Essay Sample on Issues in Defining American Society

Introduction

The American society can majorly be defined by words such as white supremacy, white privilege and racial differences. Over the years, the issues that arise from these terms have become more dominant in the current society, with the white Americans feeling dethroned from their societal throne. A review of various articles on these issues, with supplemental information from daily occurrences, helps to understand the prevalence of these issues in defining American society.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Save 25%

In his article, Donald Grinde highlights the plight of Native Americans, ranging from representation to the need to have their history and views discussed and incorporated into the school curricula. Based on his experiences, it is evident that people in power and authority have a major contribution to the writing of history, based on the roles that they play. Due to their ability to influence masses of people, those in authority structure the views of others and hence determine the social constructs at a particular time in history. Sorrells (2016) explains how white supremacy has influenced social aspects such as racial balance, with respect to how people of different races are treated. According to Grinde (n.d.), his white professors and the government as a whole played a significant role in promoting racism and ethnic division among various groups in America. The author narrates of the fights that broke out during the Civil Rights Movement in a bid to disband the blacks from protesting against racial discrimination. On his own, Grinde used his position to protest various social issues that he hoped would highlight the plights of various marginalized groups, such as women and Native Americans. This way, he hoped to change people's views and improve societal conditions for them.

Another role is to provide a description of the political, social and cultural atmosphere at the time since they provide directives for handling different situations. They also contribute by providing a genealogy of change through different times in history. Sorrells (2016) explains how the Native Americans fought to ensure that they gained recognition from Euro-Americans who reformed certain policies to provide an array of rights for them, despite their current struggles. By reforming certain rules and policies, the people in authority have thus shown the social and political developments in terms of embracing non-white Americans, despite these developments occurring at a slow rate.

Looking at current experiences highlighted in the news, one experience that resembles Grinde's struggle is the current economic problem that Indian Americans continue to experience. Institutional racism has made it difficult for these people to have access to quality education and other economic infrastructure, with many people being denied access to well-paying jobs. The lack of various social amenities such as health care and food has also resulted in increased mortality rates and poor living conditions. This case is similar to Grinde's who was unable to attend an Ivy League School despite his academic accolades in high school. Additionally, it refers to the inability of his parents to access quality education since they could not get jobs from their education as a result of the ethnic imbalance that was and still continues to influence how white Americans treat Native Americans.

Fundamentally, McIntosh (1988) describes white privilege as an invisible weightless package of unearned assets that the society has intentionally made oblivious the white people. Analogizing the concept with the contemporary patriarchy system's taboos and denials which are subject to men's advantage over the women, the author asserts that society has similarly established ways that protected and deny against white privilege. As such, the schools do not train the students to see themselves as unfairly advantaged or as an oppressor. Instead, they are taught to think of their lives as normative, ideal and morally neutral so that when a white person works to help others, the action is viewed as a step towards making other people feel like them(McIntosh,1988).

To explicitly show white privilege, the author recollects through a list of conditions in her daily life that she had been taking for granted. Things like being able to access the shopping alone at any time without the fear of being followed or harassed, as well as finding a publisher for this particular piece on white privilege are among the conditions she realizes to be easy by virtue of her skin color. She unearths a pattern of assumptions passed to her as a white person where her skin color was an asset for any move she was educated to want. As such, she could neglect anything outside her principal cultural forms and criticize it as well without fear of victimization. To sum it all, white privilege essentially empowers the white racial group, gives them confidence and comfort all in oblivious of negative effects to other groups (McIntosh,1988).

Regarding personal experience with white privilege, I can certainly confirm it has been both an advantage and a disadvantage. Having been conversant with the reality of white privilege, I cannot help but note that many of our daily-use products are basically white-centric. For instance, many cosmetics companies are still lagging behind when it comes to products that match people of color's skin tone. While this issue does not, directly, affect me, being in a family with both white race and colored members inflicts emotional torture seeing the struggle the non-white through each day simply because of white privilege's obliviousness.

On the positives of white privilege, while growing up in mixed-race neighborhood has been marked with unfair arrests of people of color, I can affirm that I have never been harassed by the authority or feared for such. Imperative to note, however, several of my kind and honest friends have been victimized solely on the account of their skin, which very unfair. As such, albeit the non-whites face the mentioned demerits, the white skin color has saved me from the above unnecessary harassment.

Looking at the study by Judith Martin, white identity can be regarded as the identification of white Americans based on the color of their skin since complexion acts as the normative aspect.

The issue of white identity arises as a result of gaining racial awareness, in terms of differences rooted in aspects of cultural and social norms. According to Martin (2000), the characteristics of white identity are rooted in its dimensions, and as such, can be broken down into three major characteristics. Firstly, white identity is subject to a structural privilege that grants white people certain extents of advantages which are limited to people of color. Martin (2000) observes that white people who embrace their white identity expect to receive a certain type of treatment in most social settings, which differs from the treatment that people of color receive. This expectation is rooted in racist beliefs, which Martin (2000) explains further when discussing the stages of developing the white identity. For example, white people expect a certain level of respect and conformity from people of other racial groups in order to feel more superior.

A second characteristic is the view of whiteness as a perception in various contexts rather than as an identity. Citing the O.J. Simpson case, Martin (2002) highlights the huge difference in views between blacks and whites regarding this case and establishes that white identity seals an individual's views on various issues, especially those that provide a racial divide. This characteristic also establishes that whites have shared perceptions making it easy to predict their stance on various social and political issues.

The third characteristic of white identity is the existence of social norms and labels that identify them and give them a certain extent of social power. According to Martin (2000), white identity allows whites to provide labels for other racial groups while limiting their labels to their normative aspect of being white.

Based on the characteristics stated above, it is easy to identify them in America, especially in the political sphere. A basic example is in the election of Donald Trump as president of the United States, which can only be as a result of white Americans trying to protect their whiteness. Having endured a regime where blackness came into power, the whites may have felt invisible during a political era that gave blacks a voice and allowed them to enjoy political benefits that arose from Barack Obama's rule. In a bid to retain their social status in their society, white Americans opted to elect President Trump who promised to "make America great again", an implication that he would revert all social and political aspects to the hands of the white people. His election into power by the whites brings about all the three characteristics of white identity. From this instance, the characteristic of entitlement and protection of individualism reflect the need to enhance the whiteness rooted in white identity.

Conclusion

From the discussion above, it is evident that, to a greater extent, American society is built upon racist beliefs and views that shape and determine the relationship between the whites and people of color. These factors also explain the dynamics of these relationships and thus help to understand and predict future interactions between white Americans and other races.

Reference

Grinde, D. A. (N.d.). Race and Kinship: A Native American's Identity before and after Words.

Martin, J. N. (2000). Understanding Whiteness in the United States. In Approaches: Understanding Intercultural Communication.

McIntosh, P. (1988). White privilege: Unpacking the invisible knapsack.

Sorrells, K. (2016). Intercultural Communication: Globalization and Social Justice. Sage Publications.