Sociological Perspective Reflection Week #7 Essay

pdf

School

Dartmouth College *

*We aren’t endorsed by this school

Course

210

Subject

Sociology

Date

Nov 24, 2024

Type

pdf

Pages

Uploaded by ProfWildcatMaster683

Intro to Sociology - Najifa Tanjeem April 10th, 2023 - Reflection Essay #5 Shreya Mishra When we apply the intersectionality theory, it is clear that race and appearance as well as class (access to affordable education, and home ownership in a safe area for example), have played a significant role in increasing structural inequality since these factors continue to affect personal wealth growth, job and education opportunities, safety, etc. Over the years, whites have benefitted and African Americans have been negatively impacted in many ways such as unemployment, income, mortgage loan risk, and land as well as home ownership in safe neighborhoods which is a significant indicator of personal wealth, etc as explained in the examples below (Reference #1 “Racial Wealth Gap” Netflix) The ultimate objective in narrowing the wealth gap is to attain equality and right now race and class determine the current gap between whites and African Americans. If we were to compare the median wealth (savings + assets - debts) of a white family and an African-American family, the values are $171,000 vs $17,600 respectively and the gap in 2018 is higher than it was at any time in the past. While the white family's median wealth has grown over time (except for a dip in 2008), the value for black families has remained unchanged in the graph at 1:44 in the video (“Racial Wealth Gap”, Reference#1). Cory Booker says “... the racial wealth gap speaks to the fact that we have a long way to go.” Wealth is important because it grows over time and across generations due to compound interest and inflation-adjusted returns from the stock market year after year. For example, $100 in 1863 would be worth $3.5 million in 2018. Here are some examples of gaps that exist purely because of race, African Americans' unemployment rate was approximately 10% compared to 5% for whites in 1954 and that trend continues even today though the rate has reduced, there is a higher chance they will be unemployed. African

Americans earn much less than whites on average and also face employment discrimination today. Wealth inequality over time is apparent in land and housing since the video says that home equity represents about two-thirds of the wealth of the middle class . For example, buying a house in a good neighborhood would also lead to a better standard of education for children, provide more job opportunities, higher safety (ranked from A through D, Intro to sociology, week 11 slides), and the home value would also appreciate over time as well as offer the family a chance for upward mobility, for example (to the middle class like Corey Booker’s family). However, obtaining a mortgage was not easy for African Americans because the mortgage risk was linked to race since black homeowners were seen as threats to housing prices. So loans weren’t insured in areas with more black families. While government homeownership programs were created as a part of the new deal, they also ranked areas, where black residents lived as the lowest (“D”) and marked them in red on maps implying their property values, would depreciate. This continued until 1968 when the fair housing act was passed. Therefore, the opportunity to own a home and grow personal wealth was directly affected. (Reverend Jessie Jackson says at 1:54 that “... we have the right to go to any school in America, but we can’t pay the tuition.”), In 1970, black homeownership was 41.6% compared to the average of 62.9%. Also, African Americans were twice as likely to get subprime mortgages (that didn’t require a down payment but were risky loans) 52.9% vs 26.1% for whites, and even African American borrowers with good credit (21.4%). After the financial crash of 2008, black communities lost 53% of their wealth compared to 16% for whites. Clearly, race played a huge factor in all of this. Corey Booker mentions his family’s difficult and challenging experience in buying a house in a white neighborhood. However, once they were able to do so, their lives changed

completely, and his father moved from poverty to the middle class when he was able to buy and sell houses in a white neighborhood that boosted their personal wealth. ● The sociological concepts that stood out most to me are eugenics, prejudice, and Institutional Discrimination/Racism like slavery and exclusionary immigration policies. Eugenics is definitely an extreme concept, especially with forced sterilizations for individuals with mental illness and epilepsy for example, and killing people (euthanasia) with physical and mental issues and inferior genetic traits like the nazis did in the 1930s and during world war II (Reference #2) so that superior genetic traits could be preserved in society. In the United States “...Thirty states adopted eugenic sterilization laws, which together accounted for the forced sterilization of approximately 60,000 Americans.” Prejudice is based on biased and negative attitudes that develop toward an ethnic or racial group based on incorrect assumptions about them. These stereotypes (“...overgeneralizations about all members of a group that do not recognize individual differences within the group” Intro to Sociology, Week 11 slides) usually develop based on events that affect society like the COVID pandemic that originated in China but had nothing to do with Asian Americans or Asian residents living here who have been targeted by hate crimes only because of their appearance. Some cultural racism also played a part in the manner in which they were targeted. Two examples of Institutional Discrimination involving racial and ethnic bias in immigration policies are the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 and the 1924 Immigration Act – National Origin Quota Policies to determine who has preference to enter the country. The Chinese exclusion act (Reference #3) was the first and only federal action to stop a specific nationality from immigrating to the U.S., including both skilled and unskilled workers. For example, Chinese miners performed difficult and dangerous jobs, plus many laborers were

Your preview ends here

Eager to read complete document? Join bartleby learn and gain access to the full version

Access to all documents
Unlimited textbook solutions
24/7 expert homework help

involved in railroad construction and were very good at their jobs, but this also resulted in racial hatred and stereotyping by white Americans. The exclusion act was the starting point for restricting immigrants by country and also establishing criteria for admitting people by ethnicity, gender, and class. For example, while there was no restriction on Western European immigrants from Great Britain or Germany the immigration act of 1924 “... severely limited the number of southern and eastern Europeans who could enter the U.S. each year and almost completely barred all immigrants from Asia” (Reference #2). The article also states the eugenics movement was responsible in part for the 1924 immigration act. References: 1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mqrhn8khGLM 2. https://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/human-testing-the-eugenics-movement-and-irbs-724/ 3. www.britannica.com/topic/chinese-exclusion-act

Related Documents

The Impact of Social Media on Teenagers: A Critical Analysis

Reflection Paper #1.docx

Order 484.doc

Lesson 11 Assignment 1.32.docx

Global Citizen Reflection.edited.docx

440574102 _assignment.docx

Controversial Topics Essay.pdf

Why Cyberbullying Should Be Treated as A Punishable Crime.docx

Exploring the Anthropocene: Week 11 Practice Quiz Insights

Tarea 6.1 ETHI1010-3100ONL.docx

TEST ORDER.docx

Community Social Work.docx

Recommended textbooks for you

Social Psychology (10th Edition)

Sociology

ISBN:9780134641287

Author:Elliot Aronson, Timothy D. Wilson, Robin M. Akert, Samuel R. Sommers

Publisher:Pearson College Div

Introduction to Sociology (Eleventh Edition)

Sociology

ISBN:9780393639407

Author:Deborah Carr, Anthony Giddens, Mitchell Duneier, Richard P. Appelbaum

Publisher:W. W. Norton & Company

The Basics of Social Research (MindTap Course Lis...

Sociology

ISBN:9781305503076

Author:Earl R. Babbie

Publisher:Cengage Learning

Criminalistics: An Introduction to Forensic Scien...

Sociology

ISBN:9780134477596

Author:Saferstein, Richard

Publisher:PEARSON

Sociology: A Down-to-Earth Approach (13th Edition)

Sociology

ISBN:9780134205571

Author:James M. Henslin

Publisher:PEARSON

Society: The Basics (14th Edition)

Sociology

ISBN:9780134206325

Author:John J. Macionis

Publisher:PEARSON

SEE MORE TEXTBOOKS

Recommended textbooks for you

Social Psychology (10th Edition)
Sociology
ISBN:9780134641287
Author:Elliot Aronson, Timothy D. Wilson, Robin M. Akert, Samuel R. Sommers
Publisher:Pearson College Div
Introduction to Sociology (Eleventh Edition)
Sociology
ISBN:9780393639407
Author:Deborah Carr, Anthony Giddens, Mitchell Duneier, Richard P. Appelbaum
Publisher:W. W. Norton & Company
The Basics of Social Research (MindTap Course Lis...
Sociology
ISBN:9781305503076
Author:Earl R. Babbie
Publisher:Cengage Learning
Criminalistics: An Introduction to Forensic Scien...
Sociology
ISBN:9780134477596
Author:Saferstein, Richard
Publisher:PEARSON
Sociology: A Down-to-Earth Approach (13th Edition)
Sociology
ISBN:9780134205571
Author:James M. Henslin
Publisher:PEARSON
Society: The Basics (14th Edition)
Sociology
ISBN:9780134206325
Author:John J. Macionis
Publisher:PEARSON