The Illusive Race Question & Class:A Bacteria That Constantly Mutates

By: Karla RuvalcabaCHS 245 OL- 14003

About the Author

• Rodolfo F. Acuña was the Founding Chair and a Professor of Chicano Studies at California.

• State University, Northridge. Acuna has accomplished many goals. He earned a B.A as well as a Master’s degree from the Los Angeles State College.

• He also earned a Ph.D. in Latin American History from USC in 1968. He is well known for his book, Occupied America, and many more.

• His awards contain the California Faculty Associations Academic Freedom Award, the Southern California Social Science Library’s Emil Freed Award, and the Dr.Ernesto Galarza Award for Distinguished Community Activist and Scholarship.

• Acuna has presented and accomplished this paper/article on April 2005 at the Society of Latino Scholars’ Graduate Student Conference on the Michigan State University campus.

Introduction:

• Racism is like bacteria. It fights cures and contains variants with rare traits. It was once concluded in society that racism was defined and was curing society from the nasty disease but only to discover racism in another form. Moreover, it has been stated about thirty five years ago one would identify the bad guys from the good guys. But currently now even the good boys have invoked the name of the man who has brought a big impact in history: Martin Luther King Jr.

Being White• Nonwhite groups have struggled for the right to be

white or at least close to being white. Being white would bring these groups entitlements and having privileges. African Americans came to a conclusion that being lighter would prevent field work. Indians in Colonial Mexico acknowledged that if they were mestizos they would no longer have to pay tribute in form of labor. Whether one was classified white or not it always relies on the determination of the dominant society.

Race• Race has been changed quicker than the academicians

have defined it. Race is resilient to social antibiotics. Most literature has focused within the black involvement. Latinos and blacks share in disparity and their experiences are dissimilar. Race frequently has dissimilar connotations between U.S. Latinos. The dissimilar admixtures have shaped ethnically diverse societies. The subtleties of race are still emerging amongst Latinos and the appearance of big amounts of immigrants who contest for space has strengthened nationalism between the groups.

Color is important• Mexican culture was shaped by a racial instruction that

was founded on race, and it continues in the attitudes of Mexican relations to this day who still have sayings such as “Que bonita pero prietita (how pretty but dark) that qualify beauty according to skin hues.”

• Color is significant. Girls are fortified to retain out of the sun. The idea of beauty is extremely rooted within numerous Latinos historical recollections. This colonial attitude can be understood on Spanish language TV where there are further non-Indian viewing Latinas than dark ones.

Immigrants• Race being defined is yet not still and has a

dissimilar intellect than it had 50 years ago.• History recommends that the United States has a

strange skill to change and reinvent groups, and ultimately gather sections of the targeted group.

• The term “immigrant ” has racial suggestions and it inspires people of the same race to move themselves away from immigrants. A Green card provides former immigrants’ rights.

Diversity• The diverse understandings on race amongst U.S. scholars

and Brazilians has triggered tensions. Brazilian intellects have named the American participation intellectual imperialism and disapprove the effect of U.S. funding on Brazilian investigation. They single out the Ford and MacArthur Foundations and state that they enforced groups created by the U.S. black involvement. Contrasting Americans who view race in terms of black and white, Brazilians view race as a range of “colors.” Whereas the censure is lawful, still U.S. Black involvement has wedged the general sector.

The Illusion of Being White

• The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo provided Mexicans the rights of complete citizens, which numerous coherent destined the right to be named white. Though, there was a slit among what the treaty thought and reality. Indigenous-looking Mexicans in the United States fervently claim that they are white when he reality is that they are not. Mexicans were for the most part viewed as nonwhite, and their right to citizenship was confronted. This disagreement was often intense. Mexicans were left out from constitutional securities.

What is the result? Is Race a Factor?Today’s Children

• January 2005, the University of California Los Angeles showed results of a survey between freshmen nationwide that presented a high percentage of college freshmen considering discrimination was no longer a main problem in the United States. Karen Hernández,18, a first-year UCLA student from Ontario planning to major in aerospace engineering quoted, “For me, the racial boundaries are not there.” The survey presented 22.7% of freshmen saying that racism was no longer a major problem in the United States. 30% were raised with students of other races and sensed contented with students of other backgrounds. According to the article the survey also stated and discovered a gap among "minorities and white freshmen as to whether it was essential or very important to promote racial understanding: 23.5% of whites said yes, it was essential or very important, and54.8% and 43.6% of Latinos felt that way.”

Latinos• It is said to be differences according to setting in the

attitudes of Latinos toward discrimination. U.S. Cubans vary from Mexicans as do those just coming from Honduras. Latinos living in mainly white neighborhoods are more apt to name themselves Hispanic than to the ones living in predominately Latino neighborhoods. The article states, “Those on the periphery will be influenced by the cores closest to them. Predominately Mexican neighborhoods generally have other Latinos living within their borders so residents are specific about their ancestry.”

Students in College• The principles of the community have disintegrated. Students who

make it to college are to be known to being skimmed off the top. Latino college students frequently come from parochial, private, magnet schools, or the Advanced Placement sectors of their schools. College students who reach the four year universities are usually the better qualified, both academically and financially. In state of California the academic segregation is active in along class lines. Selected students in public schools are upward bound students who receive some type of help. Latinos who are in the middle class have parents who can afford paying some type of tuition and costs. Then they are to be circulated through private colleges, the University of California, California State University, and Community college campuses usually along class lines.

Mexicans• A great portion of foreign-born Mexicans in the state of California

feels discrimination in schools and where they work. Furthermore, fewer foreign-born Mexicans in Texas feel the same way. According to the article, “About 31% felt discrimination in schools is a major problem; 38% felt discrimination in the workplace is a major problem. In Texas, U.S. born Mexicans are less likely than foreign-born Mexicans living in California to refer to themselves as Mexicans and much more likely to call themselves Latinos or Hispanics. Latinos overwhelmingly say that discrimination is the problem. And a majority of whites and African Americans agree; yet they are less likely to conclude that discrimination against Latinos is a problem.”

Populations• More than 50% the nation’s U.S. Latino populations are

established in created a livening in California or Texas. Furthermore, about three-quarters are living in Texas, California, Florida, New York, Illinois, New Jersey, and Arizona. The biggest amount of Mexican population are in California , Texas, Illinois, and Arizona, mainly southwestern states. The biggest Puerto Rican populations were in New York, Florida, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Two-thirds of Cubans were in Florida. It is significant to know that the quickest developing regions in the Latino population growth in the U.S south are where racism is still in effect and very active. It is said to there are still American racism that merges with old American nativism.

Latino groups• The misperception and absence of clearness spells

difficulties for the future. With race being absent it will be impossible to consider the necessities of Latinos and implement programs to accurate disparities. Identity has to be built around further than “We are Number One.” It is known that Latinos are the greatest group in the country and have not been given to them moral authority and political power. The latter must be grounded on the requirement to precise dissimilarities and inequalities.

Conclusion• The meaning of race has been more disorganized by the

appearance of rich Latin Americans who have fled the political, social, and an economic leveling in countless Latin American countries. Numerous of educated immigrants are a creation of their societies where color and family position define class. Many immigrants have little information of what the civil rights struggle in the country. They have joined “Latino” organization and define racial growth as admission. Like a bad disease, racism remains to change and inequality will worsen.

References• Acuña, Rodolfo F. (Ph.D.) “The Illusive Race

Question and Class: A Bacteria that Constantly Mutates,” JSRI Occasional Paper #59, The Julian Samora Research Institute, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, 2005.