Culture that perpetuates the myth of racial categories

Culture that perpetuates the myth of racial categories

The goal of this discussion is to allow you to analytically and creatively examine the unit’s concepts. Through productive discourse with your classmates, you can expand your thinking to consider other points of view and experiences, and challenge each other to see different analytical perspectives. To do so, it is important to write clearly, give reference or context for your examples so that they are understood, and include citations for the source of the points that you make. Use evidence based claims to support your positions and use a sociological perspective when constructing your posts.

Directions

Find an example from media or popular culture that perpetuates the myth of racial categories as inherent, fixed, and natural; and describe how it perpetuates the false idea that race is biological. Some examples include DNA tests that define one’s race; diseases that are described to only effect a single race; character traits or physical abilities that are referred to as being ‘natural’ in relation to a racial or ethnic group.

Describe what messages are sent by this example, as well as the social impact.

You must proofread your paper. But do not strictly rely on your computer’s spell-checker and grammar-checker; failure to do so indicates a lack of effort on your part and you can expect your grade to suffer accordingly. Papers with numerous misspelled words and grammatical mistakes will be penalized. Read over your paper – in silence and then aloud – before handing it in and make corrections as necessary. Often it is advantageous to have a friend proofread your paper for obvious errors. Handwritten corrections are preferable to uncorrected mistakes.

Use a standard 10 to 12 point (10 to 12 characters per inch) typeface. Smaller or compressed type and papers with small margins or single-spacing are hard to read. It is better to let your essay run over the recommended number of pages than to try to compress it into fewer pages.

Likewise, large type, large margins, large indentations, triple-spacing, increased leading (space between lines), increased kerning (space between letters), and any other such attempts at “padding” to increase the length of a paper are unacceptable, wasteful of trees, and will not fool your professor.

The paper must be neatly formatted, double-spaced with a one-inch margin on the top, bottom, and sides of each page. When submitting hard copy, be sure to use white paper and print out using dark ink. If it is hard to read your essay, it will also be hard to follow your argument.