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Race and Ethnic Relations
Week 10 Lecture
Introduction
Canada has always been a place of great diversity.
For thousands of years by First Nations
By 1867, British 60%, French 31%, Others 8%
By 2001, English 20%, 14% Scottish, 16% Irish, French 16%, Aboriginal 4%
Visible minorities 13%
Canada has been called a vertical mosaic; ethnicity as well as class is a source of inequality
The Local Ethnic Community
Immigrants comprise a high percentage of Canadian society and a very high percentage of some cities.
Chain migration: sequential movement of persons from a common place of origin to a common destination, with the assistance of those there.
Since WWII, policy has encouraged
family reunification—21% (in 2001)
safe haven—11%
now, economic benefits to our society—61%.
(2005: Education Canada)
The Local Ethnic Community
Institutional completeness: degree to which an ethnic population develops a strong sense of solidarity and ethnic identity and a self-sufficient range of ethnic institutions.
Occupational specialization: building a secure niche in the economic structure. Members may share more than culture, also economic and political interests, e.g., Italians in construction, many East Asians are entrepreneurs. But limited opportunities and discrimination could result.
(2005: Education Canada)
Ethnic Group
An ascribed status, conferred at birth
Form of social organization with boundaries maintained by social norms governing interaction
e.g., endogamy: marriage within the group
A subculture; some emphasize it more than others
A focus of identity, a sense of belonging with others, children may experience conflict
(2005: Education Canada)
Race and Minority Group
Inherited physical traits may become socially defined as very significant.
Social category: a collection of individuals who share a trait(s) regarded as meaningful.
Social meaning can include the assignment of a rank: subordinate or superordinate.
Category may have little common, but they may become a social group, e.g., First Nations.
(2005: Education Canada)
Race and Racist Ideology
Race: a social construction, “races” are not pure.
Markers like skin colour or hair are inherited independently
Racist ideologies: racial categories are natural genetic groupings, with behavioural characteristics.
Racist ideas have been challenged and are weakening.
Groups have been disadvantaged by racist stereotypes.
(2005: Education Canada)
Minority Groups
Minority Group: a category that occupies a subordinate rank in a social hierarchy.
May outnumber a dominant group
Social control:
Expulsion: forcible removal, e.g., First Nations
Genocide: intentional massacre
Discrimination: denying opportunities to members available to dominant groups
(2005: Education Canada)
Minority Groups
Systemic discrimination: by-product of ordinary functioning of social institutions, not action by individuals, e.g., height requirements
Segregation: physical distance is maintained to ensure social distance, e.g., separation of ethnic groups in cities, though people can also get employment, social support, and cultural maintenance from their own ethnic groups
(2005: Education Canada)
Explaining Discrimination
Prejudice: attitudes to individuals because of characteristics assumed to be shared
Stereotypes: mental images that exaggerate perceived undesirable traits of some members of a group applied to all members of a minority group
Due to being a part of learned culture
Teachings of parents, teachers, and others
Mass media
(2005: Education Canada)
Explaining Discrimination
Connection between prejudice and discrimination:
Relationship is very complex
A prejudiced person may not discriminate
Majority attitudes are becoming more tolerant
Aboriginal people and some visible minority immigrants are at a great disadvantage
(2005: Education Canada)
Race and Ethnic Relations in Canadian Society
Colonialism: invading people dominate an indigenous population.
British and French first sought help from First Nations, then sought their land for settlers.
Numbers of First Nations people declined drastically and some signed treaties, surrendering their lands for reservations: registered/status Indians.
Indian Act does not apply to non-status Indians, Metis or Inuit people.
(2005: Education Canada)
Race and Ethnic Relations in Canadian Society
Land claims are being negotiated, e.g., Nunavut became a third territory for some Inuit.
50% of status Indians live on reserves, generally in an impoverished state.
50% live in urban centres with disadvantage, but many are integrating into mainstream society.
(2005: Education Canada)
Other Ethnic Groups
Early 1900s, British, Americans, Ukrainians, and others from central Europe went to the West.
Mid-1900s, Southern Europeans came to cities.
Now 75% of all immigrants go to cities, principally Toronto, Vancouver, and Montreal.
80% of them are from Asia
Since 1970s, policies stress education and occupational skills
(2005: Education Canada)
Perspectives on Relations
Assimilationism: diversity will decline over time.
Park’s race relations cycle:
Contact
Competition, if resources are limited
Accommodation of weaker groups
Assimilation
However, distinctions may be maintained when characteristics are highly visible.
(2005: Education Canada)
Perspectives on Relations
Acculturation: learning culture of dominant group, but may not be assimilated into the social structure structural assimilation, with primary relationships with the dominant group.
Blacks and Aboriginals were not assimilating.
Employment equity: to increase the representation of disadvantaged groups; Aboriginal peoples, visible minorities, women, and people with disabilities (2005: Education Canada)
Perspectives on Relations
Pluralism and Multiculturalism: ethnic diversity remains a central feature of contemporary society.
Both assimilation and ethnic differentiation are going on simultaneously.
Many ethnic group members improve their positions by group efforts, ethnic solidarity as resource.
1971 Trudeau announced “multiculturalism within a bicultural society.” (2005: Education Canada)
Perspectives on Relations
Post-colonial and post-modern perspectives themes:
Be skeptical and attempt to “deconstruct” or de-mystify claims of those with power;
Study of experience of colonizer and colonized
Struggle against domination brings understanding
Variety of experience and constant change is central to lives of immigrants
How are ideas constructed and controlled and by whom
Stresses relativism, universal truth is impossible.
(2005: Education Canada)
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