Racial and Ethnic Differences

Paper Summary:

This paper takes a look at why culture-clash often occurs when different cultures meet and explains that it is often due to ignorance about the other culture, as well as excessive feelings of pride and superiority by the members of one or both cultures.

From the Paper:

"Despite its many claims and indeed efforts to the contrary, the United States of America has always been a country of division and segregation. Race, gender and class differences thus even today play an important role in the construction of society, ethnicity and indeed the social construction of prejudicial views. This means that these prejudicial views regarding the superiority or inferiority of any group of people are socially rather than biologically constructed (Lorber in Rothenburg, 2004, p. 54). The tragic thing about such social constructs is the fact that children grow up without critically examining the potentially erroneous views with which they grew up. Indeed, young boys and girls often grow up voicing and strengthening within themselves the very prejudices advocated to them by their parents. The derogatory phrase, "like a girl" (Messner in Rothenburg, 2004, p. 57), is an example of this. Such expressions signify the deep-seated inequalities still prevalent in society, and how these are reinforced in the young generation."

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