The Ambiguity of Race

JenelleWilliams                                                20^th September 2016

            “Things that are thought to to be real are real in their consequences” – Thomas Theorem

For centuries people have been trying to prove whether or not race is “real” or just a myth we can somehow get rid of. There are so many different approaches to this concept we call race. It has different definition both based on geographical location and social structure. The reasoning for trying to prove whether or not race is biological or not varies. 

    As we come to recent years, there are many proven facts that race isn’t a biological or scientifically proven concept. For centuries people spent time trying to prove how “negros” were so different from everyone else, this was called Eugenics. Eugenics was an entire study trying to prove why people of color were inferior to white people. They went as far as examining the “negro ear” or the “negro eye”. Of course, many of their findings weren’t rooted in any scientific facts, everyone doing the research wants to the results to be the same, no one will question the validity of their findings. For years’ people were taught that particular traits were exclusive to specific groups of people with a particular set of physical attributions.

            In later years, as science advances scientist begin to realize the falsity of its previous discoveries. In fact, microbiologist Pilar Ossorio proved with DNA testing that, in fact, we can have more genetic similarity with people outside of our race than with than those that we share the same racial identity with. Although the proof that real has no deeply rooted biological truth, we can’t just decide race isn’t real.

Race may not have any scientific value but it is very real in its experiences and consequences. For centuries people have been granted exclusive access to resources and power or the lack thereof because of the pigment of their skin. We can’t just decide that we’re going to deny the very thing that has created the circumstances in which we live in today. Many of the experiences encountered by people of different racial backgrounds are strategically put in place by those in places of power. Racial projects are the invisible hand of status placement. Racial projects are tools use to change or develop the “interpretation, representation, and or explanation of racial dynamics in efforts to reorganize and redistribute resources along racial lines” (Omi and Winant 93).

As an individual whether or not race was biological never really crossed my mind. My assumption or being one came from cultural similarities, not that there had to be a gene that made us the same but that there were environmental similarities that made us one. I think because my parents and grandparents were born in Trinidad and Tobago and Barbados, and I was born here, and we all were black was one of the things that let me know that there couldn’t be this one common gene that made us all the same for the simple fact that they were in fact very different from the most of the parents of the children I grew up with.

http://www.pbs.org/race/001_WhatIsRace/001_00-home.htm
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eric-cooper/guarding-against-damaging_b_12220386.html?