrich Blumenbach:
”race” classifications
Malayan
► Ethiopian
► American
► Mongolian
► Caucasian
► coined the term
"Caucasian" because he
believed that the
Caucasus region of Asia
Minor produced "the
most beautiful race of
men".
►
1830s: Philadelphia doctor and
polygenist Samuel Morton
►
►
►
collected hundreds of human skulls of known races
measured them by filling the skulls with lead pellets
and then pouring the pellets into a glass measuring
cup
tables assign the highest brain capacity to
Europeans (with the English highest of all)
 Second rank goes to Chinese, third to Southeast Asians and
Polynesians, fourth to American Indians, and last place to
Africans and Australian aborigines.
 work establish the “scientific basis” for physical
anthropology but also the idea that race is
inherently biological
Stephen Jay Gould:
“The Mis-measure of Man” (1981)
► Re-analyzed
Morton’s
data
 Morton’s racist bias
-- prevented
identification of
fully overlapping
measurements
among the racial
skull samples he
used
Race & Social Status
► Operates
as an ASCRIBED status
► Race and racial differences as a state of
nature
► Sociobiological notion that racism derives
from genes that cause groups to compete
against those who are genetically different
► Nature outside of culture
► Phenotype & blood quantum
Social Status and Affects of “Race”
► Life
chances
► Where you live
► How you are treated
► Access to wealth, power and prestige
► Access to education, housing, and other
valued resources
► Life expectancy
Society & First Nation Health
► Compared
with the Canadian population in 1996,
the First Nations population (on and off reserves)
rated lower on all educational attainment.
► Among
First Nations, the 1996 labour participation
rate was 59% and the employment rate was 43%.
 Rates for Canada as a whole were 68% and 62%,
respectively.
► First
Nations unemployment rate was twice the
Canadian rate in 1996.
Society & First Nation health
► 56.9%
of homes were considered adequate
in 1999--00.
► 33.6% of First Nations communities had at
least 90% of their homes connected to a
community sewage disposal system.
► In 1999, 65 First Nations and Inuit
communities were under a boil water
advisory for varying lengths of time
► Many communicable diseases can be traced
to poor water quality
Variation in recognized “racial” types
►
US
 Bi-racial society
►
Japan
 a nation whose population is greater than 99% born in Japan
 racism in Japan is often not directed so much against people of a
particular race or ethnic group but rather against those who are
non-Japanese
 purity
►
Brazil
 long history with slavery and as a recipient of emigrants from all
over the world
 racial paradise image
 process of whitening -- racial and cultural means through which
outsiders became "Brazilian"
 While racial divisions in Brazil are not clearly defined, class lines are
►
Canada
 Vertical mosaic
Social “Races”
► Geertz
(1973) on culture -- "a historically
transmitted pattern of meanings embodied in
symbols, a system of inherited conceptions
expressed in symbolic forms by means of which
men communicate, perpetuate, and develop their
knowledge about and attitudes toward life“
► Geertz on society – “the pattern of social
interaction”
► Culture & society – “capable of wide range of
modes of integration”
Ethnicity: A Cultural Logic of Race?
► ethnicity
forged in the process of historical
time
► subject to shifts in meaning
 shifts in referents or markers of ethnic identity
► subject
to political manipulations
► ethnic identity is not a function of primordial
ties, although it may be described as such
► always the genesis of specific historical
forces that are simultaneously structural &
cultural
Building Blocks of Ethnicity/Ethnic
Identity
► associated
with distinctions between language,
religion, historical experience, geographic
isolation, kinship, notions of race (phenotype)
► may
include collective name, belief in common
descent, sense of solidarity, association with a
specific territory, clothing, house types, personal
adornment, food, technology, economic activities,
general lifestyle
cultural markers of difference must
be visible to members and nonmembers
► valued
markers of difference by insiders
may become comic or derided by outsiders
► caricature
and exaggeration frequently mark
outsider depictions of boundary mechanisms
 stereotype is one form
ethnicity and boundaries
► where
there is a group there is some sort of
boundary
► where there are boundaries there are
mechanisms for maintaining boundaries
 cultural markers of difference that must be
visible to members and non-members
► Code
switching
► Marked and unmarked categories
Boundary maintenance
► The
ethnic boundary canalizes social life
► Boundaries may also be territorial
► Distinctions between us and them criteria
for judgment of value and performance and
restrictions on interactions
 Allows for the persistence of cultural differences
 Identities are signaled as well as embraced
► All
ethnic groups in a poly-ethnic society act
to maintain dichotomies and differences
ethnogenesis
► fluidity
of ethnic identity
► ethnic groups vanish, people move between
ethnic groups, new ethnic groups come into
existence
► ethnogenesis
 emergence of new ethnic group, part of existing
group splits & forms new ethnic group,
members of two or more groups fuse
Ethnicity, Culture, and Society
► ethnicity
is founded upon structural
inequities among dissimilar groups into a
single political entity -- society
► based
on cultural differences & similarities
perceived as shared -- culture
Ethnicity and class
► Many
poly-ethnic societies are ranked
according to ethnic membership
► May
be a high correlation between ethnicity
and class
Ethnicity as identity formation and
political organization
► Ethnic
groups – those human groups that
entertain a SUBJECTIVE belief in their common
descent because of similarities of physical type or
of customs or of both
► feelings of ethnicity & associated behavior vary in
intensity within groups (& persons) over time &
space
► Belief in group affinity can have important
consequences for the formation of a political
community
“Ethnic” Groups
► Geertz
(1973) on culture -- "a historically
transmitted pattern of meanings embodied in
symbols, a system of inherited conceptions
expressed in symbolic forms by means of which
men communicate, perpetuate, and develop their
knowledge about and attitudes toward life“
► Geertz on society – “the pattern of social
interaction”
► Culture & society – “capable of wide range of
modes of integration”