The documentary “Chocolate City” began with the sound of bongos, and people rapping “black on black, now it’s black on white.” The point of the rap was to show how much the demographics of Southeast D.C. have changed over the past couple of years. A program called Hoped VI was implemented in the city, which destroyed public housing and brought in mixed economies, which essentially ran out the lower class. The director of the movie showed the neighborhood of Arthur Capper, which featured run-down apartments, some of which did not even have any doors or windows. The director of the movie interviewed people from this community, who voiced their opinions about how invisible they feel. One lady, who was filmed multiple times throughout the movie, expressed how she felt all the government cared about was money, and that they wanted the poor black people to move out in order to bring in white upper-class people.
The people of Arthur Capper talked about how they were forced out of their homes, and were told that they were allowed to move back in soon. One woman, however, had been out of her home for three years, and it didn’t look like they had done anything to her apartment. One instance, the kids of Arthur Capper wrote up a petition and went around the whole neighborhood in order to keep the Recreational Center, which they were able to do. The adults realized that if the kids could do it, that they could too. The movie director created her own play write, where she impersonated the people of the city, with the purpose of letting others know their struggle. I had no idea that this was even going on in D.C., even though I live so close. I feel horrible for them and can’t ever imagine that happening to me.
Saturday, April 26, 2008
Thursday, April 24, 2008
assignment 3
Cassie O’Donnell
WMST250
ASSIGNMENT 3-B
Ana’s Section
The Analysis of Everyday Life
The Matrix of Domination is a theory that explains issues of oppression that deal with class, race, and gender. Although they are recognized as different social classifications, they are all in ways interconnected.
Being a young, white, female coming from an upper/middle class family, power is located in many different places throughout my everyday life. I view power on one hand, as a positive thing, an advantage, opportunity, choices/decisions, and especially privilege, and on the other hand, power can be negative, limited, constraint, and especially oppression. Although I realize that I may be oppressed in some circumstances, I find myself very privileged as well. Ways in which I feel that I am privileged is by race, class, gender, health, religion, education, ect.
Race: I feel that I am privileged by my race because I am white. Many whites have an opportunity to get a good education, a good job, health care, etc. I find that many other races are faced with daily struggles such as trying to get a good education and get a good job. It seems to come easier for the white race rather than other races. I don’t agree with this idea; however I find myself being favored due to the color of my skin.
Class: Because I am classified as middle/upper class citizen, I am given many opportunities that others in a lower social class do not have. For instance, education is easier for my family to afford rather than others. Many lower-class families do not have well paying jobs, which makes it difficult for them to support their families, let alone pay for their children’s education. Because many families cannot afford to put their children through college, the child often works to pay for their own education. This is something I never had to worry about. My father pays for my college education, which allows me to solely focus on school. I don’t think I could handle working through college; I would be too stressed out. You find that many students drop out because they can no longer afford to put themselves through school. Without a good college education, their chances of getting a well paying job are small. Sadly, they will probably end up taking a low-paying job just to get by, which will never allow them to get ahead.
Health insurance and medical care is also a benefit of being a middle/upper class citizen. This is something that many lower-class families are not given which makes it difficult for them to be seen by a doctor if sick or any other emergency. My family lives comfortably and we still wouldn’t be able to afford doctor visits without insurance, the price is too outrageous. I couldn’t imagine not being able to take my child to the doctors when he/she is sick so they can get the proper medical attention. I would be devastated.
Coming from a middle/upper class family also allows me to enjoy luxurious things. I live in a nice community, where there is little crime. I live in a nice home. I have nice clothing, and am able to do extra things such as dinning out, shopping, movies, vacationing, etc. Vacationing is a tradition in my family. We vacation at least once or twice a year. I just visited Jamaica this winter. I found it surprising that other families don’t vacation regularly. I never really realized that vacationing is a privilege, not everyone can afford it.
Gender: Being a female (especially white) allows me to have many options. Career-wise, I can explore alternate career paths. I can choose between staying home with my children or working outside of the home. Many men don’t have this option because they aren’t considered "masculine" if they decide to partake in the woman’s "role" and be the stay-at-home "mom". Men are portrayed as the breadwinner. Most men are not okay with their wives supporting their family. I also find that this is an opportunity that many white women get. While other women of different races such as African American are limited to their career options. One reason is due to the high divorce rate in African American marriages. Many women are single mothers raising their children. Lower-class women are willing to accept the most hazardous and demeaning jobs our economy has to offer because they have no other options.
Giving birth is another advantage of being a female. This is something that sets us apart from men, making us very unique. Women are often given maternity leave, which takes a lot of stress off the mother. Public policies often offer opportunities for mothers to bond with their children.
Women are also allowed to express themselves more freely rather than men. Women are also not ashamed to ask for advice from others, while men are more exposed to the dangers of self-reliance.
Religion: My family practices the Catholic faith. Being religious allows me to have something to believe in. Religion gives me guidelines to follow during my day to day life. I feel that I practice good morals and values through my religion. I am constantly thinking about how I can better myself so I can have a happy after life. Religion also gives me hope and faith that I can break through the hardships of everyday life.
American Citizen: Being an American Citizen is a great advantage. It allows us to be free, independent, and have choices. For instance, many countries control how many children couples are allowed to have, what type of government they abide by, etc. In our country, we are allowed to have our own career choices. Education is available to everyone. We have the right to vote, which allows us to choose our own government. I am able to decide when and where I get married. I can decide how many children I want and whether or not I want to stay home with them. I have the opportunity to work outside of the home and becoming independent. Women no longer need to depend on their husbands. We are given health care and welfare to those who cannot afford to support their families. These are many privileges that we have that many other citizens of other countries do not. People don’t realize what it’s like to not have these options. We tend to take these privileges for granted.
Health: I feel very privileged that I as well as my family is very healthy. Many families are faced with many hardships when it comes to taking care of a family member that is handicapped or dying from a terminal illness. Having to care for a person with disabilities can be very expensive and time consuming. This causes many families to go into debt because their medical bills are so high. This is another reason why families can’t afford to live in their homes, support their family, and send their children to college. I am very fortunate and grateful that this is something that my family does not have to deal with.
Although I find myself being very privileged, I also find myself facing limitations throughout my everyday life through race, class, gender, religion, etc.
Race: Being white can also have some disadvantages. I often feel that I am viewed as racists or hated because of slavery. I find myself being uncomfortable around some African Americans because they are still angry with White’s today. I often feel like I am judged because I am white. People are quick to assume that I live an easy life because of my race, which makes it difficult for me to connect with people of a different race. Another way I find that I am limited when it comes to my race is when it comes to education. I find that many minorities get special treatment such as, college grants, or scholarships because they are minority. I find that in my college the population is predominately minority. I often feel like I am the minority in class.
Class: I find that being upper class has some disadvantages as well. I do not qualify for certain grants or scholarships for college because my father makes good money. I tried to get a loan on my own and I was denied. What if my father decided to stop paying for my college education? How would I continue to go?
My parents tend to pay for everything, which I find to be a disadvantage to me. I’m 21 years old with no credit because my parents want to pay for everything. How would I be able to buy a home when I decided to leave my parent’s home without credit? I often fear moving out of my parents home and going out into the "real" world because I don’t know how I would survive. I have been very sheltered by my parents, and I have never had to do anything on my own. I have never been taught to have any responsibilities. This is a huge setback for me because I am at the age where I want to become more independent.
Religion: I often feel that religion is a big limitation for me. The Catholic religion is very strict and structured. Although I am free and should be allowed to marry whom I wish, my religion says otherwise. If I want to marry, my husband has to be Catholic as well. My current boyfriend is Protestant and in order for us to marry he must convert. If he wishes not to, then our church will not recognize us as "married".
Another example was my best friend’s daughter’s Baptism. The priest did not want to baptize her baby because she was not married to the baby’s father. I don’t feel like that is fair to the baby. She also wanted me to be the godmother but the priest disagreed because I didn’t attend church every Sunday. I was hurt when the priest told me I don’t practice my faith because I don’t attend church regularly. I still practice my faith in other ways such as prayer, my lifestyle, confession, etc. Although I don’t agree with my church 100 percent, I could never leave the church because my family would be devastated. I feel like that is a disadvantage to me because I practice a religion that I at times don’t agree with.
Government: The government can be a privilege however it can also be a disadvantage. Often, the government gets too much power. The Government has most influence on the way we live our lives. For example, they have a set of rules that everyone has to abide by whether they agree or not. They run the way our schools operate. They try to control what happens in our community. Our president ultimately decides what actions we take as a whole Country (ex: the war). I feel that people are often picked on by the government. In many cases I find that other races such as African Americans, Hispanics/Latinos, Asians, etc. are targeted by the police more so than whites. In that case, I have an advantage over the other races; however, I dislike the fact that the government has so much control over us.
Gender: I often feel limited by being female. I feel that oppression by sex is one of the biggest problems in my life and probably for many other women like me as well. I get the impression that women are viewed as unintelligent, physically weaker, having less power and less prestige then men.
I feel like men view women as an “object” rather than a human being. Women are so concerned about their image that they tend to make that their top priority. I can’t tell you how many articles I have read that has to do with ways women can improve themselves to make them more appealing, sexy, liked, etc. The media portrays women as a sex symbol, and if you’re not sexy, you’re not successful. I can relate to this as well because I am not happy with my image either. I am a size five, yet I still don’t feel sexy because the women I see on T.V. are unrealistically thin. No matter how much I diet and exercise I cannot get down to a size zero.
Women are often limited to what type of career they can choose as well. I find that when I apply for a job as a server or a hostess, the employees tell me that their manager says, “She can have the job as long as she’s hot”. That puts a lot of pressure on me and I’m sure a lot of other women as well.
Women are often faced with the issue of whether or not they should work outside of the home or stay home with their children. On one hand, I feel that I am at a disadvantage if I decide to work outside of the home because I will be missing time with my children. I strongly believe that children’s growth during their younger years is most crucial. Children start off as blank slates, what you write on those slates through teaching and doing is what they will learn. I want to be the one to teach my children family values, morals, religion, respect, etc. I feel that it is my duty as a parent to teach my children those things and I don’t want a day-care provider to do it for me.
On the other hand, many judge women for working outside of the home instead of staying home with the children. Many people today think the old traditionalist way that a woman’s place is at home with her family caring for her children and husband, as well as cooking and cleaning. I find this to be a form of oppression because it is not fair to expect a woman to stay home if that isn’t what she wants to do. I have big dreams of becoming a lawyer, yet people frown upon me. I don’t want to be judged for doing something that brings me success and happiness. I sometimes find others comments to be discouraging and I sometimes second guess myself, however I just strive harder towards my goals.
I often find myself getting easily distracted by the negative notions of power that surrounds me. I allow myself to become setback by the limitations that I struggle with on a daily basis. Doing this project has made me realize that everyone is privileged and oppressed in some way. Overall, I am given many more opportunities in life than disadvantages. I can’t change the way society is, however I can work towards breaking the oppressions and limitations that keep me from growing. Yes, I know I am a young white middle class female with limitations; however I am going to work hard to achieve my goals, and hopefully one day I can break those chains.
WMST250
ASSIGNMENT 3-B
Ana’s Section
The Analysis of Everyday Life
The Matrix of Domination is a theory that explains issues of oppression that deal with class, race, and gender. Although they are recognized as different social classifications, they are all in ways interconnected.
Being a young, white, female coming from an upper/middle class family, power is located in many different places throughout my everyday life. I view power on one hand, as a positive thing, an advantage, opportunity, choices/decisions, and especially privilege, and on the other hand, power can be negative, limited, constraint, and especially oppression. Although I realize that I may be oppressed in some circumstances, I find myself very privileged as well. Ways in which I feel that I am privileged is by race, class, gender, health, religion, education, ect.
Race: I feel that I am privileged by my race because I am white. Many whites have an opportunity to get a good education, a good job, health care, etc. I find that many other races are faced with daily struggles such as trying to get a good education and get a good job. It seems to come easier for the white race rather than other races. I don’t agree with this idea; however I find myself being favored due to the color of my skin.
Class: Because I am classified as middle/upper class citizen, I am given many opportunities that others in a lower social class do not have. For instance, education is easier for my family to afford rather than others. Many lower-class families do not have well paying jobs, which makes it difficult for them to support their families, let alone pay for their children’s education. Because many families cannot afford to put their children through college, the child often works to pay for their own education. This is something I never had to worry about. My father pays for my college education, which allows me to solely focus on school. I don’t think I could handle working through college; I would be too stressed out. You find that many students drop out because they can no longer afford to put themselves through school. Without a good college education, their chances of getting a well paying job are small. Sadly, they will probably end up taking a low-paying job just to get by, which will never allow them to get ahead.
Health insurance and medical care is also a benefit of being a middle/upper class citizen. This is something that many lower-class families are not given which makes it difficult for them to be seen by a doctor if sick or any other emergency. My family lives comfortably and we still wouldn’t be able to afford doctor visits without insurance, the price is too outrageous. I couldn’t imagine not being able to take my child to the doctors when he/she is sick so they can get the proper medical attention. I would be devastated.
Coming from a middle/upper class family also allows me to enjoy luxurious things. I live in a nice community, where there is little crime. I live in a nice home. I have nice clothing, and am able to do extra things such as dinning out, shopping, movies, vacationing, etc. Vacationing is a tradition in my family. We vacation at least once or twice a year. I just visited Jamaica this winter. I found it surprising that other families don’t vacation regularly. I never really realized that vacationing is a privilege, not everyone can afford it.
Gender: Being a female (especially white) allows me to have many options. Career-wise, I can explore alternate career paths. I can choose between staying home with my children or working outside of the home. Many men don’t have this option because they aren’t considered "masculine" if they decide to partake in the woman’s "role" and be the stay-at-home "mom". Men are portrayed as the breadwinner. Most men are not okay with their wives supporting their family. I also find that this is an opportunity that many white women get. While other women of different races such as African American are limited to their career options. One reason is due to the high divorce rate in African American marriages. Many women are single mothers raising their children. Lower-class women are willing to accept the most hazardous and demeaning jobs our economy has to offer because they have no other options.
Giving birth is another advantage of being a female. This is something that sets us apart from men, making us very unique. Women are often given maternity leave, which takes a lot of stress off the mother. Public policies often offer opportunities for mothers to bond with their children.
Women are also allowed to express themselves more freely rather than men. Women are also not ashamed to ask for advice from others, while men are more exposed to the dangers of self-reliance.
Religion: My family practices the Catholic faith. Being religious allows me to have something to believe in. Religion gives me guidelines to follow during my day to day life. I feel that I practice good morals and values through my religion. I am constantly thinking about how I can better myself so I can have a happy after life. Religion also gives me hope and faith that I can break through the hardships of everyday life.
American Citizen: Being an American Citizen is a great advantage. It allows us to be free, independent, and have choices. For instance, many countries control how many children couples are allowed to have, what type of government they abide by, etc. In our country, we are allowed to have our own career choices. Education is available to everyone. We have the right to vote, which allows us to choose our own government. I am able to decide when and where I get married. I can decide how many children I want and whether or not I want to stay home with them. I have the opportunity to work outside of the home and becoming independent. Women no longer need to depend on their husbands. We are given health care and welfare to those who cannot afford to support their families. These are many privileges that we have that many other citizens of other countries do not. People don’t realize what it’s like to not have these options. We tend to take these privileges for granted.
Health: I feel very privileged that I as well as my family is very healthy. Many families are faced with many hardships when it comes to taking care of a family member that is handicapped or dying from a terminal illness. Having to care for a person with disabilities can be very expensive and time consuming. This causes many families to go into debt because their medical bills are so high. This is another reason why families can’t afford to live in their homes, support their family, and send their children to college. I am very fortunate and grateful that this is something that my family does not have to deal with.
Although I find myself being very privileged, I also find myself facing limitations throughout my everyday life through race, class, gender, religion, etc.
Race: Being white can also have some disadvantages. I often feel that I am viewed as racists or hated because of slavery. I find myself being uncomfortable around some African Americans because they are still angry with White’s today. I often feel like I am judged because I am white. People are quick to assume that I live an easy life because of my race, which makes it difficult for me to connect with people of a different race. Another way I find that I am limited when it comes to my race is when it comes to education. I find that many minorities get special treatment such as, college grants, or scholarships because they are minority. I find that in my college the population is predominately minority. I often feel like I am the minority in class.
Class: I find that being upper class has some disadvantages as well. I do not qualify for certain grants or scholarships for college because my father makes good money. I tried to get a loan on my own and I was denied. What if my father decided to stop paying for my college education? How would I continue to go?
My parents tend to pay for everything, which I find to be a disadvantage to me. I’m 21 years old with no credit because my parents want to pay for everything. How would I be able to buy a home when I decided to leave my parent’s home without credit? I often fear moving out of my parents home and going out into the "real" world because I don’t know how I would survive. I have been very sheltered by my parents, and I have never had to do anything on my own. I have never been taught to have any responsibilities. This is a huge setback for me because I am at the age where I want to become more independent.
Religion: I often feel that religion is a big limitation for me. The Catholic religion is very strict and structured. Although I am free and should be allowed to marry whom I wish, my religion says otherwise. If I want to marry, my husband has to be Catholic as well. My current boyfriend is Protestant and in order for us to marry he must convert. If he wishes not to, then our church will not recognize us as "married".
Another example was my best friend’s daughter’s Baptism. The priest did not want to baptize her baby because she was not married to the baby’s father. I don’t feel like that is fair to the baby. She also wanted me to be the godmother but the priest disagreed because I didn’t attend church every Sunday. I was hurt when the priest told me I don’t practice my faith because I don’t attend church regularly. I still practice my faith in other ways such as prayer, my lifestyle, confession, etc. Although I don’t agree with my church 100 percent, I could never leave the church because my family would be devastated. I feel like that is a disadvantage to me because I practice a religion that I at times don’t agree with.
Government: The government can be a privilege however it can also be a disadvantage. Often, the government gets too much power. The Government has most influence on the way we live our lives. For example, they have a set of rules that everyone has to abide by whether they agree or not. They run the way our schools operate. They try to control what happens in our community. Our president ultimately decides what actions we take as a whole Country (ex: the war). I feel that people are often picked on by the government. In many cases I find that other races such as African Americans, Hispanics/Latinos, Asians, etc. are targeted by the police more so than whites. In that case, I have an advantage over the other races; however, I dislike the fact that the government has so much control over us.
Gender: I often feel limited by being female. I feel that oppression by sex is one of the biggest problems in my life and probably for many other women like me as well. I get the impression that women are viewed as unintelligent, physically weaker, having less power and less prestige then men.
I feel like men view women as an “object” rather than a human being. Women are so concerned about their image that they tend to make that their top priority. I can’t tell you how many articles I have read that has to do with ways women can improve themselves to make them more appealing, sexy, liked, etc. The media portrays women as a sex symbol, and if you’re not sexy, you’re not successful. I can relate to this as well because I am not happy with my image either. I am a size five, yet I still don’t feel sexy because the women I see on T.V. are unrealistically thin. No matter how much I diet and exercise I cannot get down to a size zero.
Women are often limited to what type of career they can choose as well. I find that when I apply for a job as a server or a hostess, the employees tell me that their manager says, “She can have the job as long as she’s hot”. That puts a lot of pressure on me and I’m sure a lot of other women as well.
Women are often faced with the issue of whether or not they should work outside of the home or stay home with their children. On one hand, I feel that I am at a disadvantage if I decide to work outside of the home because I will be missing time with my children. I strongly believe that children’s growth during their younger years is most crucial. Children start off as blank slates, what you write on those slates through teaching and doing is what they will learn. I want to be the one to teach my children family values, morals, religion, respect, etc. I feel that it is my duty as a parent to teach my children those things and I don’t want a day-care provider to do it for me.
On the other hand, many judge women for working outside of the home instead of staying home with the children. Many people today think the old traditionalist way that a woman’s place is at home with her family caring for her children and husband, as well as cooking and cleaning. I find this to be a form of oppression because it is not fair to expect a woman to stay home if that isn’t what she wants to do. I have big dreams of becoming a lawyer, yet people frown upon me. I don’t want to be judged for doing something that brings me success and happiness. I sometimes find others comments to be discouraging and I sometimes second guess myself, however I just strive harder towards my goals.
I often find myself getting easily distracted by the negative notions of power that surrounds me. I allow myself to become setback by the limitations that I struggle with on a daily basis. Doing this project has made me realize that everyone is privileged and oppressed in some way. Overall, I am given many more opportunities in life than disadvantages. I can’t change the way society is, however I can work towards breaking the oppressions and limitations that keep me from growing. Yes, I know I am a young white middle class female with limitations; however I am going to work hard to achieve my goals, and hopefully one day I can break those chains.
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
ASSIGNMENT #3
America is a society that is revolved around power. How much power one has is how he or she will be treated in life. Power is created by race, gender, class, sexuality, language, religion, nationality, and age. With this matrix of domination, people are left powerful or powerless due to their marked and unmarked categories. Unmarked categories are categories that the society runs on. If someone has a characteristic in an unmarked category then he or she will have some power. If someone has a characteristic in a marked category then he or she will have some power taken away. In race, the unmarked category is white. The marked categories are black, Latino/Hispanic, Asian, American Indian, Middle Eastern and many more. With gender, the unmarked category is male. The marked categories are female, transgender, and intersexed. The next category is class. In class, the upper and middle classes are the unmarked categories. The marked category is the working-class and the poor. In sexuality, if someone is heterosexual then they have power because it is an unmarked category. If someone is gay, lesbian, bisexual, queer, or transgendered then they are in the marked category which gives them less power. The unmarked language in America is English; anyone who speaks any other language is marked. Christianity is unmarked while any other religion is marked. In Nationality, someone who is a US citizen is unmarked, but someone who is anything else is marked. Finally the unmarked age is young adult. The marked age is a child or elder.
Two years ago, I encountered a situation that had to do with how much power I had. My mom and I take a yearly trip, over the summer, to Iran, to visit family and friends. This was after the event of September 11, so the airport was very strict. This had been the first time I had gone after the event of September 11. It first started when we were checking in. We had four bags and three of them had to be searched. They chose the three bags, which ended up being both of my moms and one of mine, and searched them very carefully with an x-ray, a dog, and by hand.
This first situation had to do a lot with the marked and unmarked categories. First we were females so we were marked. If we were men, maybe they wouldn’t have been so strict. This situation is difficult because terrorism is usually done by men so maybe, in this situation; we had an advantage that we were women. Another reason why they wanted to check our bags was because of the marked category of race. We are Middle Eastern and the terrorist attack was done by Middle Easterns, so they felt the need to check our belongings. If we were white, the unmarked race, they would have let us in with no problem. The next factor was that our religion was Muslim. I don’t think that religion was a big factor in this situation because they didn’t know if we were Muslim or Christian. Even if we were Christian but Middle Eastern, they still would have searched us because unless we were wearing something to signify our religion, which we weren’t, they would never know what our religion is unless we told them. Another factor was that my mom is in the marked category for language. She cannot speak English very well; she has a very big accent. The person who checked our baggage in can tell when she was talking to my mom and it gives them another reason to discriminate against her. I think that in this situation, the biggest factor was that my mom was in the marked category of nationality. She is not a US citizen, she has a green card. The fact that she is not a US citizen, for the people who check in our bags is a big factor. Since my mom was Middle Eastern, could not speak English very well, and most of all she was not a US citizen, they decided to check both of her bags and only one of my bags because I was accompanying her.
They only checked one of my bags because I was in more unmarked categories than her. The first thing is that I was in the unmarked category of language. I can speak fluent English, and I have no accent whereas my mom didn’t and couldn’t speak fluent English. If I was in the marked category then most likely they would have searched my baggage as well. The other factor that made them not check both of my bags was that I was in the unmarked category of nationality. I am a US citizen, and since they saw that, they only checked one of my bags. The only big marked category that I was in was my race. Since I am Middle Eastern, it gave them a reason to give them doubt and want to search my bags. If I had not gone with my mom and was in the categories that I am, I probably would not have been searched. And this is true because when I went the year after to Iran by myself, I was not checked on the way there or back.
This shows how race, language, and nationality have a big impact on power. Since my mom was middle eastern, couldn’t speak fluent English, and was not a US Citizen, they decided to search her as well as me because I was with her, but when I went by myself, I was not searched because I could speak English and was a US citizen, although I was Middle Eastern. These different factors encouraged the employees to either check us or not. Although this is discrimination, the workers said that it is random and that we were the number that had to be checked. I thought about it and I knew that they only check us because of our race, language and nationality.
After our bags were checked, we resumed to the gate where we said bye to my dad and had to go under the scanners. When we were walking under, they said that it was random and they chose us to be searched from head to toe. With me, they only took the hand scanners and scanned my body and said I was ok and let me go. They spent nearly an hour searching my mom. They made her take off all of her jewelry and belt. They examined each thing one by one. They took everything out of her purse and searched it carefully. After they had clearly searched her, they made her take off her shoes and socks. They examined everything and made sure that she didn’t have anything on her.
The security there knew that my mom was on a green card and that I was a US citizen. It was weird because I was with her, but all they did was search me with a machine. My mom had many disadvantages in this situation. Since my mom was in a marked category for race and was Middle Eastern, she had a very bad disadvantage. The race was not the factor that made them decide to search her and not me. Since she was in the marked category of nationality, made them want to check her. Since I was a US citizen, they didn’t feel the need to search me.
Everything in this situation had to do with marked and unmarked categories.
Since I was a US citizen, they didn’t search me, whereas my mom was in a marked category and she was searched. If someone is in an unmarked category such as being a US citizen, female, being able to speak English and being white, all give power in this society. If someone is anything other than these unmarked categories then they are marked and therefore have less power which may result in them, in my situation, being searched.
Another situation in which I encountered marked and unmarked categories that have to do with how much power I have was when I went to apply for a job at Models. I never thought that I would encounter marked and unmarked categories applying for a job because there are so many laws against race and gender discrimination. This event occurred two years ago. I was a junior in high school and needed a job. I decided to start my search at Models Sporting Goods across my house. My friends Michael and Kathleen had just gotten a job there and they were sixteen so I figured since I was sixteen also, I would be able to get a job there as well. I went to Models and asked for an application. The manger handed me the application and told me that I needed to be at least eighteen years old to apply. I told him that my friends worked there and they were both sixteen. Then he looked at me and said, “Well we are not hiring.” I was very upset because I witnessed race and sex discrimination. I never thought that it would happen to me.
When evaluating the reasons behind this situation, marked and unmarked categories explain it all. First of all both Michael and Kathleen were white, they were both sixteen, but the only difference that they had was that Kathleen was a female and Michael was a male. In this situation, the first category that I was in was a marked race. I was Middle-Eastern. Since I was Middle-Eastern, the manager did not want to offer me a job. If I was white, I guarantee that he would have been hiring. The other marked category that I was in was that I was female. Again, if I was male and was unmarked, he would have definitely hired me. Everything else, I was in unmarked categories. I was a US citizen, could speak fluent English, and was heterosexual. These factors did not even run through his head because he judged me by my race and gender.
The reason why Kathleen was hired was because they applied together, so if the manger would have told her no, she could have sued him for gender discrimination. Later when I went to visit Kathleen at work, I saw that there was another sixteen year old, white, male in training. Kathleen told me that he came to apply yesterday and the manager hired him on the spot and he started to train him. This was an example of how much less power women have in the work place for no apparent reason. I think that it is very unfair. If we live in America, were people are taught that everyone is equal, then why is someone’s power determined by his or her gender, race, nationality, etc? To verify that my assumptions were true, a week after the man rejected to hire me, Kathleen was fired because she placed a pair of shoes in the wrong isle that it was supposed to be in. When Michael did this same thing, the manager explained to him that he put the shoe in the wrong spot and to move it.
The next situation where I want to recognize marked and unmarked categories is when I went to church with my friend last year whom is Christian. I had spent the night at her house and in the morning she had to go to church. We didn’t have enough time for her to drop me off and then go to church so we decided to both go to her church. I had never been to church before so I was not aware as to what I was supposed to be doing. So we went to church and I sat down next to her. I was very quiet. They sang songs and prayed. I didn’t do much. Everyone there had memorized all of the songs and the prayers. I felt like a total outcast. Everyone there was African American except for me. Throughout the ceremony and after, everyone was starring at me and talking about me.
The reasons as to why I felt so out of place and everyone was starring and talking about me was because of marked and unmarked categories that determine power. Religion was the first factor that had a lot to do with the reason why I was being discriminated against. Since I am not Christian and am Muslim, everyone was discriminating against me because at a Christian church, people can tell who is Christian and who isn’t. They can tell if I was able to sing the songs or had a cross on my neck. If I was Christian, maybe people would not have discriminated against me. Another marked category that I am in is my race. I am Middle Eastern and the unmarked race is white. Although white is the unmarked race in our society, in the church, the unmarked race was African American. If I was Christian and Persian, maybe I wouldn’t have been powerless in this situation because I would have at least been able to sing the songs. If I was both African American and Christian, even if I had never gone to church before, I would have been powerful because of the unmarked categories that I would have been in. With being both African American and Christian, I would have been the same as everyone else there.
In my first situation at the airport, if my partner, Akbar, was in the situation instead of me, he probably would have had a different outcome. First, starting with his race, he is, like me, middle-eastern. Since he is middle-eastern, he is in a marked category and would have been powerless. The next category is his gender. He is in the unmarked category, male. In my situation, although the unmarked category for our society is male, he probably would be better off if he was a female because terrorists are usually men. Since he was a male, they would have given him a harder time. The next category is language. He is in the unmarked category because he can speak fluent English. If he was like my mom and couldn’t speak English, then they would have definitely given him a hard time. The final issue is nationality. He is in the unmarked category of nationality. He is a US citizen. Since he is a US citizen, they wouldn’t have given him as hard of a time as they did to my mom. He was in most of the unmarked categories, except for his race, but race in this case, would have given them a reason to search his bags. Also, even though being male is marked, in this situation, being a female would have given him a greater advantage.
In the situation where he would have been personally searched, he would have had a different outcome then me. Since I am a female, they wouldn’t have thought that I could have been a terrorist. Since Akbar, is a male, he has more potential to be a terrorist, so they would have searched him just as much as they searched my mom. If he was a female then he would have been in all of the categories that I was in, and so he would have had been in the same situation as me. Again, although he is in the unmarked gender category in society, male, in this situation, he would have benefited more from being a female. In this case, we both would have been powerless because I was searched, even though not as much as my mom. He would have been searched too regardless of the unmarked categories that he was in just because of the fact that he is in a marked category of race and in this case gender.
The reason why certain categories may vary depending on the situation is because it depends on what the positive category is in that certain situation. For example, in this situation, being a female, even though it is a marked category, would have given him more power and not caused the workers to search him. Another example would be in College Park, the neighborhood is mostly African Americans so the unmarked category in that area would be African American. It depends on the situation and what race, gender, or nationality rules in that situation.
In my second situation, if Akbar was in the situation, he probably would have had different results. The manager was discriminating against me because of my gender and race. With Akbar, he is in the unmarked category of male, which is what the manager was looking for. If he was marked, like me, he would have been in the same situation that I was in and wouldn’t have gotten the job. If Akbar was in the unmarked race category, white, then he would have definitely been hired because he had both traits that the manger was looking for. Akbar is in the marked race category, but it is very difficult to tell what race he exactly is. He could pass as half white, unmarked, and half something else, marked. If Akbar was in this situation, I think that the manager would have hired him.
In my last situation, Akbar would have had the exact same results as me. The Christian church had an unmarked race category of African Americans. Akbar would have been in the marked race category, Middle Eastern. Even if in society Akbar was in the unmarked category, white, he still would have been powerless in the church because the church’s majority were African American and in that church, they had the most power. His gender would have had nothing to do with power in this situation because there were both males and females in the church. Even though he was in the unmarked category, male, and I was in the marked category, female, in this situation, it wouldn’t have made a difference because there were males and females in the church. The category that made whether he had power or not was religion. In this case, he is in the same marked category as me, Muslim and not Christian. If he would have been in the categories that he was and Christian, then maybe he would have been powerful.
After examining the three situations in which marked and unmarked categories showed how much power one had, I noticed that in all three of these situations, I was powerless. Akbar is powerless in many aspects of the situations as well. He would have had power in the situation at Models because his race was undefined to the manager. The manager would have never known his race if Akbar didn’t reveal it. Power not only comes in how much money someone has or if they are king and queen of a country, it comes where the different qualities that someone has rules the population. Power is everywhere. How much power someone has because of the marked and unmarked categories that they are in, shows how that person lives his or her life. Power is defined by race, gender, religion, nationality, language, class, sexuality, and age. Whether someone is in the unmarked, dominant, category or the marked category determines the power that they are given. How much power that someone is given can be changed in some situations, class, religion, nationality, or sexuality, but in others, race and gender, it remains constant.
Two years ago, I encountered a situation that had to do with how much power I had. My mom and I take a yearly trip, over the summer, to Iran, to visit family and friends. This was after the event of September 11, so the airport was very strict. This had been the first time I had gone after the event of September 11. It first started when we were checking in. We had four bags and three of them had to be searched. They chose the three bags, which ended up being both of my moms and one of mine, and searched them very carefully with an x-ray, a dog, and by hand.
This first situation had to do a lot with the marked and unmarked categories. First we were females so we were marked. If we were men, maybe they wouldn’t have been so strict. This situation is difficult because terrorism is usually done by men so maybe, in this situation; we had an advantage that we were women. Another reason why they wanted to check our bags was because of the marked category of race. We are Middle Eastern and the terrorist attack was done by Middle Easterns, so they felt the need to check our belongings. If we were white, the unmarked race, they would have let us in with no problem. The next factor was that our religion was Muslim. I don’t think that religion was a big factor in this situation because they didn’t know if we were Muslim or Christian. Even if we were Christian but Middle Eastern, they still would have searched us because unless we were wearing something to signify our religion, which we weren’t, they would never know what our religion is unless we told them. Another factor was that my mom is in the marked category for language. She cannot speak English very well; she has a very big accent. The person who checked our baggage in can tell when she was talking to my mom and it gives them another reason to discriminate against her. I think that in this situation, the biggest factor was that my mom was in the marked category of nationality. She is not a US citizen, she has a green card. The fact that she is not a US citizen, for the people who check in our bags is a big factor. Since my mom was Middle Eastern, could not speak English very well, and most of all she was not a US citizen, they decided to check both of her bags and only one of my bags because I was accompanying her.
They only checked one of my bags because I was in more unmarked categories than her. The first thing is that I was in the unmarked category of language. I can speak fluent English, and I have no accent whereas my mom didn’t and couldn’t speak fluent English. If I was in the marked category then most likely they would have searched my baggage as well. The other factor that made them not check both of my bags was that I was in the unmarked category of nationality. I am a US citizen, and since they saw that, they only checked one of my bags. The only big marked category that I was in was my race. Since I am Middle Eastern, it gave them a reason to give them doubt and want to search my bags. If I had not gone with my mom and was in the categories that I am, I probably would not have been searched. And this is true because when I went the year after to Iran by myself, I was not checked on the way there or back.
This shows how race, language, and nationality have a big impact on power. Since my mom was middle eastern, couldn’t speak fluent English, and was not a US Citizen, they decided to search her as well as me because I was with her, but when I went by myself, I was not searched because I could speak English and was a US citizen, although I was Middle Eastern. These different factors encouraged the employees to either check us or not. Although this is discrimination, the workers said that it is random and that we were the number that had to be checked. I thought about it and I knew that they only check us because of our race, language and nationality.
After our bags were checked, we resumed to the gate where we said bye to my dad and had to go under the scanners. When we were walking under, they said that it was random and they chose us to be searched from head to toe. With me, they only took the hand scanners and scanned my body and said I was ok and let me go. They spent nearly an hour searching my mom. They made her take off all of her jewelry and belt. They examined each thing one by one. They took everything out of her purse and searched it carefully. After they had clearly searched her, they made her take off her shoes and socks. They examined everything and made sure that she didn’t have anything on her.
The security there knew that my mom was on a green card and that I was a US citizen. It was weird because I was with her, but all they did was search me with a machine. My mom had many disadvantages in this situation. Since my mom was in a marked category for race and was Middle Eastern, she had a very bad disadvantage. The race was not the factor that made them decide to search her and not me. Since she was in the marked category of nationality, made them want to check her. Since I was a US citizen, they didn’t feel the need to search me.
Everything in this situation had to do with marked and unmarked categories.
Since I was a US citizen, they didn’t search me, whereas my mom was in a marked category and she was searched. If someone is in an unmarked category such as being a US citizen, female, being able to speak English and being white, all give power in this society. If someone is anything other than these unmarked categories then they are marked and therefore have less power which may result in them, in my situation, being searched.
Another situation in which I encountered marked and unmarked categories that have to do with how much power I have was when I went to apply for a job at Models. I never thought that I would encounter marked and unmarked categories applying for a job because there are so many laws against race and gender discrimination. This event occurred two years ago. I was a junior in high school and needed a job. I decided to start my search at Models Sporting Goods across my house. My friends Michael and Kathleen had just gotten a job there and they were sixteen so I figured since I was sixteen also, I would be able to get a job there as well. I went to Models and asked for an application. The manger handed me the application and told me that I needed to be at least eighteen years old to apply. I told him that my friends worked there and they were both sixteen. Then he looked at me and said, “Well we are not hiring.” I was very upset because I witnessed race and sex discrimination. I never thought that it would happen to me.
When evaluating the reasons behind this situation, marked and unmarked categories explain it all. First of all both Michael and Kathleen were white, they were both sixteen, but the only difference that they had was that Kathleen was a female and Michael was a male. In this situation, the first category that I was in was a marked race. I was Middle-Eastern. Since I was Middle-Eastern, the manager did not want to offer me a job. If I was white, I guarantee that he would have been hiring. The other marked category that I was in was that I was female. Again, if I was male and was unmarked, he would have definitely hired me. Everything else, I was in unmarked categories. I was a US citizen, could speak fluent English, and was heterosexual. These factors did not even run through his head because he judged me by my race and gender.
The reason why Kathleen was hired was because they applied together, so if the manger would have told her no, she could have sued him for gender discrimination. Later when I went to visit Kathleen at work, I saw that there was another sixteen year old, white, male in training. Kathleen told me that he came to apply yesterday and the manager hired him on the spot and he started to train him. This was an example of how much less power women have in the work place for no apparent reason. I think that it is very unfair. If we live in America, were people are taught that everyone is equal, then why is someone’s power determined by his or her gender, race, nationality, etc? To verify that my assumptions were true, a week after the man rejected to hire me, Kathleen was fired because she placed a pair of shoes in the wrong isle that it was supposed to be in. When Michael did this same thing, the manager explained to him that he put the shoe in the wrong spot and to move it.
The next situation where I want to recognize marked and unmarked categories is when I went to church with my friend last year whom is Christian. I had spent the night at her house and in the morning she had to go to church. We didn’t have enough time for her to drop me off and then go to church so we decided to both go to her church. I had never been to church before so I was not aware as to what I was supposed to be doing. So we went to church and I sat down next to her. I was very quiet. They sang songs and prayed. I didn’t do much. Everyone there had memorized all of the songs and the prayers. I felt like a total outcast. Everyone there was African American except for me. Throughout the ceremony and after, everyone was starring at me and talking about me.
The reasons as to why I felt so out of place and everyone was starring and talking about me was because of marked and unmarked categories that determine power. Religion was the first factor that had a lot to do with the reason why I was being discriminated against. Since I am not Christian and am Muslim, everyone was discriminating against me because at a Christian church, people can tell who is Christian and who isn’t. They can tell if I was able to sing the songs or had a cross on my neck. If I was Christian, maybe people would not have discriminated against me. Another marked category that I am in is my race. I am Middle Eastern and the unmarked race is white. Although white is the unmarked race in our society, in the church, the unmarked race was African American. If I was Christian and Persian, maybe I wouldn’t have been powerless in this situation because I would have at least been able to sing the songs. If I was both African American and Christian, even if I had never gone to church before, I would have been powerful because of the unmarked categories that I would have been in. With being both African American and Christian, I would have been the same as everyone else there.
In my first situation at the airport, if my partner, Akbar, was in the situation instead of me, he probably would have had a different outcome. First, starting with his race, he is, like me, middle-eastern. Since he is middle-eastern, he is in a marked category and would have been powerless. The next category is his gender. He is in the unmarked category, male. In my situation, although the unmarked category for our society is male, he probably would be better off if he was a female because terrorists are usually men. Since he was a male, they would have given him a harder time. The next category is language. He is in the unmarked category because he can speak fluent English. If he was like my mom and couldn’t speak English, then they would have definitely given him a hard time. The final issue is nationality. He is in the unmarked category of nationality. He is a US citizen. Since he is a US citizen, they wouldn’t have given him as hard of a time as they did to my mom. He was in most of the unmarked categories, except for his race, but race in this case, would have given them a reason to search his bags. Also, even though being male is marked, in this situation, being a female would have given him a greater advantage.
In the situation where he would have been personally searched, he would have had a different outcome then me. Since I am a female, they wouldn’t have thought that I could have been a terrorist. Since Akbar, is a male, he has more potential to be a terrorist, so they would have searched him just as much as they searched my mom. If he was a female then he would have been in all of the categories that I was in, and so he would have had been in the same situation as me. Again, although he is in the unmarked gender category in society, male, in this situation, he would have benefited more from being a female. In this case, we both would have been powerless because I was searched, even though not as much as my mom. He would have been searched too regardless of the unmarked categories that he was in just because of the fact that he is in a marked category of race and in this case gender.
The reason why certain categories may vary depending on the situation is because it depends on what the positive category is in that certain situation. For example, in this situation, being a female, even though it is a marked category, would have given him more power and not caused the workers to search him. Another example would be in College Park, the neighborhood is mostly African Americans so the unmarked category in that area would be African American. It depends on the situation and what race, gender, or nationality rules in that situation.
In my second situation, if Akbar was in the situation, he probably would have had different results. The manager was discriminating against me because of my gender and race. With Akbar, he is in the unmarked category of male, which is what the manager was looking for. If he was marked, like me, he would have been in the same situation that I was in and wouldn’t have gotten the job. If Akbar was in the unmarked race category, white, then he would have definitely been hired because he had both traits that the manger was looking for. Akbar is in the marked race category, but it is very difficult to tell what race he exactly is. He could pass as half white, unmarked, and half something else, marked. If Akbar was in this situation, I think that the manager would have hired him.
In my last situation, Akbar would have had the exact same results as me. The Christian church had an unmarked race category of African Americans. Akbar would have been in the marked race category, Middle Eastern. Even if in society Akbar was in the unmarked category, white, he still would have been powerless in the church because the church’s majority were African American and in that church, they had the most power. His gender would have had nothing to do with power in this situation because there were both males and females in the church. Even though he was in the unmarked category, male, and I was in the marked category, female, in this situation, it wouldn’t have made a difference because there were males and females in the church. The category that made whether he had power or not was religion. In this case, he is in the same marked category as me, Muslim and not Christian. If he would have been in the categories that he was and Christian, then maybe he would have been powerful.
After examining the three situations in which marked and unmarked categories showed how much power one had, I noticed that in all three of these situations, I was powerless. Akbar is powerless in many aspects of the situations as well. He would have had power in the situation at Models because his race was undefined to the manager. The manager would have never known his race if Akbar didn’t reveal it. Power not only comes in how much money someone has or if they are king and queen of a country, it comes where the different qualities that someone has rules the population. Power is everywhere. How much power someone has because of the marked and unmarked categories that they are in, shows how that person lives his or her life. Power is defined by race, gender, religion, nationality, language, class, sexuality, and age. Whether someone is in the unmarked, dominant, category or the marked category determines the power that they are given. How much power that someone is given can be changed in some situations, class, religion, nationality, or sexuality, but in others, race and gender, it remains constant.
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Assignment 3B
Chris Maltbie
4.21.2008
Women Art and Culture
Project 3
Before taking WMST250: Women, Art, and Culture, I was very much oblivious to many things that were going on around me, every day. As was discussed in Project’s 1 and 2, I never really took the time to truly consider how much women have been oppressed, and at the same time, just how much of their work has been out there to be seen. Project 3, however, has asked me to do something very different. Instead of just taking notice of oppression and feminist movements, it requires that I analyze my own life, and confront how I have been oppressed and how the establishments that remove me from oppression, hold down others.
When I first read the topic of this assignment, I was quite terrified. After all, not only could I hardly think of how I was ever oppressed, but it was hard for me to quantify the systems of power that encircle all of us. More than anything, I believe this view is the product of where and how I was raised.
I grew up almost entirely in an upper-middle class suburb of
My mother, my father, and my step-dad all had extremely diverse upbringings. When my mom was in high school, she moved to
Furthermore, I grew up with, and was always extremely close to, my mother. I could easily write a small novel on all the things she has taught me, but for the purpose of this assignment, I will restrict myself to discussing her status as a woman, and what it taught me. My mom is without a doubt my greatest inspiration for a multitude of reasons. Not only did she beat breast cancer, despite being told she had 3 months to live, but she was truly a revolutionary woman in a time when women were still looked mostly down upon. After graduating high school, and without enough money to pay for college, my mother became one of an extremely small number of women to join the US Army. Even within the Army, she was quickly promoted, and rose as high as a platoon sergeant and general’s aid, gaining of respect of all of her male subordinates and superiors. She even went on to be one of the first women to complete airborne school, much to the chagrin of one of the sexist officers at the school. After leaving the military, she was able to go to a prestigious engineering school to earn her degree, before starting our family. Even after leaving the workforce for nearly 20 years, in her late-40’s my mom got a job at Boeing and was rapidly promoted to the highest position possible without finishing another Master’s degree, which she is now working on at
It was in this way that I arrived at college. Up until I arrived at the University, discrimination had remained a mystery to me. I was used to everybody accepting everybody without question, seemingly without even observing difference in race and class. It was hard for me to imagine anyone disrespecting or holding women back. After growing up with such an inspiring mother, how could anyone possibly look down on women? Suddenly I was at school, where everybody seemed to notice every difference. Although it was not always in a discriminatory way, people seemed a lot more eager to label themselves and others, and there was a great degree of exclusivity amongst the groups. Coming from an area where discriminating was not only lacking, but the distinction was as well, the views at the university were rather shocking to me. It was not until this very assignment that I really started to assess the situation.
In many ways, I feel that my view is an idealized view. A world in which everyone can be unique, but a negative distinction is never necessary, seems to be nearly utopian. Cultures and expression would not be suppressed, but neither would interaction. At the same time, this assignment shed some light on why this is so hard to achieve. On the one hand, it is a fairly paradoxical society we live in: In order to be so tolerant and indiscriminant, you often need to experience diversity, or be taught by someone who has. This creates a system in which diversity must be very visible to make progress. Perhaps more practical at the present, the other key reason that this type of view is difficult is that not everyone is privileged enough to be able to step back and disregard diversity.
As I have stated, I have been very fortunate to grown up as I have. As a member of nearly every unmarked category, there were very few times that I was discriminated against as I grew up. The more I thought about this assignment, the more it occurred to me that my “position of power” was precisely what was enabling me to mold an ideal outlook on diversity. I hold only minor experience in being discriminated against and therefore cannot fully understand what it is like to be put down. When I consider one of the times when I have been stereotyped and discriminated against, it suddenly becomes much clearer why the majority of the world does not see things the way that I traditionally had.
When I was 17, I went to a local beach town with my girlfriend, my friend, and his girlfriend. After walking around for a while and playing some mini-golf, we got in the car to head back home. I was in a slight rush because my girlfriend had a rapidly approaching curfew, and although her dad was quite fond of me, I didn’t feel like pushing it. Still, despite my rush, I was only traveling about 5 miles over the speed limit, which is hardly abnormal; in fact, 5 miles an hour is usually the minimum speed people travel above the speed limit. Nevertheless, under 5 minutes later I was pulled over. Now, I had never personally been pulled over before, but it is my understanding, based on the accounts of others, that it is standard for a single police officer to pull over a car, especially in a crime-free, upper-class beach town; however, apparently this was not the case for me. Whether it was the fact that I had 4 people in the car or that I was clearly a young-adult, I will never know, but for whatever reason, I was pulled over by 2 police officers, who apparently called for backup. When the first officer approached my vehicle, he asked for my license and registration and then returned to his car. I still don’t completely understand how this could have made him more suspicious, because I had never been pulled over or even remotely been in trouble with the law before. Regardless, the officer returned almost immediately and started questioning me about why I was in the town and about things in my car, which he had taken the liberty of searching through the windows. Shortly thereafter, I was asked to get out of my vehicle and I was berated by questions from the 3 officers. Finally, I was chastised for having my hands in my pockets, which prompted at least one officer to move his hand to his gun, and then told to get back in my car. Despite my clean record and minor offense, I was given a $200 ticket and a rather unpleasant experience.
This incident, which I know would probably be of the smallest significance to many people, was a rather short and isolated, yet still shocking, experience of discrimination. Regardless of the reasons the police had had of suspecting me of some major offense, the memory of the incident reminds me of how it feels to be put down. When I consider this event, I realized how hard it would be to see everyone as equal if there were constant reminders of how some people hold all of the power. Who am I to speak out and resist the established power of the police? Why would I ever both consider us all as equal if they didn’t?
This event showed me how power will always cause rifts and separation of classes. Perhaps now it is best to transition to the conundrum that is power. Although I have already made clear that I have never felt any more powerful than other people, this is most likely due to my position of power. Since I don’t feel the strain of being at the bottom of structures of power (I personally feel that I am probably right in the middle of the overall power structures) it is easy for me to simply not acknowledge that they exist. At the same time, it seems that people at the top of a position of power feel equally uncomfortable as those at the bottom. Although this presumption comes from many places, the most easily supportable is the testimony of family friends who are police officers.
Much in the way that dictators are always said to fear those that they suppress, or in the way that a dominant sports team is always scared of being beaten by the underdog, it seems that people with power (such as police officers) are often fearful themselves. While I’m sure some police officers are bad people, the vast majority, and all that I know personally, are very normal, personable, and nice people. Why then do all of my friends who have encountered them fear and resent them? It is my opinion that positions of power are very much like a see-saw: The people at the ends constantly find themselves flipped and at the bottom, while someone sitting at the fulcrum would never be at the top of bottom, but would remain in the same location. I once asked a police officer who was friends with the family why police were always such jerks when the pulled people over. He was not at all surprised or annoyed by the question, but told me honestly that police never consider themselves in control of a situation; when a police officer approaches a car, he doesn’t know if the driver will be a friendly citizen or a gun-wielding maniac, and unfortunately, this means that the officer must prepare for the latter scenario, always at the expense of the driver. This explanation really struck home, because it got me thinking about all positions of power. In many situations, neither side feels that they hold the power, but perspective always makes them feel as if they are at the disadvantage.
The realizations that I just discussed have helped me to understand where I am placed in “positions of power”. The relative lack of outside pressure, I feel is a result of being directly in the middle of most power structures. While I am white and male, I do not have common white/male views of many things, both because of where I grew up and because of my parents as I have discussed. Although I am upper-middle class, my family has not always been, and we are far from being extremely rich. Although I am heterosexual, I have homosexual friends and see nothing wrong with it. Furthermore, I am able-bodied, but know, and as a premed student hope to help, many disable and ill people. I am a
In conclusion, I have come to realize that positions of power are ever-present, no matter how much or how little we feel them on an individual level. It seems to me as if everyone, at some point, will feel the strain of being power-deficient. I personally feel that in many, although not all, situations, this feeling is mutual; that is, bother sides feel at a disadvantage. In the remaining cases, stereotypes and poor education on diversity are likely to blame. Although there are no easy ways to bypass a system that constantly puts the majority of parties at odds with each other, perhaps those lucky enough to observe and ponder may be able to grow in number, until finally everyone is in such a position. In this way, one day we will hopefully live without positions of power and suppression and will rather be able to see each other for what we all are: people.
Monday, April 21, 2008
Assignment #3B
The terms marked and unmarked categories, which is the unspoken hierarchy of power within our society, are not things that are familiar to a lot of people. There are many dimensions to determine which category you belong to. These categories range from race, gender, socioeconomic status, sexuality, language, religion, geography and age. One who belongs to the marked category is looked at as being powerless and subordinate to those who belong to the unmarked category. These two categories are very much present in my life being that I am in an interracial relationship, since I am white and my boyfriend is black. Despite living in a society that has supposedly moved passed the issue of skin color, there are still plenty of obstacles that we are both faced with in our relationship when it comes to race, socioeconomic status, and geography. We both come from two very different places, and the two particular instances that I am going to address is when I went to visit his family in Brooklyn, New York, and he went to visit my family in Columbia, Maryland.
My boyfriend and I took a trip up to New York to visit some of his family last summer. We first stopped in Manhattan to go to Times Square to walk around, shop, and site see. In this part of New York, there is such a large variety of people there that neither of us felt uncomfortable, even though being an interracial couple in public is not always the easiest thing. As we walked towards the subway station to go towards his Grandmother’s apartment in Brooklyn that night, she called us and insisted on coming to pick us up, and not having to take the subway or walk. My boyfriend told her to not worry about it, that it would take longer for her to come get us than it would to take the subway. Although my boyfriend now lives in Maryland, he did live in New York so he knows the subway system very well. As we got on the subway train and headed towards Brooklyn, the scenery definitely changed. As we reached the last couple of stops, I was now one of the very few white females on the train. Once we reached our stop, it was roughly 10:00 p.m. and very dark outside. We had a four block walk from the station to the apartment through an area considered the “ghetto.” The streets were lined with dim lit street lights, tall apartment buildings, and young black males congregating on the street corners and in front of the apartment building entrances.
I had been warned a few times by my boyfriend beforehand that white people are rarely seen going into that part of town, but I insisted that it was okay and that I would be fine. I always instill in him that I am from Prince George’s County, Maryland, and went to a high school where there was only a 6% White student population, so I am used to being the minority and it does not bother me. Being that we are in an interracial relationship, we are used to get stared at a lot, but this time it was different. I was getting stared at as if they had never seen a white girl before, and he was getting stared at like he should not be there with a white girl. I had a very uneasy feeling that I was not welcome there, and I had truly never felt like that before. As we got to his grandmother’s apartment, she was so relieved that we made it there safely and that she was worrying about us. I was given a tour of her small, cramped apartment, and was shown the pull-out couch that we would be sleeping on that night.
Race is the biggest factor contributing to the outcome of my trip to New York. As we were walking through Manhattan, it is almost as if marked and unmarked categories of race did not matter. We saw upper-class, lower-class, and homeless people of every race imaginable. Although racially I am considered to be unmarked, and he is considered to be marked, in New York City that did not seem to be an issue. However, once we headed to Brooklyn was when everything changed. When his Grandmother insisted on picking us up rather than us taking the subway, it did not phase me at first as to why. Now that I think about it, she may have been concerned for my well-being considering that I am white, and being white in Brooklyn is not very common, which would make me marked. On the other hand, she may have seen me as being unmarked because I am white and white people are seen as having more power, and why would a white person go into an area deemed as being “ghetto?” Then again, she may have totally forgotten about my race, and being that she is also marked because she is female, she may know that her area is not the safest for a female. It could have also been a combination of all of the above; she may have been concerned because I am both white and a female.
When we first got on the subway train, I noticed a good amount of upper-class white males on their way home from work, dressed in their business suits and carrying their leather brief cases. There were also a lot of young black teenage males, and homeless males and females in the station and sleeping on the train. In this particular setting, it is evident that marked and unmarked categories are present. The upper-class white males are unmarked and have power over the black teenagers and the homeless people who both belong to the marked category. However, a different aspect of the matrix of domination can be seen when thinking about the homeless men and women who are living in the subway station and on the trains. They do not have power over anyone at all, even if they are white males and essentially are part of the unmarked category.
Once we got off of the train and started walking, I felt that I was marked since I was being stared at and was the only white person within site. Even though my boyfriend is black and he normally would have be unmarked in Brooklyn, being that he was with me made him stand out as if he belonged in the marked category just as me as me. When we got to his Grandmother’s apartment, I did not understand why she was so worried about us. My boyfriend used to live there and would take the subway and walk in that area at night all the time and he was never bothered. But as soon as I was added to the picture, she was so worried something would happen to us. No one approached or talked to us, so I wonder if my race was the main reason she felt we would be.
A large part of belonging to a certain category depends on your socioeconomic status; there are certainly many other factors, but your status in society is a definitely a big one. The city of Manhattan is known as being the home to the upper-class business people and many wealthy celebrities, all who are unmarked. As we walked around in Times Square and window-shopped, it was evident that you needed to belong to a higher socioeconomic status to even afford something at a few of the stores. As we entered them, we were marked in the sense of our age and the way we looked and dressed compared to our fellow shoppers and the people who worked there. When we went to the train station, marked and unmarked categories were clearly present. The businessmen clearly have more power because they are white and males, but also mainly because they are in the upper-class and have money, which is a very big factor in who has power over whom in our country, which is run by the wealthy.
When we reached his Grandmother’s block, it was evident that we were not in the upper-class area of Manhattan anymore. In this particular part of town, the majority of the people who live there are marked because they are part of the working-class or poor. My boyfriend and I both come from middle-class families, which automatically makes us unmarked. His Grandmother is part of the working-class, which is why she was living in this part of Brooklyn and in that apartment. As I said earlier, my boyfriend used to live in that area as well and was also marked since he was part of the working-class. However, since leaving that area and moving to Maryland for a better life, he has that now and has moved up to the middle-class.
Geography also played an obvious role in my trip to New York. My boyfriend and I both come from the suburbs of Prince George’s County, and live in relatively nice neighborhoods with minor crimes committed here and there. We are comfortable and feel safe and secure in where we live, which would constitute us as being part of an unmarked category. However, Manhattan is not a suburb but yet it is also relatively safe and could be considered as unmarked for being a respectable place to live and visit. Yet when considering the area of Brooklyn, it is in the marked category since it is not exactly the safest place to live. As with most lower-class areas, there are a lot of drug deals, shootings, and domestic violence crimes. I do not consider that area to be more powerful then my middle-class neighborhood or Manhattan, yet in a sense it is. It has the power which produces fear in those within the community and those on the outside. People who live in a community like that strive to have the respect and power over others.
Our trip to Manhattan and Brooklyn was definitely an experience, but I feel that if I belonged to the opposite marked/unmarked category, then the outcome would have been different. For example, if I was a black female then his grandmother probably would not have been as worried about us, and I would not have been stared at like I was not welcome. Then again, if I was a male rather than a female, then maybe I would not have been looked at as if I needed to be protected and been picked up, rather than walking since we were in a dangerous area.
I come from a very large family who hosts a Chick family reunion every summer, and last year was no exception. The majority of my family on my father’s side lives in Howard County, Maryland, and last year’s reunion was at my aunt and uncle’s house in Columbia. He knew before coming to my family reunion that he would probably be the only black person, but he was okay with that. As we reached a block that was lined with $750,000 homes, I knew we had made it. After I parked my little Honda Civic next to my uncle’s BMW, we went inside so I could give him a tour. I took him through their three-level house, which has an extra living room and dining room that they do not even use. We went into the backyard where he met and talked to a lot of my family, most of which he had never met before. We got some food and sat down with my cousin and her boyfriend, who happened to be black as well. My boyfriend and my cousin’s boyfriend seemed to get along really well, and they talked almost the whole time during lunch. After a while my mother noticed that my boyfriend was only socializing with my cousin’s boyfriend. She decided to call him over to meet some of her relatives sitting at another table. After lunch, most of my cousins were swimming in the in-ground pool, so we decided to join them. After about an hour of that, we got out and walked down the street to the community’s little convenient store to get ice cream.
This is a predominately white area and he was the only black person around. We noticed that he was getting stared at a lot by the older residents of the community, as if he was not welcome there. He felt extremely uncomfortable so we got our ice cream and left. We hurried back to the house and went down into the basement where most of my cousins were. Since my aunt and uncle have two children, they furnished the basement with a pool table, slot machine, and a big screen television with every video game system available. After playing down there for a while, it was getting dark outside and everyone started to leave. My sister then decided it was time for those of us that were still there to get in the hot tub, which could fit about ten people.
Race always seems to be a factor in any event. Considering it was my family reunion, the majority of the people that were there were white, and were members of the unmarked category. When we sat down to eat lunch, it was almost as if my boyfriend and my cousin’s boyfriend gravitated towards each other since they were the same race and were part of the marked category. It seemed as though they felt the most comfortable around each other since they were the only black males that were there. Once my mother noticed this, she had him come over to meet my other relatives. This was to make him feel more like part of the family. It made it so that he felt more like part of the unmarked category, and less like part of the marked category. Even though they were technically the only marked people in a group of unmarked, does not necessarily mean that they were less powerful than us or were subordinate to us.
When we went down to the convenient store, we noticed a lot of yard workers who were being paid to cut the grass, tend to the garden, and trim the bushes of the wealthy homeowners. We also noticed that a lot of the older residents were staring at him because it was a rare thing to see a black person in that neighborhood. As they were sitting on their porch, they would often whisper and look at not only him, but me as well. They looked at me as if I should not have brought a black person into their community, which is very similar to the incident in Brooklyn. From their response, we assume that meant they did not necessarily agree with our interracial relationship. Being white technically made me unmarked, but because I brought a black person into a dominantly white area made me feel just as marked as him.
Socioeconomic status determines a lot of things in your life, especially the amount of power you have over others. My boyfriend and I may be unmarked in the sense that we belong to middle-class families, but my relatives are unmarked as well but still have a lot more power over us because they have more money. It was evident that you had to be part of the unmarked category to even be able to afford a home in that community. My uncle drives a BMW, along with many of his neighbors who have SUV’s and sports cars in their driveway. Once we went inside of their home, it was almost as if we fit more into the marked category, because we did not live in a home like that. We both come from middle-class families, but at the same time, we do not live in three-level homes with rooms that we do not even use, and an in-ground pool, a game room, or a hot tub. Also, when we walked down the street to the convenient store, we saw a few houses whose lawn was getting cut by paid workers; that is also is a sign of having a higher status in society. People who are in a marked category would not be able to hire people to cut their lawn for them. Being part of the unmarked category means that you have more power over the marked category, for the sole reason that you have more money.
Depending on your socioeconomic status, depends on where you live. My aunt and uncle are unmarked and part of the upper-class, therefore, they live in an upper-class neighborhood. They live in Columbia, a suburb of Howard County, Maryland, which is considered to be one of the nicer counties in the state of Maryland. They live in a small, quiet community, with not much more criminal activity other than speeding. Crime has certainly increased in Howard County over the past couple of years, but my aunt and uncle still feel their home is safe for themselves and their children, which would make them unmarked. My boyfriend and I live in the suburbs as well but the houses in our neighborhoods do not resemble that of my aunt and uncle’s residential community at all, so compared to them we are marked.
I definitely feel that if my boyfriend was unmarked and white, then there would not have been as much of a problem with taking him into my aunt and uncle’s community. Also, if we were part of the upper-class, then we would not have been as surprised with how my aunt and uncle lived, considering they were unmarked as well. My experience visiting my boyfriend’s family and his while visiting mine reflects social organization in that some people still have an issue with race, and especially with interracial relationships. My boyfriend said that he never knew any interracial couples while he lived in Brooklyn, and that it was definitely looked down upon in that area. Also, my older relatives have never dated interracially, and they do not necessarily understand it. However, more people in my generation accept it and date interracially themselves.
These socially constructed ideologies of marked and unmarked categories can change depending on your race, socioeconomic status, and geography which were shown in my two incidents. I learned how to determine what category I belonged to in which situation, as well as how to analyze those in my surroundings and determine which category that they belonged to as well. Although naturally I was considered to belong to the unmarked category because I am white, middle-class, and live in a nice area, I found out that when in a different geographic location my category can change.
The outcomes of situations can certainly change when you belong to a different category. The trip to New York was through the eyes of a white female; however, the following experience is from a black female’s perspective.
As we encounter many different situations in our lives, we ultimately begin to realize how we “fit into” the structure of society. Everyone falls into different categories which shows how we are different from others. Even the people we interact with everyday are different from us no matter how alike we may seem or how much we feel we have in common. Categories that exhibit these differences include one’s race, gender, social class, sexuality, able-bodiedness, language, religion, nationality, and age. These categories are those that we may or may not have control over and should not mean anything. However, society uses categories such as these to label others or judge others based on stereotypes or perceptions.
These categories, or dimensions of difference, can be described as marked or unmarked categories. A marked category is a specific element. Those that fall under this category are usually subordinate, powerless, and women. On the other hand, the unmarked category is generic. Those that fall under this category are usually more dominant, privileged, powerful, and are usually men. Although these factors may not necessarily be true, this is how these categories are viewed by most of society.
One event which clearly defined these differences was a date with my boyfriend. We decided to go out to dinner at the Cheesecake Factory in White Flint. White Flint is an area in Montgomery County, Maryland. We decided to ride the train to avoid driving. As we got onto the train at the station in my area, all one would see was black people. As we got closer to our destination, I noticed how the black people on the train quickly faded and more white people appeared. I had never rode the train this far so this was a first time experience. The quickly appearing white people let me know that Montgomery County was much different than D.C. This area was very diverse but predominately white. Many people who live in this area are a part of the middle-upper class and pretty much well off. I had rarely visited this side of town and never had I been to Montgomery County for social purposes. The restaurant was very nice and I was ready to enjoy my time at this lovely place. However, I was overwhelmed by the entire experience. There were some factors that caused me to feel uncomfortable because visiting this restaurant was a big change for me. Sometimes new experiences can be intimidating and I was definitely intimidated.
The geographic location of the restaurant was important in this situation and caused me to feel vulnerable in this “foreign” part of town. I am from southeast D.C. and being in Montgomery County, I felt powerless because the majority of the people there were white. When people usually think of southeast D.C., they think of the “ghetto” with high crime and a place that is just not friendly and nice to visit. D.C., especially southeast, is filled with numerous housing projects. A majority of the people there make a living through a low paying job and/or their dependence on welfare. On the other hand, Montgomery County is the suburbs and a place that I am not used to. Traveling to Montgomery County was a different experience for me because many of the houses and places of business in Montgomery County were very big and looked very expensive. It seemed like everyone was rich, drove expensive luxurious cars, and owned fairly large houses. This was definitely something I was not used to seeing on a daily basis. My boyfriend and I were considered marked while in Montgomery County. When in my own neighborhood, I would consider myself unmarked because I feel empowered when in my own territory. Although many people believe D.C. to be an unsafe place, I feel safe there because it is a place I have known my entire life. Therefore, when I traveled to Montgomery County, I did not feel safe. Despite the better reputation and fewer crimes the area has, I felt vulnerable and less comfortable than in my own neighborhood. This situation also relates to a child adapting to a new environment. When a child moves from his hometown to a new place, it can be scary for him and perhaps overwhelming. This new place is foreign and unknown to the child and is certainly out not anything that he is used to and out of the ordinary. It will have to take a while for the child to adapt to the new environment and feel comfortable enough to interact within his surroundings. This was exactly how I felt. When I came to Montgomery County, I was not accustomed to the area. I was not scared but intimidated by the big rich looking houses and businesses because they were far more luxurious than anything back in D.C. It took some time for me to explore the area and grow accustomed to it so I could enjoy being there.
I began to feel somewhat better when we approached the mall. The mall was my place of enjoyment and I frequently visited the mall when I needed a break from my everyday life. When we entered the mall there were some black people but the majority of the people in the mall were white. I did not pay any attention to the black to white ratio because I see all types of people when shopping. While in the mall my boyfriend and I were a part of the marked category. It did not bother me that we were in the marked category because although I was uncomfortable in the area, I did not feel inferior to the people within the mall. We walked around a bit before entering the restaurant to enjoy the scenery. Many of the stores were expensive stores. We were definitely marked in this situation because unlike the other shoppers in the mall, I doubt we could afford anything in any of the stores. The other shoppers in the mall were unmarked as they walked around with numerous bags in their hands, showing that they were obviously well off.
When we entered the restaurant, I immediately felt out of place. As previously stated, I am from D.C. where the majority of the people who live there are African American. There are some that are white but live downtown and are rarely seen in my part of town. Even when I go out within the D.C. area, I feel like I belong there. Due to the area that I lived in, I was surrounded by blacks on a daily basis. When I entered the restaurant, I felt out of place because I wasn’t accustomed to being around so many white people at one time. We were one of the only black people in the restaurant and for once, I felt different. Everyone stared like they were surprised to see that black people actually came to this side of town. My boyfriend and I, as blacks, were considered marked because we were the powerless in this case. We were the center of attention because we were black in a white neighborhood. Being considered marked in this situation could have been the reasons for the shocks and stares. The other customers in the restaurant could have felt powerful because they were white. Or perhaps, my boyfriend and I had the powerful advantage because we were the only blacks in such a place and a black person’s presence was least expected. Whatever the case, I was extremely uncomfortable but I was determined not to show the other customers that their stares had an effect on me. This shows how society unknowingly separates us and influences us to believe that one does not belong in a certain area. Someone can be considered marked just because they are in an area that rarely has people of their kind. This factor relates to a friend of mine from high school. I attended a predominately black school. The only girl in the school who was white was my friend Kelly. Kelly was the only white person I had ever known at the time but I accepted her as a friend. When others saw her, they stared, pointed, laughed, and even kept their distance because she was white. The other student’s reactions weren’t forms of racism; they were just surprised that a white girl actually attended our school. As time went on, everyone learned to accept Kelly as she was just another student. The only thing that differentiated us was that she was white and we were not but we all loved and accepted her. So, if the people in the restaurant would have accepted us, they would have gotten to see that we were just like anyone else in the restaurant, except the fact that we were black and they were white. It is a shame that this country still notices racial differences and is in shock when someone of a different race visits their side of town. We have long since gotten over racism and showing others that they do not belong or fit in simply because they are a different race.
Another issue that caused me to be out of place was that my boyfriend and I were young adults. When older adults think of young adults my age going out on dates in such nice places, they may think how can they afford to eat in this place? I believe the stares also resulted from this factor. The usual teen date is to the movies or somewhere less expensive, being that many young adults do not have high salaries, but more so part-time jobs since they are in school. The restaurant was filled with middle aged people. Many people from my area do not go out to other parts of town on dates. If they happen to go on a date, it is usually at a less expensive place in the area. As young adults in a mature setting, we were considered marked because compared to the middle aged adults there, we were like children. Although I was uncomfortable, I thought to myself: maybe these middle aged adults are shocked or perhaps even angry that we, as teens, were able to afford a meal in the same restaurant they worked every day to afford to eat in. The older adults could have felt powerful in the restaurant because they were older and we were the youngest couple there. The older adults probably looked at my boyfriend and I and assumed that we weren’t from the area, perhaps they thought that we too were members of the lower class and therefore, couldn’t afford the meal. Although their actions were rude, I didn’t mind too much. The older adults in my life still think of me as a child. They would have expected to see my boyfriend and I in a less expensive place being that we didn’t have annual incomes and because older people in that area usually visit the restaurant. The older adults in my life are overprotective and expect young adults like myself to enjoy my youth and not engage in any “adult” activities. My mother was actually surprised to hear that we were going to Montgomery County to the Cheesecake Factory. She too didn’t expect us to be going to such a nice place. The entire situation shocked me. Never did I think that young people trying to have a good time would cause this much attention. Similarly, when my boyfriend and I go out within our area, we do not attract much attention at all. I guess it is because there are a lot of affordable places that teens can go to for dates. When we are in our neighborhoods, we could be a part of the marked category. We are more powerful when in our own territories with those that are within our age group. If an older adult visited the places that us teens visit, they too would attract stares, comments, and would not fit in.
Putting the shoe on the other foot and imagining me in the opposite category would have made
this experience much different. If the area we were in was in a more rural area like D.C., I would have felt more comfortable. Being in a more rural area would have been more comfortable for me because it was something that I was used to as a result of growing up in D.C. I would have also felt less vulnerable and a sense of belonging. If my boyfriend and I were whites in the restaurant, we would have gotten a less shocking reaction. We would have been a part of the unmarked category and we would have “fit into the picture” nicely. I would have also felt better about the situation if we were older since many of the customers in the restaurant were middle aged. This would have also caused fewer stares and assumptions that we could not afford to dine in at the restaurant. This shows how everyone is confined to one area and rarely visits places that may be as close as five minutes away.
My personal experience shows how society views everyone. Everyone is different in their own way and society uses these differences as ways to hold us back or bring us up in within the social organization. In my experience, my boyfriend and I were the minority. In this situation, we were marked due to factors that were out of our control. We were judged because we were different. We were black, young adults in a suburban part of town, where those that lived there were not used to seeing people like us. Therefore, we were looked down upon and considered powerless in a place that was the complete opposite of us. In the larger picture, this shows how narrow minded some people are. Why should there be any awkward reactions to things that are different? Why should the people in D.C. be shocked when they see a white person in the area? Why should people in Montgomery County be shocked when they see young black people in the area trying to have a nice time? We should not be judged and categorized to feel like we belong in a certain place. There should not be categories that distinguish people from each other to show that one group is inferior to another group. Everyone should be equal despite their differences.
My boyfriend and I took a trip up to New York to visit some of his family last summer. We first stopped in Manhattan to go to Times Square to walk around, shop, and site see. In this part of New York, there is such a large variety of people there that neither of us felt uncomfortable, even though being an interracial couple in public is not always the easiest thing. As we walked towards the subway station to go towards his Grandmother’s apartment in Brooklyn that night, she called us and insisted on coming to pick us up, and not having to take the subway or walk. My boyfriend told her to not worry about it, that it would take longer for her to come get us than it would to take the subway. Although my boyfriend now lives in Maryland, he did live in New York so he knows the subway system very well. As we got on the subway train and headed towards Brooklyn, the scenery definitely changed. As we reached the last couple of stops, I was now one of the very few white females on the train. Once we reached our stop, it was roughly 10:00 p.m. and very dark outside. We had a four block walk from the station to the apartment through an area considered the “ghetto.” The streets were lined with dim lit street lights, tall apartment buildings, and young black males congregating on the street corners and in front of the apartment building entrances.
I had been warned a few times by my boyfriend beforehand that white people are rarely seen going into that part of town, but I insisted that it was okay and that I would be fine. I always instill in him that I am from Prince George’s County, Maryland, and went to a high school where there was only a 6% White student population, so I am used to being the minority and it does not bother me. Being that we are in an interracial relationship, we are used to get stared at a lot, but this time it was different. I was getting stared at as if they had never seen a white girl before, and he was getting stared at like he should not be there with a white girl. I had a very uneasy feeling that I was not welcome there, and I had truly never felt like that before. As we got to his grandmother’s apartment, she was so relieved that we made it there safely and that she was worrying about us. I was given a tour of her small, cramped apartment, and was shown the pull-out couch that we would be sleeping on that night.
Race is the biggest factor contributing to the outcome of my trip to New York. As we were walking through Manhattan, it is almost as if marked and unmarked categories of race did not matter. We saw upper-class, lower-class, and homeless people of every race imaginable. Although racially I am considered to be unmarked, and he is considered to be marked, in New York City that did not seem to be an issue. However, once we headed to Brooklyn was when everything changed. When his Grandmother insisted on picking us up rather than us taking the subway, it did not phase me at first as to why. Now that I think about it, she may have been concerned for my well-being considering that I am white, and being white in Brooklyn is not very common, which would make me marked. On the other hand, she may have seen me as being unmarked because I am white and white people are seen as having more power, and why would a white person go into an area deemed as being “ghetto?” Then again, she may have totally forgotten about my race, and being that she is also marked because she is female, she may know that her area is not the safest for a female. It could have also been a combination of all of the above; she may have been concerned because I am both white and a female.
When we first got on the subway train, I noticed a good amount of upper-class white males on their way home from work, dressed in their business suits and carrying their leather brief cases. There were also a lot of young black teenage males, and homeless males and females in the station and sleeping on the train. In this particular setting, it is evident that marked and unmarked categories are present. The upper-class white males are unmarked and have power over the black teenagers and the homeless people who both belong to the marked category. However, a different aspect of the matrix of domination can be seen when thinking about the homeless men and women who are living in the subway station and on the trains. They do not have power over anyone at all, even if they are white males and essentially are part of the unmarked category.
Once we got off of the train and started walking, I felt that I was marked since I was being stared at and was the only white person within site. Even though my boyfriend is black and he normally would have be unmarked in Brooklyn, being that he was with me made him stand out as if he belonged in the marked category just as me as me. When we got to his Grandmother’s apartment, I did not understand why she was so worried about us. My boyfriend used to live there and would take the subway and walk in that area at night all the time and he was never bothered. But as soon as I was added to the picture, she was so worried something would happen to us. No one approached or talked to us, so I wonder if my race was the main reason she felt we would be.
A large part of belonging to a certain category depends on your socioeconomic status; there are certainly many other factors, but your status in society is a definitely a big one. The city of Manhattan is known as being the home to the upper-class business people and many wealthy celebrities, all who are unmarked. As we walked around in Times Square and window-shopped, it was evident that you needed to belong to a higher socioeconomic status to even afford something at a few of the stores. As we entered them, we were marked in the sense of our age and the way we looked and dressed compared to our fellow shoppers and the people who worked there. When we went to the train station, marked and unmarked categories were clearly present. The businessmen clearly have more power because they are white and males, but also mainly because they are in the upper-class and have money, which is a very big factor in who has power over whom in our country, which is run by the wealthy.
When we reached his Grandmother’s block, it was evident that we were not in the upper-class area of Manhattan anymore. In this particular part of town, the majority of the people who live there are marked because they are part of the working-class or poor. My boyfriend and I both come from middle-class families, which automatically makes us unmarked. His Grandmother is part of the working-class, which is why she was living in this part of Brooklyn and in that apartment. As I said earlier, my boyfriend used to live in that area as well and was also marked since he was part of the working-class. However, since leaving that area and moving to Maryland for a better life, he has that now and has moved up to the middle-class.
Geography also played an obvious role in my trip to New York. My boyfriend and I both come from the suburbs of Prince George’s County, and live in relatively nice neighborhoods with minor crimes committed here and there. We are comfortable and feel safe and secure in where we live, which would constitute us as being part of an unmarked category. However, Manhattan is not a suburb but yet it is also relatively safe and could be considered as unmarked for being a respectable place to live and visit. Yet when considering the area of Brooklyn, it is in the marked category since it is not exactly the safest place to live. As with most lower-class areas, there are a lot of drug deals, shootings, and domestic violence crimes. I do not consider that area to be more powerful then my middle-class neighborhood or Manhattan, yet in a sense it is. It has the power which produces fear in those within the community and those on the outside. People who live in a community like that strive to have the respect and power over others.
Our trip to Manhattan and Brooklyn was definitely an experience, but I feel that if I belonged to the opposite marked/unmarked category, then the outcome would have been different. For example, if I was a black female then his grandmother probably would not have been as worried about us, and I would not have been stared at like I was not welcome. Then again, if I was a male rather than a female, then maybe I would not have been looked at as if I needed to be protected and been picked up, rather than walking since we were in a dangerous area.
I come from a very large family who hosts a Chick family reunion every summer, and last year was no exception. The majority of my family on my father’s side lives in Howard County, Maryland, and last year’s reunion was at my aunt and uncle’s house in Columbia. He knew before coming to my family reunion that he would probably be the only black person, but he was okay with that. As we reached a block that was lined with $750,000 homes, I knew we had made it. After I parked my little Honda Civic next to my uncle’s BMW, we went inside so I could give him a tour. I took him through their three-level house, which has an extra living room and dining room that they do not even use. We went into the backyard where he met and talked to a lot of my family, most of which he had never met before. We got some food and sat down with my cousin and her boyfriend, who happened to be black as well. My boyfriend and my cousin’s boyfriend seemed to get along really well, and they talked almost the whole time during lunch. After a while my mother noticed that my boyfriend was only socializing with my cousin’s boyfriend. She decided to call him over to meet some of her relatives sitting at another table. After lunch, most of my cousins were swimming in the in-ground pool, so we decided to join them. After about an hour of that, we got out and walked down the street to the community’s little convenient store to get ice cream.
This is a predominately white area and he was the only black person around. We noticed that he was getting stared at a lot by the older residents of the community, as if he was not welcome there. He felt extremely uncomfortable so we got our ice cream and left. We hurried back to the house and went down into the basement where most of my cousins were. Since my aunt and uncle have two children, they furnished the basement with a pool table, slot machine, and a big screen television with every video game system available. After playing down there for a while, it was getting dark outside and everyone started to leave. My sister then decided it was time for those of us that were still there to get in the hot tub, which could fit about ten people.
Race always seems to be a factor in any event. Considering it was my family reunion, the majority of the people that were there were white, and were members of the unmarked category. When we sat down to eat lunch, it was almost as if my boyfriend and my cousin’s boyfriend gravitated towards each other since they were the same race and were part of the marked category. It seemed as though they felt the most comfortable around each other since they were the only black males that were there. Once my mother noticed this, she had him come over to meet my other relatives. This was to make him feel more like part of the family. It made it so that he felt more like part of the unmarked category, and less like part of the marked category. Even though they were technically the only marked people in a group of unmarked, does not necessarily mean that they were less powerful than us or were subordinate to us.
When we went down to the convenient store, we noticed a lot of yard workers who were being paid to cut the grass, tend to the garden, and trim the bushes of the wealthy homeowners. We also noticed that a lot of the older residents were staring at him because it was a rare thing to see a black person in that neighborhood. As they were sitting on their porch, they would often whisper and look at not only him, but me as well. They looked at me as if I should not have brought a black person into their community, which is very similar to the incident in Brooklyn. From their response, we assume that meant they did not necessarily agree with our interracial relationship. Being white technically made me unmarked, but because I brought a black person into a dominantly white area made me feel just as marked as him.
Socioeconomic status determines a lot of things in your life, especially the amount of power you have over others. My boyfriend and I may be unmarked in the sense that we belong to middle-class families, but my relatives are unmarked as well but still have a lot more power over us because they have more money. It was evident that you had to be part of the unmarked category to even be able to afford a home in that community. My uncle drives a BMW, along with many of his neighbors who have SUV’s and sports cars in their driveway. Once we went inside of their home, it was almost as if we fit more into the marked category, because we did not live in a home like that. We both come from middle-class families, but at the same time, we do not live in three-level homes with rooms that we do not even use, and an in-ground pool, a game room, or a hot tub. Also, when we walked down the street to the convenient store, we saw a few houses whose lawn was getting cut by paid workers; that is also is a sign of having a higher status in society. People who are in a marked category would not be able to hire people to cut their lawn for them. Being part of the unmarked category means that you have more power over the marked category, for the sole reason that you have more money.
Depending on your socioeconomic status, depends on where you live. My aunt and uncle are unmarked and part of the upper-class, therefore, they live in an upper-class neighborhood. They live in Columbia, a suburb of Howard County, Maryland, which is considered to be one of the nicer counties in the state of Maryland. They live in a small, quiet community, with not much more criminal activity other than speeding. Crime has certainly increased in Howard County over the past couple of years, but my aunt and uncle still feel their home is safe for themselves and their children, which would make them unmarked. My boyfriend and I live in the suburbs as well but the houses in our neighborhoods do not resemble that of my aunt and uncle’s residential community at all, so compared to them we are marked.
I definitely feel that if my boyfriend was unmarked and white, then there would not have been as much of a problem with taking him into my aunt and uncle’s community. Also, if we were part of the upper-class, then we would not have been as surprised with how my aunt and uncle lived, considering they were unmarked as well. My experience visiting my boyfriend’s family and his while visiting mine reflects social organization in that some people still have an issue with race, and especially with interracial relationships. My boyfriend said that he never knew any interracial couples while he lived in Brooklyn, and that it was definitely looked down upon in that area. Also, my older relatives have never dated interracially, and they do not necessarily understand it. However, more people in my generation accept it and date interracially themselves.
These socially constructed ideologies of marked and unmarked categories can change depending on your race, socioeconomic status, and geography which were shown in my two incidents. I learned how to determine what category I belonged to in which situation, as well as how to analyze those in my surroundings and determine which category that they belonged to as well. Although naturally I was considered to belong to the unmarked category because I am white, middle-class, and live in a nice area, I found out that when in a different geographic location my category can change.
The outcomes of situations can certainly change when you belong to a different category. The trip to New York was through the eyes of a white female; however, the following experience is from a black female’s perspective.
As we encounter many different situations in our lives, we ultimately begin to realize how we “fit into” the structure of society. Everyone falls into different categories which shows how we are different from others. Even the people we interact with everyday are different from us no matter how alike we may seem or how much we feel we have in common. Categories that exhibit these differences include one’s race, gender, social class, sexuality, able-bodiedness, language, religion, nationality, and age. These categories are those that we may or may not have control over and should not mean anything. However, society uses categories such as these to label others or judge others based on stereotypes or perceptions.
These categories, or dimensions of difference, can be described as marked or unmarked categories. A marked category is a specific element. Those that fall under this category are usually subordinate, powerless, and women. On the other hand, the unmarked category is generic. Those that fall under this category are usually more dominant, privileged, powerful, and are usually men. Although these factors may not necessarily be true, this is how these categories are viewed by most of society.
One event which clearly defined these differences was a date with my boyfriend. We decided to go out to dinner at the Cheesecake Factory in White Flint. White Flint is an area in Montgomery County, Maryland. We decided to ride the train to avoid driving. As we got onto the train at the station in my area, all one would see was black people. As we got closer to our destination, I noticed how the black people on the train quickly faded and more white people appeared. I had never rode the train this far so this was a first time experience. The quickly appearing white people let me know that Montgomery County was much different than D.C. This area was very diverse but predominately white. Many people who live in this area are a part of the middle-upper class and pretty much well off. I had rarely visited this side of town and never had I been to Montgomery County for social purposes. The restaurant was very nice and I was ready to enjoy my time at this lovely place. However, I was overwhelmed by the entire experience. There were some factors that caused me to feel uncomfortable because visiting this restaurant was a big change for me. Sometimes new experiences can be intimidating and I was definitely intimidated.
The geographic location of the restaurant was important in this situation and caused me to feel vulnerable in this “foreign” part of town. I am from southeast D.C. and being in Montgomery County, I felt powerless because the majority of the people there were white. When people usually think of southeast D.C., they think of the “ghetto” with high crime and a place that is just not friendly and nice to visit. D.C., especially southeast, is filled with numerous housing projects. A majority of the people there make a living through a low paying job and/or their dependence on welfare. On the other hand, Montgomery County is the suburbs and a place that I am not used to. Traveling to Montgomery County was a different experience for me because many of the houses and places of business in Montgomery County were very big and looked very expensive. It seemed like everyone was rich, drove expensive luxurious cars, and owned fairly large houses. This was definitely something I was not used to seeing on a daily basis. My boyfriend and I were considered marked while in Montgomery County. When in my own neighborhood, I would consider myself unmarked because I feel empowered when in my own territory. Although many people believe D.C. to be an unsafe place, I feel safe there because it is a place I have known my entire life. Therefore, when I traveled to Montgomery County, I did not feel safe. Despite the better reputation and fewer crimes the area has, I felt vulnerable and less comfortable than in my own neighborhood. This situation also relates to a child adapting to a new environment. When a child moves from his hometown to a new place, it can be scary for him and perhaps overwhelming. This new place is foreign and unknown to the child and is certainly out not anything that he is used to and out of the ordinary. It will have to take a while for the child to adapt to the new environment and feel comfortable enough to interact within his surroundings. This was exactly how I felt. When I came to Montgomery County, I was not accustomed to the area. I was not scared but intimidated by the big rich looking houses and businesses because they were far more luxurious than anything back in D.C. It took some time for me to explore the area and grow accustomed to it so I could enjoy being there.
I began to feel somewhat better when we approached the mall. The mall was my place of enjoyment and I frequently visited the mall when I needed a break from my everyday life. When we entered the mall there were some black people but the majority of the people in the mall were white. I did not pay any attention to the black to white ratio because I see all types of people when shopping. While in the mall my boyfriend and I were a part of the marked category. It did not bother me that we were in the marked category because although I was uncomfortable in the area, I did not feel inferior to the people within the mall. We walked around a bit before entering the restaurant to enjoy the scenery. Many of the stores were expensive stores. We were definitely marked in this situation because unlike the other shoppers in the mall, I doubt we could afford anything in any of the stores. The other shoppers in the mall were unmarked as they walked around with numerous bags in their hands, showing that they were obviously well off.
When we entered the restaurant, I immediately felt out of place. As previously stated, I am from D.C. where the majority of the people who live there are African American. There are some that are white but live downtown and are rarely seen in my part of town. Even when I go out within the D.C. area, I feel like I belong there. Due to the area that I lived in, I was surrounded by blacks on a daily basis. When I entered the restaurant, I felt out of place because I wasn’t accustomed to being around so many white people at one time. We were one of the only black people in the restaurant and for once, I felt different. Everyone stared like they were surprised to see that black people actually came to this side of town. My boyfriend and I, as blacks, were considered marked because we were the powerless in this case. We were the center of attention because we were black in a white neighborhood. Being considered marked in this situation could have been the reasons for the shocks and stares. The other customers in the restaurant could have felt powerful because they were white. Or perhaps, my boyfriend and I had the powerful advantage because we were the only blacks in such a place and a black person’s presence was least expected. Whatever the case, I was extremely uncomfortable but I was determined not to show the other customers that their stares had an effect on me. This shows how society unknowingly separates us and influences us to believe that one does not belong in a certain area. Someone can be considered marked just because they are in an area that rarely has people of their kind. This factor relates to a friend of mine from high school. I attended a predominately black school. The only girl in the school who was white was my friend Kelly. Kelly was the only white person I had ever known at the time but I accepted her as a friend. When others saw her, they stared, pointed, laughed, and even kept their distance because she was white. The other student’s reactions weren’t forms of racism; they were just surprised that a white girl actually attended our school. As time went on, everyone learned to accept Kelly as she was just another student. The only thing that differentiated us was that she was white and we were not but we all loved and accepted her. So, if the people in the restaurant would have accepted us, they would have gotten to see that we were just like anyone else in the restaurant, except the fact that we were black and they were white. It is a shame that this country still notices racial differences and is in shock when someone of a different race visits their side of town. We have long since gotten over racism and showing others that they do not belong or fit in simply because they are a different race.
Another issue that caused me to be out of place was that my boyfriend and I were young adults. When older adults think of young adults my age going out on dates in such nice places, they may think how can they afford to eat in this place? I believe the stares also resulted from this factor. The usual teen date is to the movies or somewhere less expensive, being that many young adults do not have high salaries, but more so part-time jobs since they are in school. The restaurant was filled with middle aged people. Many people from my area do not go out to other parts of town on dates. If they happen to go on a date, it is usually at a less expensive place in the area. As young adults in a mature setting, we were considered marked because compared to the middle aged adults there, we were like children. Although I was uncomfortable, I thought to myself: maybe these middle aged adults are shocked or perhaps even angry that we, as teens, were able to afford a meal in the same restaurant they worked every day to afford to eat in. The older adults could have felt powerful in the restaurant because they were older and we were the youngest couple there. The older adults probably looked at my boyfriend and I and assumed that we weren’t from the area, perhaps they thought that we too were members of the lower class and therefore, couldn’t afford the meal. Although their actions were rude, I didn’t mind too much. The older adults in my life still think of me as a child. They would have expected to see my boyfriend and I in a less expensive place being that we didn’t have annual incomes and because older people in that area usually visit the restaurant. The older adults in my life are overprotective and expect young adults like myself to enjoy my youth and not engage in any “adult” activities. My mother was actually surprised to hear that we were going to Montgomery County to the Cheesecake Factory. She too didn’t expect us to be going to such a nice place. The entire situation shocked me. Never did I think that young people trying to have a good time would cause this much attention. Similarly, when my boyfriend and I go out within our area, we do not attract much attention at all. I guess it is because there are a lot of affordable places that teens can go to for dates. When we are in our neighborhoods, we could be a part of the marked category. We are more powerful when in our own territories with those that are within our age group. If an older adult visited the places that us teens visit, they too would attract stares, comments, and would not fit in.
Putting the shoe on the other foot and imagining me in the opposite category would have made
this experience much different. If the area we were in was in a more rural area like D.C., I would have felt more comfortable. Being in a more rural area would have been more comfortable for me because it was something that I was used to as a result of growing up in D.C. I would have also felt less vulnerable and a sense of belonging. If my boyfriend and I were whites in the restaurant, we would have gotten a less shocking reaction. We would have been a part of the unmarked category and we would have “fit into the picture” nicely. I would have also felt better about the situation if we were older since many of the customers in the restaurant were middle aged. This would have also caused fewer stares and assumptions that we could not afford to dine in at the restaurant. This shows how everyone is confined to one area and rarely visits places that may be as close as five minutes away.
My personal experience shows how society views everyone. Everyone is different in their own way and society uses these differences as ways to hold us back or bring us up in within the social organization. In my experience, my boyfriend and I were the minority. In this situation, we were marked due to factors that were out of our control. We were judged because we were different. We were black, young adults in a suburban part of town, where those that lived there were not used to seeing people like us. Therefore, we were looked down upon and considered powerless in a place that was the complete opposite of us. In the larger picture, this shows how narrow minded some people are. Why should there be any awkward reactions to things that are different? Why should the people in D.C. be shocked when they see a white person in the area? Why should people in Montgomery County be shocked when they see young black people in the area trying to have a nice time? We should not be judged and categorized to feel like we belong in a certain place. There should not be categories that distinguish people from each other to show that one group is inferior to another group. Everyone should be equal despite their differences.
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
The Brochure
The Dirty "F" Word
SELF-QUIZ:
Now that you have learned a little bit about feminism, take a few moments to answer these questions and try to be as honest as you can. You may be surprised to see your results!
- Do you think men and women should be socially, politically, and economically equal?
- Do you think women should receive the same amount of pay for the same amount of work as men?
- Do you think women should receive the same amount of attention and health care as men?
- Do you feel that it is okay for a woman to work outside of the home if that’s what she wishes to do?
- Do you feel that women are just as competent as men and deserve the same choices and opportunities as men?
- Do you agree that you can still be a feminist if you do Not agree with ALL feminists ideas and beliefs?
Once again, as yourself, do you believe that men and women should be socially, politically, and economically equal?
-If you answered YES to these questions, do you now consider yourself a feminist?
-Well, I guess that is up to you!
If you still believe in the old fashioned definition that women should be submissive to their husbands and devote their lives to having babies and their husbands…then you have learned nothing!
Many people, mostly men have preconceived notions about what a feminist is. Many think feminists are “just a bunch of bra-burning, hairy-legged, man hating LESBIANS!
(This is where you list the stereotypes): When asked what comes to mind when you think of feminists, people quickly began shouting unsavory characteristics such as:
- Ugly
- Bitchy
- Angry
- Boring
- Loud
- Annoying
- Butch
- Lonely
- Lesbian.
- Women who make the world worse
- Women who promote homosexuality
- Women who destroy families
- Women who destabilize society
- Rebellious wives
- Tramps
- Turned aside after satin
TRUE DEFINITION: Feminism is the movement whose goal is to make the social, political and economic rights for women equal to those of men; eliminating gender barriers, and overall pro-woman but not anti-male. They are not saying that men as individuals are the problem; the problem is the unquestioned power they receive because of their sex. Women’s worth in the world has to lead to a system that creates inequalities based on perceived gender differences.
Previously hidden art by women are beginning to re-emerge. Museums in the
GENDER EQUALITY
· Employment differences is one of the most pressing issues today.
o Women make 70 cents for every 1.00 men make.
· Socially constructed roles
· Human rights for all
· Eliminate gender disparities
WOMEN ARE HUMANS!
- Are underpaid or unpaid and that’s okay.
- What they look like is more important than what they do.
- If they get raped, it’s their own fault...due to the way they dress or even look at a guy.
- If they love women it is because they are incapable of getting a “real” man.
- If they expect community care for their families then they’re considered SELFISH.
- If they stand up for their rights they’re LOUD
- If they DON’T stand up for themselves, they are WEAK. (typical weak female).
- If they marry it’s only to trap the man.
- If they DON’T marry, they’re considered UNNATURAL.
- Because they aren’t deemed responsible enough to decide if when and how they give birth…they are FEMINISTS!
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