Social Categorization Essay

Vincent Nguyen

Professor Mcauley/TA: Arguera

Black Studies 7

27 November 2017

Oppression through Social Categorization

Gender roles and racial discrimination has changed in many ways throughout history as within recent societal representation. In the the early 1900s, woman wore skirts that brushed the floor, belted jackets, fancy dresses etc. In the early 1990s, women wore short dresses, heeled shoes, turtlenecks etc. In fact, every succeeding generation has brought with it different expectations for how races,women and men are viewed within society. Although, we may be more open to expectations than were past generations, there are still expected norms of behavior for women and men in society. For example,“gender roles” means society expects

we tend to focus on them one at a time as if they were separate from one another but they are not. This term that they are connected is called “intersectionality”, for instance, gender discrimination against men/women, can be related, and shaped by their race or ethnicity as well. To put it differently, a person does not experience oppression single handedly, but rather simultaneously. Furthermore, this is seen in the Caribbean “Even where a strong white local elite is present; race is defined socially. Thus it enters into the mechanisms of social mobility and stratification via registrations: physical characteristics, pigmentation, in some indeterminate way, “culture.”. Of these colour is the most visible, the most manifest and hence the handiest way of identifying the different social groups. But colour itself is defined socially: and it too is a composite term. Hence, the distinction between European and African features is ranked on the basis of a European standard. However, Hall continues, when these characteristics are combined with other systems of stratification (education, wealth, occupation, lifestyle, taste, appearance, values) they can socially “lighten” and individual.” (downtown ladies 12). In other words, race is defined per group and thus has different meanings, and these meanings are put into the mechanisms of social mobility and stratification (value is given to achieved status) which could be physical characteristics, pigmentation, and in some way culture to define a person. Moreover, this social mobility can be “lightened” by other factors which is indirectly correlated to a white person's lifestyle because of the consideration of an “education, lifestyle, wealth etc.”. Therefore, further exemplifying the loss of the African community because by obtaining these values of a white person, will the black person become more “socially lightened” and closer to being a real human