This article shows how different populations respond to race and how perspective can change one’s view on race as a whole. I found this article extremely interesting. The author did a fantastic job painting a picture of the state of racism in America through her studies and research. One piece of information that was huge for me in my understanding of the meaning of this article was the difference between two college campuses, University of Hawaii and Dartmouth.
Velasquez-Manoff wrote about her colleague and her time at Dartmouth, a prestigious school in the northeast that at the time had a white population of 75%. “She encountered a barrage of questions from fellow students. What was her ethnicity? Where was she from? Was she Native Hawaiian?” Immediately, her fellow students began attempting to smack a label to her, trying to figure out ‘What are you?’ in order to put you in that group’s bubble. She described the lunch room at this school as blacks sitting with blacks, whites sitting with whites and so forth down the list of races. Being from hawaii, a very racially accepting place, she was blown away.
Meanwhile, at the University of Hawaii, things were different. The island as a whole Having a very strong ethnic presence, white, is a minority. To mainland Americans, this experience was eye opening. “they suddenly perceive themselves as having a color — a race. And if they’re going to have friends, they’re forced to socialize with nonwhites, which means pushing past their preconceptions.” She went on to talk about a study that showed that these students began to accept race as a fluid concept more and more the longer they spent at the University. To me, these experiences show how perspective can change one’s views of categorization and racial acceptance.
Dr Pauker’s experiences at Dartmouth are very similar to Nguyen’s experiences growing up in western Michigan with a background of being born in Saigon. Nguyen was bombarded with similar questions, “Your name is what?” people would ask. “How do you spell that?” Sometimes they would laugh in my face. “You know what your name looks like, right? Did your parents really name you that?” Both Authors wrote about how these questions made them feel less like a person to them and their peers, and more like an ethnic label. Both of these examples show the lack of awareness of categorizing people as well as the subconscious desire to make sure people who don’t look the same as you, know that they don’t.
I personally have never thought of myself as a member of the white race, however I have thought about other members of other races as that particular race. Being a part of a majority my whole life has made me become blind to my own racial identity. After reading this article I am just now seeing a problem with that.
