Susan Saulny
"Counting by Race Can Throw Off Some Numbers"
The New York Times
February 9,2011
URL: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/10/us/10count.html?pagewanted=1&_r=2&hp
Topic: Discussion of how difficult it is to classify race in an increasingly mixed race society. There is also a "continued discussion" with other writers attached.
Summary: When it comes to keeping racial statistics, the nation is in transition, moving, often without uniformity, from the old “mark one box” limit to allowing citizens to check as many boxes as their backgrounds demand. Changes in how Americans are counted by race and ethnicity are meant to improve the precision with which the nation’s growing diversity is gauged. In the process, however, a measurement problem has emerged. Despite the federal government’s setting standards more than a decade ago, data on race and ethnicity are being collected and aggregated in an assortment of ways. The lack of uniformity is making comparison and analysis extremely difficult across fields and across time.
Intended audience: General Public
Key points: Contrary to the debate on Saturday, the classification of race by the US government is not being pressed by whites for discrimination, but by racial minorities who want to ensure funds for disadvantaged students are directed appropriately.
Relevance: Continues our discussion from the Race as an Illusion seminar.
It is a problematic system in which people are allowed to claim a certain "race"(without any evidence) and tie their answer to government benefits. Seems clear to me that if people are rewarded to claim minority status, they will.
ReplyDeleteIt also seems strange to me that in an effort to get people to see through outward appearances, we seem to be catagorizing and rewarding people for their differences rather than focusing on similarities.
We saw last week that outward appearance is deceiving and in the end genetically, we are all almost identical with no evolutionary evidence supporting eugenics efforts between the perceived races.
Why we are continually taught to focus on differences I don't know but seems to go a long way to understanding why actions of injustice and jealousy sometimes still exists.
Who benefits by separating the "races"?
Though we cannot continue to focus on differences of race since we are all alike in that sense, I believe what minorities, especially African-American, are trying to address is the continued inequity of cultures. If we do not somehow figure out how to lessen the gap, then there will continue to be disadvantages, anger and frustration with the way the situation is currently. By tracking races we are able to see where those injustices are still located and attempt - how, I am not sure - to deal with them. Once those differences lessen then we will not need to focus on them, but we are not there yet.
ReplyDelete