During my school years, I largely have been mercifully unaware of the concept of race. I grew up in a military family and have stayed in almost all parts of the country, including few foreign countries as well. Because of constant exposure to varied races and cultures, I have never being particularly distressed with any race and interaction with people from different races has been an integral part of my growing years. Moreover, my family is also not restrictive on race and therefore, I have people of different race in my family life. All these factors don’t make acknowledging racial difference a specific event of my life.
Upon thinking and rambling in the memories of past, I remember one incidence where I specifically realized the intensity of racism and the negative feelings associated with it. The incidence took place when my family moved to military house in North Chicago. Military houses are usually surrounded with families of all race and culture and so was ours. However, when I joined the school, I was bullied by other children who were not white and I was declared to belong to minority community as whites were less in number in that school. I was singled out and was subjected to rebuked and bullied behavior of other non-white children. This event is hazy in my memories because my family stayed in North Chicago for less than a year and soon I moved out from that school. However, upon recollecting I realize that this event marks the point in my life when I truly became aware of race and became subject of the negative feelings associated with it.
The school history doesn’t comprise of category of races efficiently and there is no systematic work pertaining to the description of racism and races in the history textbooks and teaching curriculum (Anderson). The views on races are frequently driven by and associated with the skin color and black people are black because of their skin color. However, a very interesting case has been presented by Anderson, where a family was ruled by the court to be “legally black” because “Phipps family had a traceable amount of black blood” and the United States highest court also adhered to the decision because “rule that defines as black any person with any African-American ancestry despite his or her physical characteristics” (Anderson, p. 88). Racism arises from ethnocentrism which is based on conviction that one religion or culture is superior to others and to this statement; I can relate my life incidence of being singled out and considered as inferior by the non-white children.
The racism and race are the concept of modern era and the ancients of Greek and Romans didn’t classify the human’s superiority and inferiority on the basis of skin color. The diversity and beauty of the humans of different races was appreciated by the ancients without the slightest intention of racism. The conviction of African Americans to be viewed as inferior to Native Americans is defined in history with the fact that European settlers in North America, in their search for slave labor considered African Americans as inferior racially and suited for the servile jobs . European settlers, in order to legalize slavery of African Americans created legal systems that promoted the attacks on Natives and acquired their lands. They invested in white people and promoted them as superior race in comparison to other races present in North America. As stated by Lipsitz, “The possessive investment in whiteness is not a simple matter of black and white” (Lipsitz, p. 2) and all minority groups have been subjected to the racism driven hostility and exploitation. At this point, I would like to draw on my limited experience of racism which was also based on minority, only difference being that in North Chicago white children were in minority and thus, subject to be ostracized socially and bullied.
It is significant for the elimination of racism that children should be taught the truth about race and U.S. history. Presently, the textbook in history states races as the result of different gene pools, observed facts and physical characteristics that are prominent to facilitate differentiation and teaches them there exists different perspectives which determines the ethnicity and race. However, to unite America, it is important that children realize than race is not a product of biology, of natural evolution or of nature rather it the choice of human to segregate themselves in races and is a product of history. Race is an ideology which needs comprehension and explanation and not the blind following. Therefore, race does not define one religion or culture to be superior to others. These are created by humans to fulfill their selfish motives. Children ought to know the history of America that it was rich in resources and the landscapes of North America were so dense with wood that they had to be cut by the colonist to commute. The myths of Indians being the inferior race should be eliminated with the Indians being preserving the Amazon area which was ruined by Columbus. They should be informed that for the race and culture, a common ground exists which is above all the races and cultures. Thus, children need to learn the real facts of race and U.S. history which is not included in textbooks.
Work Cited
Anderson, James D. "How We Learn About Race through History." Lloyd S. Kramer, Donald Reid and William L. Barney. Learning history in America: schools, cultures, and politics. University of Minnesota Press, 1994. 87 - 106.
Cheney, Lynne V. "Former Chair of the National Endowment for the Humanities." n.d.
Lipsitz, George. The possessive investment in whiteness: how white people profit from identity politics. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1998.
Mann, Charles C. "1491: new revelations of the Americas before Columbus." The Atlantic Monthly 2002 March 2006: 41-53.
