Before the lecture, I didn’t know much about the the terms other than their basic definitions. I watched the three videos given to us which gave me a much greater understanding of each term (racism and discrimination especially). The talk that Clint Smith did on how he was raised was especially informative because I had never thought about it from that perspective before. I thought the reading we were given from Giddens was also really helpful in describing ethnicity and discrimination in a more detailed way.
These were my initial thoughts on what each term meant:
- Race – Your race is the social/cultural background that a you come from. I then moved on to thinking about racism, which is when somebody is discriminated against directly because of their race. This can be for many reasons but the first one I thought of was because some people may have the mindset that their race is more superior than others.
- Ethnicity – The social/cultural background that a person is born in/grows up in where they share the same culture, language and history etc. They may also follow the same beliefs because it could be a tradition of that certain ethnic background to follow a specific religion.
- Prejudice – When you make a prejudgment on somebody but do not have any facts or evidence to back it up. This can also involve being bias or hostile towards someone for no real reason.
- Discrimination – Mistreating someone or treating them unfairly. This could be due to their race, age, gender or religion etc.
During the lecture, we were told more about each term and how significantly they affected so many people’s lives. I did already know that racism has been a massive issue in the past and definitely still is nowadays but it is still so shocking to hear stories about how far racism can go. This can be seen clearly in various examples we were given during the lecture, but one story stuck with me in particular.
Emmet Till was a young boy who was accused of ‘flirting’ with the woman in a store and was then brutally murdered because of it. The case was taken to court but purely because Emmet and his Uncle (who was identifying the killers) were black and the accused was white, the jury made a quick decision to clear all charges. Only this year, the woman admitted that she had fabricated the whole story and that Emmet was completely innocent. Circumstances like this highlight how racism can escalate to shocking levels, even taking the lives of the innocent.
After the input, I rewatched the video which showed Clint Smith talking about his childhood and how his parents brought him up and found it even more powerful. He explained that he had to be raised with different rules to his white friends because of how others may perceive the actions of a black child in comparison to a white one. The fact that two kids could be treated differently for taking part in the same action solely because of the colour of their skin highlights the level of inequality and prejudice against ethnic minorities.
Before this lecture my understanding of racism and discrimination was fairly basic and looking at the resources provided, plus the lecture lead by Derek, really made me think more into the present significance of racism. It is vital for people who are potentially going to be teaching children to understand how important it is to be accepting and treat everybody equally, no matter what ethnic background someone may come from.
