Race

Christy Chavez                                                                                               September 21^st ,2016

How do you define race?

There are many different arguments about race; I question myself what is race? Moreover, where did it all begin?

The relationship between race as a sociological concept and race as a scientific concept can go hand in hand. Sociological concept is an understanding of questions and ideas asked in sociology. Sociology itself can vary in many different aspects because it can be the study of people, places, or the development of an idea. The scientific concept is an understanding of a study or an understanding of an idea using science. Between both concepts using race, the relationship is the study of science using DNA, skin color, hair shape, eye color and even athletic ability. According to Race and Race theory, it states “At its most basic level, Race can be defining as a concept that signifies and symbolizes sociopolitical conflicts and interests in reference to different types of human bodies. Although the concept of race appeals to biologically based human characteristics (phenotype), selection of these particular human features for purposes of racial signification is always and necessarily a social and historical process” (Winant H., p172).  The idea of race has been going for hundreds of years, in history race has been a method people used to categorized individuals by their skin color. People have made it’s a social construct.  In the film “Race: The Power of an Illusion, Episode 1,” microbiologist Pilar Ossorio stated “There’s as much or more diversity and genetic difference within any racial group as there is between people of different racial groups.”  This film shows that students use their DNA as a genetic code to explore the biology of human variation. In this experiment the students believed that their genetic code would be most similar to someone who physically looked like them. In the end the result was that their genetic code was more similar to someone in a group different then their own. Throughout the film race is proven to be a concept that has nothing to do with genetic variation it is how the idea of race was informed to an individual.

According to society I would be consider Latina, I consider myself Garifuna who falls under as an African American. My mother is Honduran and my father is Guatemalan to society they would be consider Latinos because their counties were colonized by Spain Los Españoles. But just like in America racism exist so does in central America, majority of the coast of Honduras, Guatemala, Belize is fill with Garifuna people. Garifuna people are Black Carib with African Ancestry who were never slaved. I consider myself African American under the idea of my ancestors migrated from Africa to Honduras and Guatemala and my parents migrated to the United States. Which gave me the privilege to be an American.  I believe anyone as an individual you should be able to identify your race; your Skin color should not matter. Even though race will always be a word that is misleading or misunderstood, people has built an image around the word, and  race will always be questioned.

Christy Chavez                                                                                                             September 21^st , 2016

References

1. Sankar, P., Cho, M. K., & Mountain, J. (2007). Race and ethnicity in genetic research. American Journal of Medical Genetics Part A, (961–970)

2. Winant, H (2000). Race and Race Theory. (169-183)

Further Reading

3.Herrera-Paz, E.-F., Matamoros, M., & Carracedo, Ã. (2010). The Garífuna (black Carib) people of the Atlantic coasts of Honduras: Population dynamics, structure, and phylogenetic relations inferred from genetic