Category: Haney López

Cultural studies

Post author By Syndicated User
Post date November 5, 2013

I really enjoyed this week’s reading I think that like gender and feminist studies and theory ethnic literary and cultural studies really talk about current and important issues. One of the things that stood out to me was a quote by Haney Lopez, which stated “Race may be American’s single most confounding problem, but the confounding problem of race is that few people seem to know what race is”(966) I think this really describes much of the racial discrimination and problems. One of the reasons why it is so hard to define “Race” is because race its self is not a biological aspect but a social construct Lopez mentions that: “the referents of terms like Black and White are social groups, not genetically distinct branches of human kind” (966). That is why the personal example Lopez gives of him and his brother and how both are half Salvadorian and half Irish but he considers himself Latino but his brother identifies more with the Anglo side of the family. Showing that race really is a construct and the individual plays a role in defining himself. Yet self-definition of what race is not the only thing that defines what race we are but also other social aspects. Lopez highlights that the law has always influenced our concept of race he says “law serves not only to reflect but to solidify social prejudice making law a prime instrument in the construction and reinforcements of racial subordination”(965) Like the Hudgins V. Wright who decided how to determine some one’s race and set a precedent for the future. Another thing that caught my attention was the notion of the time when Irish became white how they passed form not being discriminated to being part of the white supremacist culture. Showing how this is a constructed idea and can change (maybe someday we will all become part of it). But why doesn’t it change? Well Fishkin says that the reason is that everyone overvalues “whiteness” not just white people but everyone and reminds me of many racist comments Spanish people say and how they overvalue whiteness (of course here I’m overgeneralizing). But in conclusion because race is constructed it can also be deconstructed and this should be our aim to have a race-less world (and genderless too).

Anzaldua Haney López

A sad history of racism

Post author By Syndicated User
Post date November 5, 2013

In the text “The Social Construction of Race”, by Ian F. Haney López, I think there are some important statements that deconstruct the social (or hegemonic, in terms of Gramsci, we might say) common ideas about “race”. For instance, he says: “[T]he confounding problem of race is that few people seem to know what race is” (966). Of course, these few people aren’t owners of a truth. He also says this important statement: “Race is neither an essence nor an illusion, but rather an ongoing, contradictory, self-reinforcing, plastic process subject to the macro forces of social an political struggle and the micro effects of daily decisions” (966). Finally, in the section “Biological Race”, he puts over the table the most convincing argument against the believe of the existence of races: “Rather, the notion that humankind can be divided along White, Black, and Yellow lines reveals the social rather than the scientific origin of race” (967).

I’ve lived in a country (Perú) for 25 years where these ideas are very far for being part of the social and political discourse. The roots of racism in Perú could be traced since pre-Hispanic times. The last Empire before the arrive of the Spaniards, the Quechuas (miscalled Inkas; the Inka was the Emperor, only him has that title; the society were the Quechuas) subjected other cultures to theirs, forcing them to move from their territories, to change their language, religion, etc. Then, the Spaniards came and did the same and worst. They made a distinction from them and the “Indians”. But then, emerged the “criollos” (the descendants of Spaniards borned in Perú); the “mestizos” (descendants of Spaniards and “Indians”); etc, etc. In the XVIII century the mixture provoked, that the viceroy of that time, Manuel de Amat y Juniet (famous for his romance with the popular actress called the “Perricholi”) entrusted a “scientific” work to determine the “races” in Perú.

Unfortunately, in Perú the “racial” (and “classist”) discourse is still present. “Whites” (most of them in Lima) against “mestizos” (contemptuously called “cholos”) and “indios” (from the Andes and the Amazonia) and vice versa; “whites against “blacks” or “mulatos” and vice versa; “blacks and “mulatos” against “mestizos” and “indios” and vice versa; etc. That is why some people say that in Perú there is no nation, but a mixture of nations in constant conflict. A terrible example of this is the “rule” that some “exclusive” discos have in Lima: “Se reserva el derecho de admisión” [“The right of admission is reserved”]. It means, only “white” people could enter. If one is not white, then have to pay a huge amount of money or simply received a stupid excuse such as that there is a private party or something like that. Many of these cases have been denounced and the owners of the discos still doing the same (they pay the fine and they continue). Some comments are made, but in a few days everything continues to be the same.

The text of Gloria Anzaldua (I like it very much), also reminds me another type of discrimination in Perú: the linguistic. People who come from the Andes to the coast and whose native language is the Quechua or other than Spanish, are discriminated: “they don’t speak well, they are ignorant”. But also among native Spanish speakers exists discrimination. Some people, for instance, say “dijistes” (you said) instead of “dijiste”, which is the rule. Then, when someone says that word, is consider also an ignorant for not speak in an “adequate” Spanish.

So, with all these I want to emphasize that even it is already known that races a social construction, societies (or some of them) still practice racism. Why? Maybe because we still have some prehistoric elements or simply because we feel a terrible fear of the other.

Just to finish with an irony of a connoted Political Scientist in Perú: “I am privileged in this country [Perú]: I am white in a racist society; I am of the middle-class in a classist society; I am heterosexual in a homophobic society”.

Here a recent and very interesting documental about racism in Perú with English subtitles:

Fanon Haney López

So ….What is race?

Post author By Syndicated User
Post date November 4, 2013

This is the question of the week. We often hear that term, but do we really know what it entails? “Race” is one of these words that make me uncomfortable. I don’t understand it, I don’t know what people mean when they use “it” and I am even more lost when somebody ask me about […]