racism essay intro

Racism Essay: Example and Tips

racism essay intro

Our world would be much better if we didn’t know what racism is. Unfortunately, even in the most developed countries and civilized societies, this problem can hardly be considered overcome. Writing essay on racism is complicated and required not only knowledge and skills of writing, but also tact, respect and understanding. Any separate point of the essay plan may be used as a separate short essay on a narrower topic about racism.

  • 1 Possible topic of racism essays
  • 2.0.1 Introduction
  • 3 History of racism
  • 4 Racism of the 19th century and attempts at its scientific substantiation
  • 5 Modern history of racism
  • 6 Theorists of racism
  • 7 Biological causes of racism
  • 8 Social causes of racism
  • 9 Psychological causes of racism
  • 10 Racism in the USA
  • 11 Most famous fighters against racism
  • 12 How Martin Luther King influenced racial politics in the US
  • 13.1 Conclusion

Possible topic of racism essays

  • Racism as a global problem of the modern world
  • Features of racism in the United States and worldwide
  • History of racism as a social phenomena
  • How can we overcome racism?
  • My heroes among fighters against racism (Nelson Mandela, M.L. King)
  • Racism: from history to present day – we have chosen this topic to cover as an example of essay about racism problem.

Template of essay Racism: from history to present day

Introduction, history of racism, racism of the 19th century and attempts at its scientific substantiation, modern history of racism, theorists of racism, biological causes of racism, social causes of racism, psychological causes of racism, racism in the usa, most famous fighters against racism, how martin luther king influenced racial politics in the us, black racism.

We live in the 21st century, when people loudly talk about world peace, and at the same time in a world where a new, “modern racism” is thriving, which emphasizes not only blood but also culture. Racism is a discrimination based on race, it includes ideas about the initial division of races into higher and lower levels, where the first dominate the second. One of the beliefs of racism is that the race influences the character, thinking and mental abilities of a single person. It is not right. The existence of racism in general is not correct. Does a person choose how to be born? You can not get rid of the race if you are included in it. Every person who lives in a free country, regardless of race, skin color, and religion, has rights and freedoms, the same as all. It is worth noting that racism is not only an opinion, or prejudice, racism implies under itself, constant mockery, insults, humiliation, beatings, and even murder. The cause of racism is not the color of the skin, but human thinking, and therefore to begin to fight it, follows from the eradication of incorrect prejudices. Racism is like an infection that has spread all over the world.

Despite the fact that the open manifestation of racism is punishable in most countries, it is difficult to recognize that this provides sufficiently reliable protection against its manifestations. In this essay, we will make an attempt to look at the problem of racism from various points of view, because it clearly shows that, despite the full confirmation of the unscientific nature of racist theories, the ideas of racism and nationalism continue to actively live in modern society.

Thus, it is proposed to look at the problems of racism from several points of view, separately highlighting the scope and manifestations of racism:

  • Racism as a manifestation of the political interests of countries or individuals.
  • Racism as a way to justify intervention on the territory of other states.
  • Social racism, which manifests itself more broadly in the color problem and is expressed in the dominance of one group of people over others.
  • Psychological racism. In this case, we are talking about an attempt to identify the causes of the manifestation of racism on the basis of considering the situation with an individual, starting from the psychoanalytic theory.

In the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, racism is designated as any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on race, color, descent, national or ethnic origin, having the purpose or effect of destroying or impairing the recognition, use or exercise on an equal footing of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural or any other areas of public life.

The international community, the UN condemn racism as a gross violation of universal and fundamental human rights, demand from all countries active struggle for the eradication of racism. The weighty decolonization of human rights in 1948, the UN Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination of 1963, the Declaration on Race and Racial Prejudice of 1978 and others.

Racism is an ideology that uses external differences as the main reason for refusing equal treatment of members of another group on the basis of scientific, biological or moral characteristics, consider them different from their own group and initially downstream. Previously, racism was considered only a manifestation of the negative attitude of white to black people, but international documents of the second half of the twentieth century called racial discrimination not only by skin color, but also by descent, national or ethnic origin.

Races, in turn, are understood as historically formed territorial groups of people connected by the unity of origin, which is expressed in general hereditary, morphological and physiological attributes that vary within certain limits.

Thus, it is no longer possible to understand racism as a problem of different skin colors. Racism must be considered more widely as a social and psychological problem. Within a single country, within one ethnic group, there may exist specific forms of racism, so-called social racism. This is when the poor and under-educated population, for example, peasants, experience infringement of their dignity and rights, inadequate wages at a quite official level. This is especially true for third world countries, and this represents one of the forms of modern slavery.

In the Middle Ages, statements about the “blood” differences between “nobility” and “rabble” were designed to justify class inequality. In the era of the initial accumulation of capital (16-18 centuries), when the European states first seized the colonies, racism served the purposes of inhuman exploitation, and often the justification for the extermination of the Indians of America, Africans, many peoples of South Asia, Australia and Oceania.

In the era of slavery, racism served the interests of slaveholders, who argued that the equation of people in rights would contradict the very nature in which inequality prevails. Under the conditions of the feudal system, racism took the form of the dogma of blue blood from the ruling elite, allegedly created by nature itself for undivided power over the fate of the farmer.

The epoch of capitalism was marked by the new flourishing of racist theories, which were intended to serve as the theoretical basis for the forcible seizure of lands among the indigenous peoples of America, Africa, Asia, Australia and Oceania. The immediate goal of racism has always been to morally disarm the victim of oppression, to destroy his faith in himself, to place him contempt for himself, to inspire him with the awareness of the legitimacy of his lack of rights and thereby paralyze his will to fight his oppressors.

In America, in the 18th and 19th centuries, there was active hunting for Indian scalps, and according to such racial policies, a number of racial theories appeared during that period, which seemed to be very useful for the colonial policies of England and other European countries, theories that extolled the white race on the facts of its intellectual superiority, on the strength of these theories, the oppression of black slaves in America flourished.

Politicians of many countries resorted to racism when they felt the need to justify the “right” to rule or capture. A striking example of this is Japanese racism. As soon as Japan began colonial expansion into other countries (for example, China), a theory of the superiority of the “Japanese race” over all other races and peoples of the world (General Araki, Tainzaki Junichiro, Akiyama Kanzoo and other “Japanese”) was created. The “original” racist theories were created in due time by some zealous panturkers, ideologists of the nobility of Poland, Finnish reactionaries who dreamed of creating a “great Finland” from Scandinavia to the Urals, something similar put forward by Jewish chauvinists, praising the greatness of the “chosen” God-people.

In the 18th century, within the framework of the emerging biological science, there arose the theory of polygenesis – the origin of mankind from different ancestors. Although this theory was soon disproved (Darwin, in particular), attempts to scientifically substantiate racism were made until the end of the XIX century.

What arguments were used to justify the need for racist theories?

  • Higher cultural level of the state. The presence of greater socialization and complexity of the social order.
  • Technically more advanced objects and tools. Instruments of labor and weapons, vehicles.
  • As a consequence of the second point, as evidence, the possibility of civilized peoples to influence nature and the environment.

In 1923, Dr. J. Dunston, a British psychiatrist and member of the Commission for Mental Hygiene in South America, said: “There is reason to believe that Aboriginal people, even from the best tribes, most likely refer to a race that is lower in mental development compared with ours… Aborigines define time in inaccurate ways, and as a rule, they do not know what their age is. And in their dances, which they love so much, there are no graceful movements – an important psychological aspect that should be carefully studied…”

Senator John Calhoun reasoned: “We can prove the necessity of slavery. Africans are not able to take care of themselves and completely lose their minds when the burden of freedom hits them. Merciful towards them is to show concern and protect them from insanity.”

The first attempts at scientific substantiation of racism and the first racial theories appeared in the 18th century, this was due to the colonization of the lands of Africa, America, and also parts of Asia. The idea of ​​all the first racial theories: the white race is the most complete. Later, yellow and black racism appeared. The first racists to promote white supremacy were: Morton, Pett, Gleddon.

The theory of “natural slavery” of Aristotle turned out to be a serious source, to which many anthropologists-racists have referred for centuries. But it should be noted that when writing about slaves “from nature”, Aristotle did not mean a slave as a representative of another race. Slaves in ancient times were people who belonged to the same race as their masters. For centuries, slaves were poor and unprotected people who were unable to withstand the onslaught of the conquerors.

A “scientific” explanation was used to justify slavery in the United States. As early as in 1797, psychiatrist Benjamin Rush, the “father of American psychiatry,” said that black skin is the result of a rare, inherited disease called “Negro”, which arose from leprosy. Rush claimed that the only sign of healing is that the skin turns white again. This label of “disease” served as the basis for the segregation of black (so that white could not “get infected”).

In November 17, 1863, the London Anthropological Society – the first anthropological organization in England opened the first meeting. The president of the society, James Ghent, made a presentation on the place of the black people in nature, which provided numerous proofs of the inequality of whites and Negroes, and negroes attributed the most negative properties of human nature. The president sympathetically quoted the most pointless opinions, if only they could serve him as material against the Negro race.

In the first volume of the memoirs of this society, there appeared essays on the history of anthropology, also aimed at substantiating racism, written by Bendish, a determined supporter of polygenism. Tracing the development of ideas about the origin of human races since the early Middle Ages, he states that monogenism has always been the dogma of the church, and that critical minds (Julian the Apostate, Paracelsus, Giordano Bruno), on the contrary, always defended the idea of ​​a multitude of independent centers the origin of various human races.

An attempt to substantiate the proximity of a Negro to a monkey was made by Lawrence back in 1819, and the energetic defense of polygenism in England was already conducted in the 1940s by Hamilton Smith and in the fifties by Robert Knox. The idea of ​​the inequality of human races with extraordinary strength broke out in America at a time when the issue of the slave trade was exacerbating. When, in 1844, England, supported by France, appealed to the US Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs Calhoun with a proposal to liberate the Negroes and stop trafficking, Calhoun was at a loss and did not know how to formulate an answer to the two European powers. On the advice of the well-known anthropologist, Moreton Calhoun wrote a note addressed to England, in which he rejected any change in the legal status of the Negroes, since the Negroes are supposedly a special breed of people.

A great help to the ideologists of slavery was the error of the Dutch anatomist Camper, who, back in the 18th century, suggested to consider people and animals in the profile and measure the value of the angle, which makes the profile line with the horizontal. With this comparison it turned out that the angle of Apollo Belvedersky’s angle is close to the straight, the European has a few degrees less, the Negro is even smaller, the orang-utans are slightly smaller than the Negro, while in other animals the angle is very small.

Very much support of racial theory was provided by Louis Agassiz, who developed the theory of the origin of various human races in eight regions of the globe, corresponding to the so-called zoogeographical provinces. According to the concepts of the time, this meant that there was no relationship between human races, that they were created independently of each other and very different in their natural properties, both physical and spiritual.

In the first half of the 19th century, the mainstay of racist theories became the United States, and subsequently the aggravation of the struggle between the slaveholders and the abolitionists – adherents of the liberation of the black people. Seeking to strengthen their economic and political positions, slave-owners from the southern states adopted reactionary racial theories. In the most expressive form they were formulated by the anthropologist Morton and his followers N. Norton and D. Glidden. So in the year 1844, the latter published the book Types of Humanity, where the idea of ​​the Blacks belonging to a special biological species close to humanoid monkeys was conducted.

Already in 1907, the first law was adopted, which made forcible sterilization legal. Soon similar laws were adopted in most states of America, and then in many countries of Europe. The very operations to sterilize the mentally retarded, sick with severe hereditary diseases and just hereditary poor and non-white began even earlier. According to the estimates of prominent eugenics experts, every tenth was subject to sterilization in the United States. According to their plans, openly published in the eugenic press, about 14 million people were to be deprived of the ability and the right to have children.

In other countries, according to their plans, this percentage was much higher. In fact, all nations recognized as “inferior” were subject to sterilization: Negroes, Indians, Jews, Arabs and many, many others. All those who did not fit the standard invented in the early part of the century by American experts (and not by German Nazis!) “Nordic” German race. To prevent such “geeks” the United States adopted the appropriate immigration laws, as well as laws that prohibit mixed marriages of whites with “inferior”.

So, the authoritative figure in the field of public education Charles Bobbit complained in his article “Practical eugenics”: “In past glorious times, the blood of the race was pure as a mountain source… Now public schools and charity supply crutches of all mentally and morally backward, violating the purity of heredity.”

It is worth noting that the doctrines of the racial purity and superiority of the white race were not simply the ideas of ignorant, unconscious masses. Those were carefully thought out ideas of many of their most respectable and highly educated people in America, each of whom was an expert in his field and each had enormous authority.

Anthropology was used to prove that all those phenomena that in reality inevitably flow from a certain system of production relations at the present historical stage (the concentration of wealth in the hands of a small number of owners, the struggle for colonies, unemployment, the superprofits of an insignificant minority and poverty, etc.), are supposedly manifestations of the immutable laws of nature and the hereditary inequality of people.

Joseph Arthur de Gobineau (1816-1882), a theorist of racism in Europe of the nineteenth century, in his work On the Inequality of the Races, speaks not only of the superiority of the white race over all the others, but also of the fact that only a certain circle of people of the higher race is its true representative. He tries to justify the right of domination of biologically and genetically “predetermined” Aryan (white) race. In 1853, Count Gobineau published the book The Experience of Inequality of Human Races. He was supported by the biologists Haeckel, Galton. They tried to scientifically substantiate the idea of ​​the inequality of races, but through the years of their research, they could not stand any criticism and were universally recognized as groundless, unprovable and pseudoscientific.

Vazhe de Lyapuzh (1854-1936), a prominent French racist, tried to prove that the head index of representatives of the upper classes of society is less than that of people from the lower classes with a more round, brachycephalic skull. Lyapuzh even claimed that “a brachycephalic skull is a sign of individuals who can not rise above barbarism.” Contrary to this misconception, statistics show that mentally gifted people often have a large round head and that brunettes predominate among representatives of the so-called upper class.

Le Bon, a French sociologist. He wrote a book entitled “The psychology of peoples and masses” in which he believed that equality is contrary to nature, and inequality of races is an objective mode of existence. Le Bon writes: “The white race genetically and physiologically surpasses other races according to their intellectual abilities, the subtleties of the theoretical-cognitive and value attitude toward the world, logical thinking. The yellow race is inferior to white one order, brown to 2, Americanoid to 3, black is not capable without white control at all of anything.”

Houston Stewart Chamberlain, an Englishman who emigrated to Germany after marrying the daughter of the German composer Wagner and developing the racist ideas of the teachings of Gobineau and Lyapuzh, also substantiates the superiority of the German race over other peoples, but he has already given these ideas substantial development, as he presented the racial theory in more frank and aggressive form. He acted as a staunch supporter of the struggle to maintain the “purity” of the race and preserve it from all sorts of alien influences and impurities. Chamberlain was the first in Germany who laid the “foundations” of the theory of races and “eugenics” – the “science” of racial purity and peculiar methods of “selection” of people, as later described by a kind scientist Darre: “How did we revive the Hanoverian horse by selecting thoroughbred stallions and mares, so we will revive the pure type of the northern Germanic by compulsory crossing for a number of generations.”

Malthus (1766-1834), an English economist, one of the founders of social Darwinism, eugenic racism, author of The Treatise on the Law of Population (1798), which develops the view of the need to destroy state aid to the poor and that the famine and poverty of the masses depend not ostensibly on the social system, but on the excessively rapid reproduction of the poor. This “theory”, which justifies the death of millions of people of oppressed classes and peoples, was deservedly evaluated by the classics of Marxism, who described it as a manifestation of the deepest despiciness of thought. The connection of Malthus with social Darwinism is most clear where it states that poverty and vice themselves automatically prevent the excessive reproduction of the population (elimination of the “unadapted”). The connection of Malthus with eugenics is manifested in the preventive measures recommended by him, which should limit the reproduction of the poor strata of the people.

Joseph Deniker (1852 – 1918), Russian racial theorist. References to his main work of 1900 “Human races” can be easily found in many Soviet academic works on anthropology. One of the leading racial theoreticians of Weimar Germany and then the Third Reich, Hans FK Günther, in his fundamental work “Nordic Worldview” openly acknowledged that the name of the basic part of the German racial doctrine “was first introduced by the Russian racial theorist Deniker”.

Karl Ryoze, a racist, released in 1905-06 the book “European Racology”. His conclusion: “The Nordic racial component of the German people is the main bearer of his spiritual strength.”

Frances Galton, (1822 – 1911), an English psychologist and anthropologist. Analyzing the factors of heredity, came to the conclusion about the need to create eugenics. Limitation of psychological views was manifested in his ideas about the predetermination of intellectual achievements of man by his genetic resources, and political reactionary – in an attempt to present the masses with biologically inferior.

Alfred Ploetz, published in 1895 the book “The Basics of Racial Hygiene”, revised the ideas of the “father of eugenics” Francis Galton (1822-1911). Ploetz founded in 1904 the “Archive of Racial and Social Biology”, and in 1905 – the German and the International Society of Racial Hygiene. He wrote then: “We must feel like the knights of life, a beautiful and powerful life, from which all earthly happiness arises and the victorious aspiration of which only upsets us and gives us hope for the future, for the golden age that people put in the past.”

A number of ethologists pointed to the biological determinism of xenophobia in humans. Animals have a phenomenon of ethological isolation, which is aggression and hostility shown by them in relation to close species and subspecies. The biological expediency of such behavior is the ban on the formation of mixed pairs. Thus, accepting the idea of ​​the evolution of man from the animal world, it is possible to admit the existence of xenophobia of the modern man remaining in the psyche and manifesting itself in the form of racism.

Certain moods of sympathy and antipathy towards representatives of another population are reflected in a number of examples. These include, for example, the effects of sympathy “to distant and to someone else’s”, while strangers in this population appear in units and do not yet form separate groups. If the number increases, then there is already national hatred, growing out of inter-group competition. Let us recall the warm feelings for the black students during the Festival of Youth and Students in Moscow, Russia in 1957, from which many “colored” children appeared. Similar phenomena, the so-called “phenomena of rare males” are inherent in most species of animals.

Thus, we can talk about a number of phenomena that a person may have inherited from animals, although this, of course, can not serve as an explanation for racism as a social phenomenon. These biological phenomena can be considered as additional reasons for raising the level of racism and xenophobia, acting along with stronger factors – social and psychological.

The main social cause of racism is, of course, the Weimar Syndrome. This is an economic recession that discards those who, in another situation, would be the middle class key. These people are just the source and at the same time a breeding ground for racist, fascist, xenophobic and nationalist sentiments.

The economic crisis in countries is often combined with a political catastrophe or with a military defeat, as in Germany. But in principle, to provoke nationalism and racism, this is not necessary: ​​in Costa Rica, without any war, the influx of guest workers from Nicaragua in the years of liberal reforms caused a sharp increase in xenophobia towards them.

In Germany and Japan, after 1945, with the long-lasting popularity of fascist and racist ideas, the adult population managed to prevent the organization of the Nazis, as the economic crisis quickly turned into growth. Whereas, according to the German Constitutional Protection Agency, the number of ultra-right extremists in the FRG in 2009 increased by one-third, from about 20,000 to 30,000. Experts attribute this to the deterioration in the economic situation and the fall in living standards due to the global financial crisis.

Those serious efforts made by American society to keep even the current level of political correctness, which exists mainly in words, show the organic nature of nationalism and racism in any society built on property, competition and the market. The fact is that all feelings associated with the relevant values ​​are psychologically identical with those feelings that nourish nationalism, racism and xenophobia, and differ only in the absence of fetishism, rigid attachment to the specific appearance of the “stranger”. “Alien” – the potential object of application of hostility and discrimination in a capitalist society – is your current competitor, not necessarily “black” or “color.”

Thus, a good environment for the development of racism in society is the economic problems and the influx of additional emigrants to the country that make up under capitalist society additional competition for the main category of citizens in the country. This contributes to the emergence of a racist / xenophobic myth – that all troubles, problems and turmoil come from “strangers”, and that others are “certainly worse”, and this “worse” justifies their humiliation, even prescribes it (“we” “better”).

The appearance of “Alien” focuses on feelings of hatred, fear and superiority, directs them towards the goal – people of a different nationality. To survive and succeed in a hostile environment, these Strangers inevitably become the source of the very problems in which they were suspected (crime, corruption, exploitation, etc.).

But these are not the only possible reasons. A number of sociologists note the presence of the so-called ethnocide in most people, which manifests itself in the rejection of reconciliation with differences in culture that do not coincide with the rhythms of their own culture. This phenomenon of ethnocentricity is especially characteristic for countries with an ethnocratic regime of government, where the ruling ethnos retains all the main posts and “high places” in the country.

Also, sociologists note the great importance of intergroup competition. In a number of experiments set by Muzaffar Sherif, it was clearly demonstrated that any situation of inter-group competition immediately causes a strong and stable inter-group enmity. For example, in experiments conducted with adolescent boys, even when the boys were selected at random, and there were no biological or racial differences between them, there was still strong inter-group competition.

“The simple distribution of boys across the two premises was enough to excite the feeling “we are against them,” and assigning names to groups (“Eagles” and “Rattlesnakes”) increased the sense of rivalry. The boys began to belittle the achievements of another group and ridicule its members. However, the real passion flared up when the experimenters introduced elements of competitive activity into boys’ interaction. Hunting for treasures, playing hut against the hut, tug-of-war, athletic contests led to the appearance of offensive nicknames and confrontations between members of different groups. They were called “cowards” and “stinkers” … threatening inscriptions were hanging out, the usual phenomenon was fights in the dining room.

Once, due to competition, intergroup feud was immediately associated with any details of the external appearance of the members of both teams, even the most random signs teenagers constantly tried to rethink as group symbols “suitable” for focusing enmity, until they stop at the most suitable one. As soon as the corresponding signification has taken place, the individual personality with that completely disappears behind the corresponding symbol.

After the above experiments, Muzaffar Sherif (1961) modeled a series of situations where intergroup cooperation is an indispensable condition for overall good, and intergroup competition will bring only harm. So, during an all-day excursion, it was “discovered” that a single truck was stuck in the ditch, where it is possible to bring food, and everyone should push it. On another occasion, a break was organized in supplying the camp with water coming from a remote reservoir, and all together it was necessary to restore the pipeline, etc. Sheriff notes that the imposition of common goals on groups played a decisive role in stopping hostility.

The existence of objective sociological reasons for the emergence of hatred, enmity towards other ethnic groups, still does not explain the fact that within one society different people are differently exposed to racist attitudes. Thus, we can talk about the presence in the psyche of one or another individual of a number of reasons explaining his propensity for racism and causing xenophobic sentiments.

The psyche is designed in such a way that in order to respect oneself, to feel calm and dignified, most people are forced to ignore some of their properties that they actually possess. All that a person does not accept in himself, in the Jungian tradition of analytical psychology, is usually called a “shadow.”

Not noticing their own unacceptable qualities, people often transfer their external objects around themselves: to “people in general”, saying, for example, that “people are evil,” or on certain specific people, being, for example, confident that “he hates me.”

The psychic mechanism here is as follows: the psyche, as a rule, spreads itself and its properties beyond its limits. And feeling, for example, greedy, a person “naturally”, assumes that such are all the others. The evaluation mechanism that is put into operation further allows a person to believe that “I am not like that” if the mind is not ready to accept this phenomenon. This is followed by repression – in relation to yourself. But assuming that “I’m not like that,” a person continues to see others as “such.” The shadow seems to fall on people around.

“Primitive personality (and in every nation, as it is known, a mass personality reacts like a primitive person) is not able to realize evil as “its own personal evil”, since its consciousness is so weakly developed that it is not capable of resolving the conflicts that have arisen. Therefore, the mass personality invariably perceives evil as something alien and, as a result of this perception, everywhere and always strangers become victims of a shadow projection.

In the country, the objects of the shadow projection are national minorities. Obviously, due to racial and ethnic characteristics, and even more so if there is a different skin color, national minorities are most suitable for shadow projection. There are various variants of the psychological problem of national minorities: religious, national, racial and social. However, all variants have one common feature-the split in the structure of the collective psyche.

The role of strangers, which was formerly performed by prisoners of war and shipwrecked, is now performed by the Chinese, Negroes and Jews. The same principle determines the attitude towards religious minorities in all religions (Erich Neumann).

“A stranger as an object of shadow projection plays an extremely important role in psychic energy. The shadow is an alien ego of our personality, our conscious, opposing point of view, which has a disastrous effect on our conscious attitude and sense of security – can be exteriorized and then destroyed. The struggle against heretics, political opponents and enemies of the people is essentially a struggle with our religious doubts, the vulnerability of our political position and the one-sidedness of our national outlook” (Neumann).

The actions of such a person are unconscious. Until now, the Shadow problem has manifested itself and affects the objectivity of judgments, incorrect, distorted assessments that are affected by a racial feature. In the report of the American institute Goldwater, entitled “Race and disability. Racial bias in Arizona special education institutions” for 2003 it was noted that “60% of the fourth-graders from low-income and African-American families showed a result “below the required level” in the last state exam to assess progress in training.” Black schoolchildren are 3 times more likely than white to receive a label “mentally retarded.” Although black pupils make up only 16% of the total number of schoolchildren in the United States, 32% of children who are trained by the mentally retarded program are children.

From the point of view of analytical psychology, the collective will strives for its liberation with the help of a “scapegoat” as long as there is a sense of guilt arising during the formation of the shadow as a factor of splitting in the mind.

For example, as pre-election arguments, Hitler announced that Germany would finally be able to restore the former greatness that was lost as a result of the loss in the First World War. Recall that in January 18, 1919 in Paris, there opened a peace conference of 27 allied and affiliated states, who believed that the end of the First World War should be formalized. The future fate of Germany the winners decided without its participation. In general, Germany lost 13.5% of the territory (73.5 thousand square kilometers) with a population of 7.3 million people, of which 3.5 million were Germans. These losses deprived Germany of 10% of its production capacity, 20% of its hard coal output, 75% of iron ore reserves and 26% of iron production. Germany was obliged to transfer to the winners almost the entire military and merchant marine fleet, 800 locomotives and 232 thousand railway wagons. The total amount of reparations was to be determined later by a special commission, and while Germany pledged to pay the Entente countries an indemnity amounting to 20 billion gold marks.

But despite the seriousness of the economic consequences of the Treaty of Versailles, they did not affect the future fate of the Weimar Republic, but the fact that a sense of humiliation prevailed in Germany, which contributed to the emergence of moods of nationalism and revanchism. At Versailles, British Prime Minister D. Lloyd George prophetically stated that the main danger of the concluded treaty is that “we push the masses into the arms of extremists”.

Neumann stated that any war can take place only if the enemy becomes a shadow projection carrier. Therefore, the passion and joy of participating in a military conflict, without which it is impossible to force a single person to participate in the war, stems from satisfying the needs of the unconscious shadow side. Wars are a correlate of the old ethics, because in them the activation of the unconscious, shadow side of the collective is visibly manifested (Neumann).

Racism in the United States existed from the very beginning of the state. A society founded by white people, differing in their national and religious characteristics, was very different in its relation to other groups. The victims of racism were non-white indigenous people – Indians – and Negro slaves.

Before slavery in colonial America became completely based on skin color, thousands of African slaves served European colonists together with white and Indian slaves. Sometimes black slaves after working off the term of slavery received freedom and land allotment, that is, they became landowners.

In 1676, there began an uprising against the Governor of Virginia and the system of exploitation of the poor colonists by wealthy landowners who was led by Nathaniel Bacon. After his death, the revolution lost its leader, but Bacon gained widespread support among slaves, and as a result they still achieved the fact that now only Negroes could be used as slaves, and white was promised various benefits.

These decisions marked the beginning of a long period of “black slavery”, when Negroes were used for agricultural work, especially in the production of cotton and tobacco. In the North, slavery was much less common – usually in the form of domestic servants.

Although the US Congress banned the importation of new slaves from Africa in 1808, this practice has existed for at least another half-century. Slavery was nominally abolished in 1863 by Abraham Lincoln, and in fact the 13th Amendment to the US Constitution, which was adopted in 1865. But even after the abolition of slavery, racism has long existed in the form of separate learning, places “only for whites,” the laws of Jim Crow, etc.

Significant progress in overcoming racism in the United States began in the 1960s when, as a result of the success of the civil rights movement, significant political and socio-economic measures were taken to ensure equality and overcoming the age-old abyss that separated African Americans, American Indians and other minorities from mainstream American life. At the same time, racism still remains one of the hottest topics of American public life.

World knows many fighter for the rights and freedoms. We will shortly name only five of the most famous fighters against such an evil phenomena as racism.

  • Nelson Mandela

Nelson Mandela is one of the most famous fighters for human rights. He was the enemy of apartheid, who spent 27 years in prison for his convictions. Mandela began his fight by participating in demonstrations against raising the price for travel in public African transport. Later, he was accused of treason and preparation for a coup. “In my country, you first go to jail, and then become president,” said the human rights activist. According to unconfirmed official data, Mandela was a communist. In the early 1990s, Mandela was released from prison and awarded with the Nobel Peace Prize. In 1994, after the election, he became a president of South Africa – the first black leader of this republic. “I firmly learned that courage is not a lack of fear, but a victory over it.” A courageous person is not one who does not fear, but one who fights with it,” Mandela thought. He died on December 5, 2013 at the age of 96 years.

  • Mahatma Gandhi

In his homeland in India, Mahatma Gandhi achieved almost the status of a saint, and throughout the world he is known as a legendary peacemaker who gave his life for the independence of the people from the British colonists. In his struggle, he used the principles of non-resistance to evil by violence. His life principle was the phrase: “If you encounter the enemy, defeat him with love.” The philosopher urged the Hindus and Muslims to reconcile, and also considered wealth a vice. This was not liked by local millionaires, who began to organize murder attempts on the spiritual leader. Gandhi was already 80 years old at the time, and he philosophically attacked his life: “If I’m destined to die from a madman’s bullet, I will do it with a smile.” He was shot by a hired killer. Before his death, Gandhi made it clear that he forgives the attacker. Even in the last moments of his life, he followed his principles.

  • Martin Luther King

Baptist preacher Martin Luther King fought for the rights of the black population of the US, opposing segregation. His famous speech “I have a dream” has become a model of the oratory of all times and peoples. The preacher’s talent unfolded in full force. The speech on the struggle against racism was heard in August 1963 by 300,000 Americans gathered at the Lincoln Memorial. I have a dream that the day will come when our nation will rise and live to the true meaning of its motto. We believe it is self-evident that all people are created equal, King said. He was shot by a sniper, who, according to the official version, was a single killer. However, many associate the death of Martin Luther King with interest to him from the FBI.

  • Aung San Suu Kyi

Burmese politician Aung San Suu Kyi was recently recognized as the “hero of our time”, and the famous director Luc Besson took a film about her. The daughter of the general and the people’s leader, who was killed during the next redistribution of power, Su Zhi from childhood was far from home. Later, as a married lady and the mother of two children, she decided to return to Burma and promote democratic values. She advocated the freedom of people and was against the power of the local junta. Suu Kyi was actively involved in politics, achieving popular recognition and house arrest, which lasted 15 years. Being in this imprisonment, she in absentia received the Nobel Peace Prize. She did not see not only fellow party members, but also her family – her husband and children. “There is only one real prison – this is a prison of fear, and there is only one real freedom – freedom from fear,” Suu Kyi said. In 2010, she was released from house arrest, and she continued to actively participate in the political life of the country, which was now called Myanmar.

  • Eleanor Roosevelt

The wife of US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Eleanor Roosevelt was one of the founders of the United Nations. Under her leadership, the United Nations developed the famous Universal Declaration of Human Rights. In addition, Eleanor Roosevelt was a famous feminist. “A woman is like a tea bag, you never know how strong she can be until she is trapped in boiling water,” urged First Lady of the World, as she was called by Harry Truman. Eleanor Roosevelt defended the rights of all – from black people to sexual minorities. And she did it very convincingly. For example, after arriving in a tutored school and noticing the dirty floors, the president’s wife took a broom and started revenge. In 1961, John F. Kennedy included her in the US delegation to the UN, appointing a member of the Peace Corps and entrusting her with the chairmanship of the Commission on Women’s Rights. Eleanor Roosevelt died of leukemia at the age of 78 years. Now the prize bearing her name is awarded annually for outstanding activities in the field of human rights protection.

On April 4, 1968 in Memphis, the most famous defender of the rights of black Americans, Martin Luther King, was killed. The mission of the legendary preacher did not end with his death. The Civil Rights Movement, which he headed, was able to make significant progress in the fight against racial segregation. King’s name became a symbol of equality, not only in America, but throughout the world.

The civil rights movement originated in the US in the middle of the last century. Despite the fact that the Civil War (1861-1865) ended 90 years before, racial equality in America was never established. At the root of the formation of society in the United States, there were white immigrants from Europe, and all the opportunities in this society were open to them.

Formally, equality was declared everywhere, but even people from the non-Anglo-Saxon environment for a long time were subjected to certain restrictions in the US. So, numerous immigrants from Italy and Ireland did not have real opportunities to climb the career ladder. But in the most disenfranchised position there was a black minority.

After the Civil War and the Reconstruction of the South, within the framework of the policy of national reconciliation and the struggle for the votes of the citizens, the southern states of the USA gradually gained the opportunity to legislatively restrict the rights of the Negroes. Thus, a policy of racial segregation appeared: the white majority distanced themselves from the black people in all aspects of everyday life. As a result, natives from the Black Continent had their own schools, shops, cafes, railroad cars and even places in public transport.

Even the possibility of voting was limited: the right to elect and be elected was closely linked with the educational and property qualification. But here there was a difficulty with the voting of the white poor, and then a decision was made that the descendant of the voters could not lose their voting rights. At the same time, every black American was immediately pointed to his place in society. Of course, such social pressure could not but provoke protests, which grew as the level of life and education of black people increased.

It can not be said that prior to the Civil Rights Movement, public opinion was indifferent to the problems of the minority. As early as 1909, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was founded. This organization conducted active propaganda against segregation and lobbied for the interests of racial minorities. Martin Luther King – the most famous fighter for the rights of black people in US history – joined its ranks in his youth.

By the 1950s, Americans were gradually beginning to understand that the former policy of racial segregation should be a thing of the past. But for this opinion to become universal, a bright personality, like Martin Luther King, was needed.

Career start

King was born in 1929 in a family that by American standards of that time reached almost the maximum possible for blacks success in society. His father served as a pastor of a Baptist church, the parishioners of which were the best-off black residents of Atlanta.

Martin Luther King received a good education, graduating from college in 1948. While still a student, he was ordained a priest, although he repeatedly denied the church’s dogmas and considered himself a religious skeptic. However, the church career was the most suitable for the son of the priest, so King continued his education in the theological seminary, after which he became a bachelor of theology. Later he was awarded a doctorate.

In 1954, King moved to south – to the city of Montgomery. It was here that the Civil Rights Movement was born, and King became his ideological inspirer.

Minority Leader

In Montgomery, Pastor King led a civilian “bus protest”, which was the result of the incident with the dark-skinned seamstress Rosa Parks. She refused to give way to the white man’s bus, for which she was arrested and fined. As a result, black Montgomery residents began a large-scale boycott of urban public transport. The resistance rally lasted more than a year and was crowned with sensational success: the federal authorities recognized Alabama’s segregation measures as illegal. From that moment it became clear that the liquidation of the system of separation of the white and colored population of the South is a matter of the near future.

Participation in the protest made King popular. He became the universally recognized informal leader of the Civil Rights Movement and engaged in politics. King went around the country and made speeches before the color minority, substantiated their right to fight for equality, participated in protest marches and numerous rallies. The pastor from Montgomery became so famous that his speeches gathered hundreds of thousands of people.

Despite the fact that in the early 1960s the movement for equal rights gradually began to acquire a radical bias supported by leaders such as the Muslim preacher Malcolm X and the head of the organization of black self-defense Robert Williams, King denied violence. He insisted that only non-violent methods of struggle would lead to equality. King listened to the ideas of Gandhi and to the slogans of civil resistance to the power of the British in India. Many of the political practices of Gandhism King successfully implemented in the United States.

Death of the Preacher

By 1968, Martin Luther King was one of the most influential politicians in the United States. He became an unconditional charismatic leader for the large black population of the United States. By that time, the influence of the conservatives in the South had already come to naught, and the liberal administration of President Johnson was completely dismantling the segregation system.

Despite the fact that King had many enemies, the most influential people of the United States sought to establish friendly relations with him. Partly, therefore, the murder of King was one of the most resonant in American history.

On April 4, 1968 King was in Memphis, where he supported the strike of black workers. He stopped in an inexpensive motel “Lorain”, which belonged to his friend, also dark-skinned. Going out to the balcony of his room in the evening, King was killed by a single shot from a rifle. Three months after the assassination, the London police detained the American James Earl Ray with false documents. After the arrest, he confessed to the crime and was deported to the United States. Examination of fingerprints showed that Rei was the killer of King.

Versions of crime

The murder of King caused a wide public response: the country was swept by excitement that affected 110 cities. And after the sentence was passed to James Earl Ray, many versions and motives of the crime appeared, in many of them King’s murderer figured exclusively as a performer.

The prosecution believed that Ray had arrived at the Loraine motel, rented a room in someone else’s name, found out which room King had stayed in, and locked himself in his room, waiting for the victim. Noticing that King went out on the balcony, Rei took aim and shot. After that, he immediately threw the gun and left the motel. Then Ray somehow got a Canadian passport and went to London, where he flew to Portugal, but soon for unknown reasons he returned to London, where he was detained.

However, a number of experts consider this story questionable. After all, after Rey signed a frank confession, he refused his words and denied that he had killed King all his life. Skepticism is reinforced by the fact that the perpetrator threw a gun with fingerprints of his fingers at the crime scene. Historians point out that ballistic examination of weapons was carried out with great delay, and its results are still recognized as doubtful. In addition, James Earl Ray was from a poor family, he was tried several times for theft, and at the time of the attempt on Martin Luther King, he might not have enough resources to organize the crime himself.

All this gave rise to the version of FBI involvement. Supporters of this theory believe that Martin Luther King interfered with American politicians, his influence was excessive, and he could seriously affect the outcome of the election. In addition, conservatives from the American special services believed that the death of the leader of black Americans would lead to the downfall of the Civil Rights Movement, and this will allow the supporters of segregation to take revenge.

The King’s Effect

Despite the death of the spiritual leader, the Movement for Civil Rights has not lost its positions. The fight against racial segregation has continued, and in the last thirty years, national minorities have even received a number of social preferences as compensation for centuries of oppression.

Martin Luther King received state recognition. In the United States, since 1986, King’s Day is celebrated at the highest level. A lot of streets, squares, educational institutions, libraries and hospitals all over the country are named after the legendary preacher. King’s speeches have become a model of American oratory, they are studied in colleges and universities.

Experts acknowledge that King’s activities really created a new reality, but they note that modern America has not become less controversial than it was 50 years ago, the nature of the contradictions has simply changed.

We have become accustomed to hearing about “white” racism, that is, about the racism of the “white” people in relation to the people of color. But there is also “racism” in racism, it is also called reverse racism. I consider it necessary to explain this kind of racism.

To begin with, we will explain the very concept of “black” racism. Black racism (also reverse racism, reversible racism, blackism) is an ideology that is prevalent in the USA and South Africa among the people of the Negroid race and carries the idea of ​​the superiority of the black people (Africans, African Americans) over the Caucasoids. It originated as a response to white racism.

At the same time, one should not allow a huge error, and not to confuse the reverse (“black”) racism with anti-racism.

In the 1920s, in the US, the activist of the black movement for equality and emancipation from oppression, Marcus Garvey, founded the World Association for the Advancement of the black people. In his speeches and convictions, Garvey attached great importance to the racial purity of the blacks and suggested that all American citizens of African descent be moved to Africa in order not to mingle with the “white devils”. Garvey called his followers “new blacks” and called to be proud of the fact that they are black. On the basis of racism, Garvey, as it is not surprising, even approached the organization of the Ku Klux Klan.

In the 1960s, the movement for resistance to racism in the United States was divided into followers of Martin Luther King, an advocate of non-violent resistance to discrimination against blacks and followers of Malcolm X, the ideologist of the religious movement “Nation of Islam.” Under the influence of his sermons, the movements of the “Black Panthers” and the organization “Republic of New Africa” ​​developed. It was to this time, with the realization of the fact of oppression and the growth of protest moods, that the minds of the black population of North America are captured by the idea of ​​reverse racism, because in their opinion it is a proportional response to the manifestation of white racism.

The “Nation of Islam” in its promotion of the struggle for black rights, most often did not go beyond preaching and extremist as well as racist statements against whites. These were only words that were not confirmed by any deeds. However, the words fell in fertile soil and, after the murder of Malcolm X, which happened during a public speech in Harlem, the “Black Panthers” moved from words to deeds.

The Black Panther party, founded by Huey Newton, arose as a response to the Ku Klux Klan. However, in the early days of existence, the “Black Panthers” expressed their discontent exclusively on legal grounds. They walked through the streets with cartridges inserted into the shotguns, not sending them to the chamber (according to the American law, such weapons were considered uncharged), armed to the teeth went behind police cars, without violating the rules of the road.

However, the Black Panthers went on to illegal violent actions. By the end of 1970, a total of 48 skirmishes killed 10 blacks and 12 policemen. The police arrested 469 “panthers”. The head of the FBI said that the “Black Panthers” represent “the most serious threat to the internal security of the country.”

Equally important for the emergence of the ideas of black racism was the emergence of an organization advocating separation from the United States and the creation of the Republic of New Africa on the territory of the southern states. Also, I would like to demonstrate the most famous stories of the manifestation of “black” racism:

  • A white woman, Sarah Taylor, was fired from her job at the Bishop State Community College in 2002, so that she could make room for a new black employee.
  • The Federal Court of Appeals of the State of Michigan on May 16, 2002, decided that during admission to colleges, it is possible to take into account the race of entrants. This decision was made after examining the cases of two white Americans accusing the Michigan law college in Detroit of racial discrimination. Despite higher exam results, white college applicants were not enrolled because too many places were reserved for African Americans.

As can be seen from these materials, the problem of racism is more complex than the biological and anthropological problem, and goes beyond political or economic factors. Despite the fact that the scientific attempt to substantiate racism has shown its complete failure, racism has not ceased to exist. The reason for this is in the social and psychological properties of both the individual and the groups to which the mechanisms that foster competition operate, and then the enmity between the different groups.

The appearance of racism in society is based on a number of reasons, one of which is the mentality of this ethnos, others – economic factors and the standard of living in the state. Also of great importance are social factors of low level of culture and awareness of citizens of the country, which are additional catalysts of racism.

Nevertheless, this makes it possible to assert that the problem of racism can be compensated and successfully solved with the integrated approach of state structures and management tools that take into account all influencing factors.

What is Racism Essay? All You Need to Know

Racism is a deeply rooted social issue that has plagued societies for centuries. In this comprehensive guide, we will explore the intricacies of a racism essay, shedding light on its various aspects, including definition, significance, types, and effective strategies to address and eliminate racial prejudice. Let’s embark on a journey to gain a profound understanding of this critical topic and equip ourselves to contribute to a more inclusive and harmonious world.

Racism, an enduring and deeply ingrained social issue, has left an indelible mark on the fabric of human society. Stemming from historical biases, prejudices, and power dynamics, racism encompasses a range of discriminatory attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors that target individuals or groups based on their perceived racial or ethnic backgrounds. 

This essay delves into the intricate web of racism, exploring its origins, manifestations, and consequences while also highlighting the ongoing efforts to combat and eradicate this deeply rooted problem.

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What is a “racism essay”?

At its core, a racism essay is an academic composition that critically examines and dissects the concept of racism. It delves into the multifaceted nature of racial discrimination, analyzing its historical roots, contemporary manifestations, and the impact it has on individuals, communities, and societies at large.

A well-crafted racism essay not only defines and explores the concept but also provides insights into potential solutions and ways to combat racism.

The Historical Foundations of Racism

Understanding the historical context is crucial to comprehending the origins of racism. Many scholars trace the roots of modern racism back to the era of European colonialism and the transatlantic slave trade. During this period, deeply ingrained prejudices and stereotypes emerged, leading to the systematic oppression of certain racial groups. The essay elaborates on these historical events and their enduring influence on contemporary societal structures.

Significance of Addressing Racism

Racism poses a significant threat to social cohesion, equality, and justice. Through the essay, we explore the far-reaching consequences of racial discrimination, from perpetuating social inequalities to fostering distrust among diverse communities. Well’ by acknowledging the gravity of the issue, society can begin to take proactive steps to address and dismantle racist ideologies.

How to Write a Racism Essay

Writing a racist essay requires careful consideration, research, and a structured approach. Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to write an effective racism essay:

  • Choose a Specific Aspect: Racism is a broad topic. Narrow down your focus to a specific aspect, such as the historical roots of racism, its impact on education, the workplace, or society at large, systemic racism, or strategies for combating racism.
  • Research thoroughly: Gather credible sources from books, academic journals, reputable websites, and other scholarly materials. Understand the history, causes, consequences, and current debates surrounding racism.
  • Develop a Strong Thesis Statement: Your thesis statement should be clear and specific, outlining the main point or argument of your essay. It sets the tone for the entire essay and guides your readers as to what to expect.
  • Create an Outline: Organize your thoughts by creating an outline. Include an introduction, body paragraphs (each discussing a separate point or example), and a conclusion. This structure provides a coherent flow to your essay.
  • Start with a hook to grab the reader’s attention (e.g., a striking statistic, a thought-provoking quote, or a brief anecdote).
  • Provide context for the issue of racism and introduce your thesis statement.
  • Outline the main points you will discuss in the body paragraphs.
  • Begin each paragraph with a clear topic sentence that introduces the main idea of the paragraph.
  • Provide evidence from your research, such as examples, statistics, and quotes, to support your points.
  • Analyze and interpret the evidence, explaining how it relates to your thesis.
  • Use transitional words and phrases to ensure a smooth flow between paragraphs and ideas.
  • Address counterarguments: acknowledge opposing viewpoints or potential counterarguments. Refute them with logical reasoning and evidence to strengthen your position.
  • Discuss Real-Life Examples: Incorporate relevant real-life case studies, historical events, or personal experiences to illustrate the impact of racism and make your essay more relatable.
  • Propose Solutions or Recommendations: If applicable, suggest practical steps, policies, or initiatives that can help combat racism or promote equality.
  • Summarize the main points discussed in your essay.
  • Restate your thesis in a different way to emphasize your main argument.
  • Reflect on the broader implications of the topic and the importance of addressing racism.
  • Leave the reader with a thought-provoking statement, a call to action, or a final insight.
  • Revise and proofread: Review your essay for clarity, coherence, grammar, and punctuation errors. Consider seeking feedback from peers or instructors.
  • Cite Your Sources: Properly cite all the sources you used in your research using the appropriate citation style (e.g., APA, MLA, Chicago).

Remember, writing a racist essay is not just about conveying information; it’s also about promoting understanding, empathy, and a commitment to positive change. Use your words to inspire meaningful dialogue and contribute to the ongoing fight against racism.

Related: How to Write an Opinion Essay

Types of Racism Explored in Essays

Essays exploring racism often delve into various types of racism that have existed and continue to impact societies around the world. Here are some key types of racism that can be explored in such essays:

  • Individual Racism: This type of racism involves personal beliefs, attitudes, and actions that discriminate against individuals based on their race or ethnicity. It can manifest as racial slurs, stereotypes, microaggressions, or acts of discrimination carried out by individuals.
  • Institutional Racism: Also known as systemic racism, this form of racism is embedded within societal institutions such as government, education, healthcare, and the criminal justice system. It perpetuates racial disparities and inequalities through policies, practices, and norms that disproportionately affect certain racial or ethnic groups.
  • Structural Racism: Similar to institutional racism, structural racism refers to the overarching social structures and systems that advantage certain racial groups while disadvantaging others. It encompasses both historical legacies and present-day realities that contribute to racial inequalities.
  • Cultural racism: This type of racism involves the belief that certain racial or ethnic groups are culturally superior or inferior. It can lead to cultural appropriation, stereotyping, and the marginalization of particular cultural practices or traditions.
  • Colorism: Colorism is a form of discrimination based on skin color within the same racial or ethnic group. It often privileges lighter skin tones over darker ones and can lead to internalized racism and self-esteem issues.
  • Environmental Racism: Environmental racism refers to the disproportionate exposure of minority communities, particularly low-income communities, to environmental hazards such as pollution, toxic waste, and industrial facilities. This results in adverse health and economic effects.
  • Racial Profiling: Racial profiling involves the targeting of individuals by law enforcement or other authorities based on their perceived racial or ethnic background rather than on evidence of criminal behavior.
  • Microaggressions: Microaggressions are subtle, everyday actions or comments that convey derogatory or demeaning messages towards marginalized racial or ethnic groups. These can be unintentional but still contribute to a hostile environment.
  • Institutionalized Discrimination: This form of racism is codified in laws, policies, or practices that explicitly discriminate against certain racial or ethnic groups. It can be historical, such as Jim Crow laws, or contemporary, such as discriminatory housing practices.
  • Racial Segregation: Racial segregation involves the physical separation of different racial groups, often resulting in unequal access to resources, opportunities, and quality of life.
  • Digital Racism: In the modern age, digital platforms can be breeding grounds for racism, where hate speech, online harassment, and discriminatory practices thrive.
  • Interpersonal Racism: Interpersonal racism refers to discriminatory actions, attitudes, or behaviors between individuals of different racial or ethnic backgrounds. It can manifest in interpersonal conflicts, social interactions, or even violence.
  • Overt and covert racism: overt racism is explicit and easily recognizable, while covert racism is subtler and often masked as seemingly innocuous actions or statements.
  • Cultural Appropriation: This involves the adoption or imitation of elements from a marginalized culture by members of a dominant culture, often without understanding or respecting the cultural context.

These types of racism intersect and intertwine, contributing to complex systems of oppression and inequality. Essays that explore these various types of racism contribute to a deeper understanding of the multifaceted nature of the issue and the need for comprehensive strategies to address and eliminate racism.

The Role of the Media in Perpetuating Racism

In today’s digital age, media plays a pivotal role in shaping public opinion and perpetuating stereotypes. The essay discusses how the media can either reinforce or challenge racist narratives, highlighting examples of both scenarios. By critically analyzing media portrayals, individuals can become more discerning consumers of information and contribute to dismantling harmful stereotypes.

Intersectionality and racism

Intersectionality recognizes that individuals can face multiple forms of discrimination simultaneously. The essay explores how factors such as race, gender, class, and sexuality intersect, compounding the effects of racism. By acknowledging intersectionality, society can work toward creating more inclusive and empathetic spaces.

Overcoming unconscious bias

Unconscious bias refers to the subtle prejudices that influence our perceptions and decisions without our awareness. The essay provides insights into recognizing and addressing these biases, offering practical strategies to promote fair and equitable treatment for all individuals.

Education as a Catalyst for Change

Education plays a pivotal role in challenging preconceived notions and fostering empathy. The essay emphasizes the importance of inclusive curricula and educational initiatives that promote cultural awareness and understanding. Moreover, by equipping the younger generation with knowledge, we can pave the way for a more tolerant and compassionate society.

Combating Racism: Legal and Legislative Measures

Legislation can serve as a powerful tool to combat racism. The essay examines landmark legal cases and anti-discrimination laws that have contributed to dismantling racist practices. It also highlights the ongoing efforts to enact and enforce legislation that promotes equality and social justice.

Grassroots movements and activism

Throughout history, grassroots movements have been instrumental in driving social change. The essay showcases the role of activism in raising awareness about racism, from the civil rights movement to contemporary advocacy efforts. 

Building inclusive communities

Creating inclusive communities requires intentional efforts to bridge divides and foster understanding. The essay explores community-building strategies that encourage dialogue, cooperation, and cultural exchange. Simply cultivating an environment of respect and openness, communities can become bastions of diversity and acceptance.

Challenging Microaggressions

Microaggressions are subtle, often unintentional acts of discrimination that can have a profound impact on marginalized individuals. The essay sheds light on identifying and addressing microaggressions, emphasizing the importance of empathy and active listening in promoting constructive conversations.

Empowering Bystanders to Take Action

Bystanders have the power to intervene and disrupt instances of racism. The essay discusses the concept of bystander intervention and provides practical guidance for individuals who want to support victims of discrimination. However, by empowering bystanders, we can collectively create a culture of intolerance for racist behaviors.

Promoting cultural exchange and understanding

Cultural exchange enhances cross-cultural understanding and dispels misconceptions. The essay explores the role of cultural events, festivals, and initiatives in fostering intercultural dialogue.

The psychology of racism

Examining the psychological underpinnings of racism provides valuable insights into its origins and perpetuation. The essay delves into theories of prejudice and bias, shedding light on the cognitive processes that contribute to discriminatory behaviors.

Fostering allyship and solidarity

Allyship involves individuals from privileged groups actively advocating for marginalized communities. The essay explores the principles of allyship and solidarity, offering guidance on how to be an effective ally in the fight against racism.

Q: How do I start writing a racist essay? Begin by researching the historical context of racism and its various forms. Develop a clear thesis statement that outlines your essay’s focus and main arguments.

Q: Can I share personal experiences in my racism essay? Yes, sharing personal experiences can add depth and authenticity to your essay. However, ensure that your experiences contribute to the overall message you want to convey.

Q: What are some effective ways to conclude a racist essay? A: Conclude by summarizing the key points of your essay and reiterating the importance of combating racism. You can also encourage readers to reflect on their role in promoting inclusivity.

Q: How can educators address racism in the classroom? Educators can incorporate diverse perspectives into the curriculum, facilitate open discussions about racism, and provide resources for students to deepen their understanding.

Q: What is the impact of racial prejudice on mental health? Racial prejudice can lead to increased stress, anxiety, and depression among marginalized individuals. Addressing racism is essential for promoting mental well-being.

Q: How can I support anti-racist organizations? You can support anti-racist organizations by volunteering, donating, or participating in their initiatives. Amplifying their messages on social media also contributes to their efforts.

Final thoughts 

In a world striving for progress and equality, understanding the nuances of racism is paramount. Through this comprehensive guide, we have explored the various dimensions of racism, from its definition and historical foundations to its contemporary manifestations and strategies for combating it.

One thing for sure is that by actively engaging in discussions, promoting inclusivity, and challenging discriminatory attitudes, each individual can play a pivotal role in fostering a more just and harmonious society. Also, we recently wrote an article on how to Write a DBQ Essay , we hope you check it out.

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How to Tackle an Argumentative Essay on Racism

racism essay

If you have to write an argumentative essay on racism you should consider writing about more recent developments in this field. For example, reverse discrimination based on race, when the members of a majority group are discriminated when they apply for a job or admission to a higher educational institution because the company or college in question have certain quotas for the members of previously discriminated groups. As a result, the representatives of these minority groups can get a job or an admission even if they are less suitable for it or have lower test scores. Thus, minority groups get special treatment – exactly what the struggle against racism was supposed to eliminate.

Don’t forget than an argumentative essay is supposed to be based not only on your opinion and logical conclusions, but facts as well. It is the main difference of this kind of work from, for example, expository essays – argumentative essays involve far greater amount of research work and come as a result of it.

This means that before starting to write you have to organize your thoughts, prepare additional information, study a number of sources, and find enough proof for your point of view. Don’t start writing immediately hoping to cover doubtful aspects of your discourse later – you may discover that the necessary sources of information happen to be unavailable or some facts may actually turn out to be opposing your argumentation, not supporting it. In this case, you may be forced to start anew or rewrite large fragments of your work, which is never a pleasant thing and even less so if your deadline is near.

In the end, your essay should have three things: logical argumentation, factual foundation and (it is very advisable) examples. Preferably personal ones – if you have ever encountered instances of racism of any kind, it may be very useful in your essay – for example, such things make for excellent introduction paragraphs.

Paper title: Argumentative Essay: “Study approves ban on smoking”

Academic level: College (1-2 years)

Discipline: Health Care

Paper Format: MLA

Paper title: Argumentative Essay: “Against School Uniform”

Discipline: Education

Paper Format: APA

Paper title: Argumentative Essay: “Muslims in Terms of Racism”

Academic level: College (3-4 years)

Discipline: Sociology

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National Academies Press: OpenBook

Measuring Racial Discrimination (2004)

Chapter: 1 introduction, 1 introduction.

M ost people would agree that equal opportunity to participate as a full and functioning member of society is important. Nonetheless, existing social and economic disparities among racial and ethnic groups suggest that our society has yet to achieve this goal. For instance, Hispanics have higher school dropout rates than other racial and ethnic groups (Hauser et al., 2002). The black–white wealth gap remains large (Conley, 1999; Oliver and Shapiro, 1995). Young Native Americans are incarcerated in federal prisons at higher rates than any other minority racial group (Smelser and Baltes, 2001; Weich and Angulo, 2002). And some Asian Americans, among other minority groups, have poorer access to health care services and treatments than whites (Institute of Medicine, 2003). Such racial disparities are pervasive and may be the result of racial prejudice and discrimination, as well as differences in socioeconomic status, differential access to opportunities, and institutional policies and practices.

Such racial disparities persist despite the many legal and social changes that have improved opportunities for minority racial and ethnic groups in the United States. Several factors may contribute to racial differences in outcomes, including differences in socioeconomic status, differential access to opportunities, and others. One factor that should be considered is the role of racial discrimination. Overt discrimination against African Americans and other minority groups characterized much of U.S. history; a question is whether and what types of discrimination continue to exist and their effects on differential outcomes.

Although researchers in specific disciplines have investigated discrimination in particular domains, there has been little effort to coordinate and

expand such research in ways that could help to better understand and measure various kinds of racial and ethnic discrimination across domains and groups and over time. To address this problem, the Committee on National Statistics convened a panel of scholars in 2001 to consider the definition of racial discrimination, assess current methodologies for measuring it, identify new approaches, and make recommendations about the best broad methodological approaches. In particular, this panel was asked to conduct the following tasks:

Give the policy and scholarly communities new tools for assessing the extent to which discrimination continues to undermine the achievement of equal opportunity by suggesting additional means for measuring discrimination that can be applied not only to the racial question but in other important social arenas as well.

Conduct a thorough evaluation of current methodologies for measuring discrimination in a wide range of circumstances where it may occur.

Consider how analyses of data from other sources could contribute to findings from research experimentation, such as the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development paired tests.

Recommend further research as well as the development of data to complement research studies.

Although there is substantial direct empirical evidence for the prevalence of large disparities among racial and ethnic groups in various domains, it is often difficult to obtain direct evidence of whether and to what extent discrimination may be a contributing factor. Differential outcomes by race and ethnicity may or may not indicate discrimination. Examples of studies using methods that persuasively measure the presence or absence of discrimination are rare, and appropriate data for measurement are often unobtainable. As a result, there is little scholarly consensus about the extent and frequency of discrimination and how it relates to continuing disadvantages along racial and ethnic lines (Fix and Turner, 1998).

One reason it is difficult to assess discrimination is that changes have occurred in the nature of prejudiced attitudes and discriminatory behaviors. With the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and other laws that prohibit discrimination because of race in a variety of domains, overt discrimination is less often apparent. However, discrimination may persist in more subtle forms. Indeed, social psychological research suggests that relatively automatic and unexamined cognitive processes, of which the holder (and sometimes the target) may not be fully aware, can lead to discrimination (Devine, 1989; Fiske, 1998). These subtleties make defining and measuring discrimination more difficult.

STUDY APPROACH AND SCOPE

The panel’s goal in this report is to review and comment on the methods used in various social scientific disciplines to identify types of racial discrimination and measure their effects. The report is designed to help social science researchers, policy analysts, federal agencies, and concerned observers better understand how to assess racial discrimination in different domains, drawing on different social science methods and data sources as appropriate. To approach this important but difficult task, the panel focused on defining relevant concepts, examining various methodological approaches and data sources, and considering directions for future research.

The purpose of this report is not to promote a single “right” way to measure discrimination. In some situations, one approach may be more easily implemented and more credible; in other situations, another approach may be more appropriate. Often, multiple approaches will be needed to provide credible evidence about the prevalence of discrimination in a domain. Thus, the panel attempts to identify the broad range of approaches for measuring discrimination and to provide a critical review of their relative credibility when applied in different situations. The panel develops a cross-disciplinary research and data collection agenda for action by public and private funding agencies and the research community.

The report makes no attempt to actually measure current or past levels of discrimination in any domain. Our purpose is not to report numbers or impacts but to provide guidance and encouragement to researchers and policy analysts as they work across domains to identify where discrimination may be present and what its effects may be.

In the first part of this report, the panel defines the concepts of race and racial discrimination from a social science perspective, which we believe is the appropriate perspective for research and policy analysis on discrimination. When referring to race in the report, the panel uses the categories established by the federal classification standards (U.S. Office of Management and Budget, 1997) to identify whites, blacks or African Americans, American Indians and Alaska Natives or Native Americans, Asians, and Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders. According to these standards, Hispanics or Latinos are referred to as an ethnic group. Yet, although the panel was asked to consider racial discrimination, Hispanics (a rapidly growing ethnic population) also face discrimination. In addition, concepts of race and ethnicity are not clearly defined for many Hispanics, so for these two reasons our discussion often refers to Hispanics as well as to specific racial groups. Throughout the report, the term disadvantaged racial group is used to refer to groups in the United States (e.g., blacks) whose disadvantage can be linked historically to discriminatory practices and policies and who are, consequently, part of a legally protected class.

The panel is concerned with broad types of discriminatory behaviors and processes that have negative consequences for disadvantaged racial groups in various social and economic arenas. We draw on sociological, social psychological, and other literature to develop our definition of racial discrimination. We also discuss the conceptual possibility that discrimination may operate not just at one point in time and within one particular domain but at various points within and across multiple domains throughout the course of an individual’s life. The panel acknowledges that the effect of such cumulative discrimination may not be easily identified or measured.

In interpreting that part of its charge to review measurement methods, the panel chose to address broad approaches that could be applied across domains, rather than making recommendations about specific approaches for particular domains. Therefore, although examples are used throughout the report to illustrate efforts to measure discrimination in particular circumstances, our main focus is on methods (e.g., experiments, observational studies, survey research) that can be used to study discrimination under many different circumstances.

The examples of disparities and discrimination measurement that we provide come from research in five domains: labor markets and employment, education, housing and mortgage lending, health care, and criminal justice. Although not the only domains of concern, these are key areas of social interaction for which discrimination can seriously limit life opportunities; these are also among the areas for which the federal government regularly collects administrative and survey data long used by researchers to study discrimination and discriminatory effects. We do not provide an exhaustive set of examples for each of these areas. Rather, a selected bibliography of important literature reviews, major reports, and other work on data collection and analytical methods used in each of these domains is provided at the end of this report.

Much of the discussion in this report on such topics as statistical inference, experimental design, and data quality is relatively technical in nature. Although sometimes dry, the import of this discussion should not be misunderstood by readers who are deeply concerned about the possible extent and continued effects of racial discrimination in American life. It was our shared concern about racial discrimination that drew each member of the panel into the in-depth discussions of measurement reflected in this report. Because we view racial discrimination as a crucial social issue, we believe it is essential to use the most credible and accurate measurement approaches.

In carrying out this study, the panel met and deliberated over a period of almost 2 years. We held meetings, invited speakers, and commissioned several papers (see Box 1-1 ); we requested input from prominent scholars on key issues; reviewed a large body of literature on salient aspects of the law and criminal justice, labor markets, housing markets, education, and

health care; investigated the ways in which race is defined in various federally funded surveys; reviewed the literature on race, prejudice, and discrimination; and examined other literature on survey design, experimental evidence, and statistical analysis.

REPORT ORGANIZATION

This report is divided into three parts. The chapters in Part I provide a conceptual framework for thinking about racial discrimination. Chapter 2 explores the meaning of race as a social construct and provides historical background on the complex issues surrounding race in the United States and how it is measured in the decennial census and other federal data collections. Chapter 3 defines discrimination from a social science perspective and explains why we focus on racial discrimination. Our definition of racial discrimination is informed by legal concepts of discrimination, but it also encompasses behaviors and processes that may not be unlawful or easily measured. Chapter 4 provides a framework for understanding how racial

discrimination may operate. As the discussion indicates, there are different ways in which discrimination can occur and various mechanisms that can result in discriminatory behavior. Identifying various sources of discrimination is a crucial first step in developing theories or models of discrimination and using them to guide data collection and research for measuring the presence and extent of different types of discrimination.

The chapters in Part II examine methodological approaches to measuring discrimination and the advantages, limitations, and best techniques associated with each. Chapter 5 provides a general framework for inferring causation and a brief introduction to some of the topics covered in detail in the chapters that follow. Chapter 6 focuses on experimental methods, including field and laboratory experiments. Chapter 7 describes the use of statistical analysis of observational data to measure discrimination, reviewing the necessary assumptions and potential credibility of various approaches. Chapter 8 focuses on approaches employing attitudinal and behavioral indicators of discrimination, including methods based on survey data and administrative records. Each of these chapters describes specific approaches and the situations in which they can be implemented and may be appropriate. Where possible, we also attempt to identify more and less credible approaches, providing guidance for future scholars seeking to use the most effective methods. Chapter 9 at the end of Part II addresses issues of racial profiling, as an illustration of an area in which measuring discrimination is difficult.

The chapters in Part III present the panel’s priorities for data collection and research for improved measures of race and racial discrimination. Chapter 10 describes the data collected by federal statistical and administrative agencies that may support analysis of racial discrimination and its effects. The discussion focuses on concepts and measures of race and ethnicity in federal data sources, how different measures may affect distributions and consequent analyses for racial and ethnic groups, and research that is needed to improve federal measures. Chapter 11 considers the nature of cumulative effects of discrimination within and across multiple domains, seeking to identify techniques that can be used to provide a fuller measure of the impact of discrimination when it occurs over time and in more than one social arena. Little empirical work has been done on cumulative discrimination, so research and data collection in this area are important to pursue.

Finally, Chapter 12 suggests next steps for program and research agencies to build a research agenda that is directed to priority needs for measuring racial discrimination. The aim of the chapter is not to develop a detailed agenda per se, which is beyond the panel’s scope and resources, but to suggest a series of steps whereby agencies may identify priority research topics; evaluate them for feasibility and cost-effectiveness; and bring to bear the necessary conceptual frameworks, research methods, and data. Whether

conducting research from a policy perspective or more basic research, it will be important to support multidisciplinary studies that draw on a range of methodologies and data sources.

The report ends with two appendixes: Appendix A presents the agenda for the Workshop on Measuring Racial Disparities and Discrimination in Elementary and Secondary Education held by the panel in July 2002; Appendix B provides biographical sketches of the panel members and staff.

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Racism - List of Essay Samples And Topic Ideas

It is difficult to imagine a more painful topic than racism. Violation of civil rights based on race, racial injustice, and discrimination against African American people are just a small part of issues related to racial inequality in the United States. Such a topical issue was also displayed in the context of school and college education, as students are often asked to write informative and research essays about racial discrimination.

The work on this paper is highly challenging as a student is supposed to study various cruel examples of bad attitudes and consider social questions. One should develop a topic sentence alongside the titles, outline, conclusion for essay on racism. The easiest way is to consult racism essay topics and ideas on our web. Also, we provide an example of a free college essay on racism in America for you to get acquainted with the problem.

Moreover, a hint to writing an excellent essay is good hooks considering the problem. You can find ideas for the thesis statement about racism that may help broaden your comprehension of the theme. It’s crucial to study persuasive and argumentative essay examples about racism in society, as it may help you to compose your paper.

Racism is closer than we think. Unfortunately, this awful social disease is also common for all levels and systems in the US. A student can develop a research paper about systemic racism with the help of the prompts we provide in this section.

Racism in Pop Culture

Emma Watson, Tom Hanks, both names are familiar and quite popular in Hollywood and on television. An emerging actor John Boyega whose name may not be widely known nevertheless impressed the audience with his character Finn from Star Wars. But as popular as these movie actors are, the movie that they all starred in The Circle did not sit well with the audience. In addition to the movie's low rating on film review sites and its abrupt ending that left […]

Appeal to Ethos, Logos and Pathos Racism

Abraham Lincoln once said, Achievement has no color."", but is that really true? In many cases of racism, people have been suppressed and kept from being able to contribute to the society. Racism is a blight and a hindrance to our development. Imagine the many things we could do if people could set aside differences and cooperate meaningfully. Sadly that is not the case. In reality, people are put down because of their heritage and genetics. By no means is […]

Professions for Women by Virginia Woolf

Have you ever asked yourself why people assume something of others by looks? In the chapter, Professions for Women written in 1931 by Virginia Woolf, who talks about her life and the difference she tried to make for all women in that period. She wanted her audience who were professional women to be able to figure out on their own what her story was about. Woolf talks about how she was unmasked and confused as she makes her readers understand […]

We will write an essay sample crafted to your needs.

Racism in Movie “42”

The movie I chose for this assignment is 42 starring Chadwick Boseman and Harrison Ford. The movie is about Jackie Robinson, a baseball player who broke the color barrier when he joined the Brooklyn Dodgers. One of the topics we covered in this course was racism. For my generation it is hard to understand how pervasive racism used to be in society. I have three cousins that have a black father. Many of my friends are from different races and […]

Racism and the U.S. Criminal Justice System

Introduction The primary purpose of this report is to explore racism issues in the United States justice system and addressing the solutions to the problem affecting the judicial society. Racism entails social practices that give merits explicitly solely to members of certain racial groups. Racism is attributed to three main aspects such as; personal predisposition, ideologies, and cultural racism, which promotes policies and practices that deepen racial discrimination. Institutional racism is also rife in the US justice system. This entails […]

About Black Lives Matter Movement

The fundamental rights and freedoms enshrined in the Constitution are inherent for all. There is no question that all people (blacks, Latinos, Indians, or white) were created free and equal with certain inalienable rights. This is a universally accepted principle. Segregation and racism against minorities in this country have been widely discussed, and prominent figures have taken a stand asking people to join in the fight for equality. This stand addresses the significance of black lives. However, contrasting opinions on […]

Structural Racism in U.S. Medical Care System Doctor-Patient Relationship

US history is littered with instances of racism and it has creeped into not only social, political, and economic structures of society, but also the US healthcare system. Racism is the belief that one race is superior over others, which leads to discrimination and prejudice against people based on their race or ethnicity (Romano). Centuries of racism in the United States' social structures has led to institutionalized or systemic racism”policies and behaviors adapted into our social, economic, and political systems […]

Slavery and Racism in “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn”

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is absolutely relating a message to readers about the ills of slavery but this is a complex matter. On the one hand, the only truly good and reliable character is Jim who, a slave, is subhuman. Also, twain wrote this book after slavery had been abolished, therefore, the fact that is significant. There are still several traces of some degree of racism in the novel, including the use of the n word and his tendency […]

The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman by Ernest James Gaines

The author of The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, Ernest J. Gaines, is a male African American author who has taken full advantage of his culture by writing about rural Louisiana. His stories mainly tell the struggles of blacks trying to make a living in racist and discriminating lands. Many of his stories are based on his own family experiences. In Ernest J. Gaines’ novel, The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, four themes that are displayed are the nature of […]

History of Racism

Racism started in the 1700s and has still been occuring till this day. From the looks of it, it seems to be that racism would never end. Because of cultural reasons, stereotypes, and economic reasons, it will always be an issue. People teach their kids to be racist, and make racists comments like it's normal. We can't stop people from having their personal opinions on racism, but we can stay aware of how racists others could be, our history of […]

A Simple Introduction to Three Main Types of Racism

Race plays an important role in both personal and social life, and racial issues are some of the most heated debates in the world due to their complexity, involving the diverse historical and cultural backgrounds of different ethnic groups. Consciously or unconsciously, when one race holds prejudice, discrimination, and a sense of superiority to oppress another race, the issue of racism arises. Based on aspects of individual biases, social institutions, and cultural backgrounds, the three most common types of racism […]

Civil Rights Martyrs

Are you willing to give your life for your people? These martyrs of the civil rights movement gave everything for their people. Although some may say their deaths did not have an impact on the civil rights movements. They risked their lives just so African Americans could have the rights they have today. The definition of martyr is a person who is killed because of their religious or other beliefs. They believe that everyone should be equal and have the […]

Making Racism Obsolete

Does racism still exist? Some would say no?, but some would agree that racism is a cut that won't heal. Molefi Kete Asante is a professor at Temple University and has written many books during his career. In this analysis I will dissect Asante's work covering racism from the past, present and the future moving forward. Asante argues that America is divided between two divisions, the Promise and the Wilderness. Historically, African Americans has been at a disadvantage politically, socially, […]

American Rule in the Philippines and Racism

During our almost 50 years of control in the Philippines, many of our law makers and leaders were fueled by debates at home, and also our presence overseas. These two perspectives gave a lot of controversy as to how Americans were taking control, and confusion of what they were actually doing in the Philippines. Many leaders drew from Anglo- Saxon beliefs, which lead to racist ideas and laws. These combined proved unfair treatment of the Filipinos and large amounts of […]

Social Media’s Role in Perceptions of Racism in the USA

Research studies show that racism has been in existence for centuries. Whether this is still an issue, is the question we must ask ourselves. The internet or, social media has become a major part of society over the years and conveys information, news, opinionated posts, and propaganda, as well. There are several factors involved within this topic and a plethora of resources available in search of the answers. We will look at different opinions, research studies, and ideas in relation […]

The Institutional Racism

In today society there is several police brutality against black people, and it is governed by the behavioral norms which defined the social and political institution that support institutional systems. Black people still experience racism from people who think they are superior, it is a major problem in our society which emerged from history till date and it has influences other people mindset towards each other to live their dreams. In the educational system, staffs face several challenges among black […]

Movie Review of Argo with Regards to Geography

The movie "Crash" is set in a geographical setting which clearly helps in building the major themes of racial discrimination and drug trafficking. This is because the movie is set in Los Angeles which is an area of racial discrimination epitome and partially in Mexico, a geographical area well known for drug trafficking (Schneider, 2014). The physical geographical setting where the movie is shot is very crucial as it helps in developing the main themes of the movie. The movie […]

The Development of Cultural Racism Associated with American Politics

Abstract Politics in the United States have always been a heated issue, and never more so than now. The surprising election of Donald Trump has created a clear cultural divide on many levels that continues to cultivate hate, and gifts not just Americans but the entire world with cultural racism that we have not seen for a long time. The political divide in America affects every American, every day, so much so that you would be hard-pressed to find someone […]

Racism and Civil War

One person is all it takes to change the world, for the good or for the bad. In this democratic society, every person is granted the same three unalienable rights: Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. If the Declaration of Independence stands true, then what’s the difference between a white individual and a black individual? The word “racism” is associated with the idea of one race being superior to the other, most commonly, blacks are “inferior” to whites. No […]

What is Racism?

Racism is prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one's own race is superior and the belief that all members of each race possess characteristics or abilities specific to that race, especially so as to distinguish it as inferior or superior to another race or races. the belief that all members of each race possess characteristics or abilities specific to that race, especially so as to distinguish it as inferior or […]

There Will Always be Color Racism is not Dead

Racism is not dead. Equality does not exist. The color of a person's skin still matters. Even in the 21st century, there are flaws within our legal system that has allowed Jim Crow to still exist under a new skin. The United States has used mass incarceration to continually disenfranchise millions of the African American Community. In The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, Michelle Alexander reasons that the criminal justice system is faulty and with […]

Discrimination of Races

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Racism and Discrimination: the Influence of Past Sins

Discrimination against black people by white people in the United States had been regarded as a matter of course and justifiable for more than 300 years. Therefore, the problem is far more than whether the laws are prohibited or not, but whether people's mind and concepts are changed or not. The latter is something that everyone understands but is the most difficult to do. While looking at American history, the history of African Americans can be said to be soaked […]

Racism: Unmasking Microaggressions and Discrimination

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Color Blind Racism

I enjoyed watching this documentary “White Like Me”, by Tim Wise. What I found most surprising was the fact that Tim Wise was a white male and was the individual in the film talking about the discrimination people of color receive. There were a few other things that surprised me, like the fact that there are more African Americans in jail and on probation than the number of those enslaved in 1850. The movie version of Black Like Me was […]

The Acts of Imperialism and Racism in “The Heart of Darkness”

In the novel The Heart of Darkness, the reader is introduced to the acts of imperialism and racism. The story tells of Europeans who have established a colony in Africa that is being used for trade purposes. However, the background of the story is that the Europeans are trying to colonize the Africans and introduce them to the European way of living. The white traders are not only trying to change the Africans way of life, the whites also view […]

Stereotyping and Discrimination

Introduction The movie starts with all the animals living together and happily in the big city. Their peaceful lives are then disturbed by ferocious predators. The case goes to the swindler fox and a bunny cop, those who unintentionally solve many problems related to hidden cases of interspecies.Rhetorical Strategies Few of the negative observers interpret that movie does not openly or directly express the racism. Additionally, the writer named as Nico Lang also asserts that movie does not score much […]

Police Brutality and Racism

The Declaration of Independence was created to protect the inalienable rights that all Americans receive at birth, yet police brutality continues to threaten the rights of African Americans everywhere. Police everywhere need to be given mandatory psychological tests in order to gain awareness of racial bias in law enforcement and allow citizens to slowly gain trust for the officers in law enforcement. No one wants a child to grow up in a world filled with hate. As Martin Luther King […]

Effects of Racism in Desiree’s Baby

As hard as it may be to talk about it, race has found a humble abode in literature. Desiree’s baby revolves around race and how it affects its main characters. A woman by the name of Desiree gives birth to a baby boy who is fathered by cruel slave master Armand Aubigny. Desiree makes a startling discovery when she finds out that her baby is of African heritage and this infuriates her husband who kicks them out causing Desiree to […]

Racism and Slavery

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How To Write An Essay On Racism

Introduction to the complexities of racism.

Writing an essay on racism involves delving into a complex and sensitive subject that has deep historical roots and contemporary implications. Begin your essay by defining racism as a system of discrimination based on race, affecting individuals and groups socially, economically, and politically. Highlight the importance of understanding racism not only as overt acts of discrimination but also as institutional and systemic practices. This introduction should lay the groundwork for your exploration, whether it's focused on historical aspects of racism, its manifestations in modern society, or strategies for combating racial prejudice and inequality.

Historical Context and Evolution of Racism

The body of your essay should include a detailed examination of the historical context and evolution of racism. Discuss how racism has been perpetuated and institutionalized over time, highlighting key historical events and policies that have contributed to racial discrimination and segregation. Depending on your essay’s focus, you might explore the transatlantic slave trade, colonialism, Jim Crow laws, or apartheid, among other topics. This historical perspective is crucial for understanding how past injustices continue to shape present racial dynamics and attitudes.

Analyzing Modern Manifestations of Racism

Transition to discussing the modern manifestations of racism. Examine how racism operates in current societal structures, such as in the criminal justice system, education, employment, and healthcare. Discuss the concept of systemic racism and how it perpetuates inequality, as well as the impact of racial bias and stereotypes in media representation and everyday interactions. This section should also address the intersectionality of racism, acknowledging how race intersects with other identities like gender, class, and sexuality, contributing to unique experiences of discrimination.

Strategies for Addressing and Combating Racism

Conclude your essay by exploring strategies for addressing and combating racism. Discuss the importance of education, awareness-raising, and open dialogue in challenging racist beliefs and stereotypes. Reflect on the role of policy changes, affirmative action, and reparations in addressing systemic racism. Emphasize the importance of individual and collective action in fostering a more inclusive and equitable society. Your conclusion should not only summarize the key points of your essay but also inspire a sense of hope and commitment to anti-racist efforts, underscoring the ongoing work needed to dismantle racism in all its forms.

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Racism and History of Discrimination Essay

Racism and other kinds of discrimination have existed for centuries and still prevail in modern-day society. While many people view racism as a social construct that only exists among ordinary people, it is much more frequent among government authorities and law enforcement agencies, with police brutality being one of the most acute issues. Such an issue is not merely a local or state problem but a federal one, permeating the entire country. As a result, while different policies aim to eradicate racism-caused police brutality, it still exists and causes many deaths.

There are many instances of the given issue that led not just to disabilities but also to deaths. For example, despite a 1993 prohibition on chokeholds by the New York Police Department, policeman Daniel Pantaleo nonetheless fatally choked Eric Garner in 2014 (The Economist, 2020). In one of the latest occurrences, Derek Chauvin, a Minneapolis law enforcement officer, knelt on George Floyd’s neck for 8 minutes on May 25, 2020, causing George Floyd to pass away (Valbuena et al., 2020). As a result, the policy sector this sort of social injustice falls under is criminal justice. According to the United Nations, among the core problems that impact this sector are “racial profiling, harassment, verbal abuse and abuse of power by law enforcement officials” (United Nations, 2022). As a result, advocacy should be aimed at creating new models in criminal justice that will ensure the protection of all minority groups and due process. As has been mentioned by the UN, “racial discrimination in law enforcement and the criminal justice system cannot be separated from systemic racism” (United Nations, 2022). Therefore, such a macro policy intervention should aim at holding those law enforcement officers responsible for the brutality.

Hence, despite efforts to end racism-related police violence, it still occurs and claims many lives. Criminal justice is the area of policy that deals with this kind of social injustice. Racial discrimination, harassment, emotional insults, and the misuse of authority by law enforcement authorities are among the significant issues that have an influence on this industry, according to the United Nations. Therefore, advocacy efforts should focus on developing new criminal justice models that would guarantee the protection of all minority groups and due process. The goal of such a macro-political intervention should be to hold violent law enforcement personnel accountable.

The Economist. (2020). In America protests have already brought policy changes . The Economist. Web.

United Nations. (2022). Addressing and responding to racial discrimination in the criminal justice system . UN. Web.

Valbuena, V., Howard, R., Bonner, S., & Dimick, J. (2020). Let us not be silent . Annals of Surgery , 272 (6), 915-916. Web.

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Bibliography

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Essay #8. Anti-Racism May Be An Answer

There’s one thing about writing about racism today. There will never be a shortage of material. It seems there will always be someone, somewhere, who will eventually say something racist. Everyday people say racist things. Famous people say racist things. The difference is, the famous have more to lose than the rest of us–or do they? Because their racist rants oftentimes find their way into mainstream and social media, we find out about it sooner or later. The rest of us can say our racist comments in the privacy of our homes and among our friends. Remember when Hulk Hogan became the newest celebrity to add his name to the racist rant hall of fame? I liked the character Hulk Hogan. So, it saddened me to learn about his racist rant. If you remember, Hulk Hogan apparently got upset with his daughter after finding out she was dating a Black man. He then went on an “N” word rant, which was taped. The taping was 8 years prior but brought back to life and made public. From the news account, I remember listening to it and from a reporter who grew up loving Hulk Hogan, it was bad. The WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment) cut all ties with Hulk Hogan. I mean the WWE excommunicated him to the land of nonexistence. To his credit Hulk Hogan apologized profusely. But what else was he going to do?

Is the WWE’s punishment going to undo, un-hurt or fix any problems in the Black community? Is the WWE’s punishment going to help teach society not to say or do such racist things? The answer is no. Like I’ve said to you several times before, racism is an on-purpose act that must be undone, on-purpose. I think the WWE should have given Hulk Hogan a chance to undo his racist rant, by sending him to (in this case) a Black school or youth center and let him tell the kids and their parents why he’s sorry for what he said. I think WWE and Hulk Hogan should have gone into their pockets and fix a problem in a poor Black school district. I think the WWE and Hulk Hogan should have started an after-school tutoring program to help Black kids do better in their school. This would have been an anti-racist act. This would have started the process of un-doing racism. If Hulk Hogan had made racist comments about Mexican people, Asian people, Native Indian people, or women, then what I’m talking about would apply to those communities. The same goes for any other race or group of people that have been offended by racist and hateful acts or comments perpetrated by wealthy people or organizations.

My point is, apologies aren’t enough. With all the racist rants and acts that are going on in this country, nothing is being done to undo racism. Firing people who make racist, sexist or any other hateful comments, doesn’t do anything for those communities or people hurt by the comments. An anti-racism approach needs to be taken. These communities need to demand more than apologies. Firing people who make racist comments does not educate or re-educate anyone. If society stays uneducated, racism will continue; Headline: “Racist person fired! End of Racism!”–probably not.

From Racist to Non-Racist to Anti-Racist: Becoming a Part of the Solution Copyright © 2001, 2020 by Keith L. Anderson, PhD is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Home — Blog — Topic Ideas — Essay Topics on Racism: 150 Ideas for Analysis and Discussion

Essay Topics on Racism: 150 Ideas for Analysis and Discussion

essay topics on racism

Here’s a list of 150 essay ideas on racism to help you ace a perfect paper. The subjects are divided based on what you require!

Before we continue with the list of essay topics on racism, let's remember the definition of racism. In brief, it's a complex prejudice and a form of discrimination based on race. It can be done by an individual, a group, or an institution. If you belong to a racial or ethnic group, you are facing being in the minority. As it's usually caused by the group in power, there are many types of racism, including socio-cultural racism, internal racism, legal racism, systematic racism, interpersonal racism, institutional racism, and historical racism. You can also find educational or economic racism as there are many sub-sections that one can encounter.

150 Essay Topics on Racism to Help You Ace a Perfect Essay

General Recommendations

The subject of racism is one of the most popular among college students today because you can discuss it regardless of your academic discipline. Even though we are dealing with technical progress and the Internet, the problem of racism is still there. The world may go further and talk about philosophical matters, yet we still have to face them and explore the challenges. It makes it even more difficult to find a good topic that would be unique and inspiring. As a way to help you out, we have collected 150 racism essay topics that have been chosen by our experts. We recommend you choose something that motivates you and narrow things down a little bit to make your writing easier.

Why Choose a Topic on Racial Issues? 

When we explore racial issues, we are not only seeking the most efficient solutions but also reminding ourselves about the past and the mistakes that we should never make again. It is an inspirational type of work as we all can change the world. If you cannot choose a topic that inspires you, think about recent events, talk about your friend, or discuss something that has happened in your local area. Just take your time and think about how you can make the world a safer and better place.

The Secrets of a Good Essay About Racism 

The secret to writing a good essay on racism is not only stating that racism is bad but by exploring the origins and finding a solution. You can choose a discipline and start from there. For example, if you are a nursing student, talk about the medical principles and responsibilities where every person is the same. Talk about how it has not always been this way and discuss the methods and the famous theorists who have done their best to bring equality to our society. Keep your tone inspiring, explore, and tell a story with a moral lesson in the end. Now let’s explore the topic ideas on racism!

General Essay Topics On Racism 

As we know, no person is born a racist since we are not born this way and it cannot be considered a biological phenomenon. Since it is a practice that is learned and a social issue, the general topics related to racism may include socio-cultural, philosophical, and political aspects as you can see below. Here are the ideas that you should consider as you plan to write an essay on racial issues:

  • Are we born with racial prejudice? 
  • Can racism be unlearned? 
  • The political constituent of the racial prejudice and the colonial past? 
  • The humiliation of the African continent and the control of power. 
  • The heritage of the Black Lives Matter movement and its historical origins. 
  • The skin color issue and the cultural perceptions of the African Americans vs Mexican Americans. 
  • The role of social media in the prevention of racial conflicts in 2022 . 
  • Martin Luther King Jr. and his role in modern education. 
  • Konrad Lorenz and the biological perception of the human race. 
  • The relation of racial issues to nazism and chauvinism.

The Best Racism Essay Topics 

School and college learners often ask about what can be considered the best essay subject when asked to write on racial issues. Essentially, you have to talk about the origins of racism and provide a moral lesson with a solution as every person can be a solid contribution to the prevention of hatred and racial discrimination.

  • The schoolchildren's example and the attitude to the racial conflicts. 
  • Perception of racism in the United States versus Germany. 
  • The role of the scouting movement as a way to promote equality in our society. 
  •  Social justice and the range of opportunities that African American individuals could receive during the 1960s.
  •  The workplace equality and the negative perception of the race when the documents are being filed. 
  •  The institutional racism and the sources of the legislation that has paved the way for injustice. 
  •  Why should we talk to the children about racial prejudice and set good examples ? 
  •  The role of anthropology in racial research during the 1990s in the USA. 
  •  The Black Poverty phenomenon and the origins of the Black Culture across the globe. 
  •  The controversy of Malcolm X’s personality and his transition from anger to peacemaking.

Shocking Racism Essay Ideas 

Unfortunately, there are many subjects that are not easy to deal with when you are talking about the most horrible sides of racism. Since these subjects are sensitive, dealing with the shocking aspects of this problem should be approached with a warning in your introduction part so your readers know what to expect. As a rule, many medical and forensic students will dive into the issue, so these topic ideas are still relevant:

  • The prejudice against wearing a hoodie. 
  •  The racial violence in Western Africa and the crimes by the Belgian government. 
  •  The comparison of homophobic beliefs and the link to racial prejudice. 
  •  Domestic violence and the bias towards the cases based on race. 
  •  Racial discrimination in the field of the sex industry. 
  •  Slavery in the Middle East and the modern cultural perceptions. 
  •  Internal racism in the United States: why the black communities keep silent. 
  •  Racism in the American schools: the bias among the teachers. 
  •  Cyberbullying and the distorted image of the typical racists . 
  •  The prisons of Apartheid in South Africa.

Light and Simple Ideas Regarding Racism

If you are a high-school learner or a first-year college student, your essay on racism may not have to represent complex research with a dozen of sources. Here are some good ideas that are light and simple enough to provide you with inspiration and the basic points to follow:

  • My first encounter with racial prejudice. 
  •  Why do college students are always in the vanguard of social campaigns? 
  •  How are the racial issues addressed by my school? 
  •  The promotion of the African-American culture is a method to challenge prejudice and stereotypes. 
  • The history of blues music and the Black culture of the blues in the United States.
  • The role of slavery in the Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain. 
  •  School segregation in the United States during the 1960s. 
  •  The negative effect of racism on the mental health of a person. 
  •  The advocacy of racism in modern society . 
  •  The heritage of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” and the modern perception of the historical issues.

Interesting Topics on Racism For an Essay 

Contrary to the popular belief, when you have to talk about the cases of racial prejudice, you will also encounter many interesting essay topic ideas. As long as these are related to your main academic course, you can explore them. Here are some great ideas to consider:

  • Has the perception of Michael Jackson changed because of his skin transition? 
  •  The perception of racial problems by the British Broadcasting Corporation. 
  •  The role of the African American influencers on Instagram. 
  •  The comparison between the Asian students and the Mexican learners in the USA. 
  •  Latin culture and the similarities when compared to the Black culture with its peculiarities. 
  •  The racial impact in the “Boy In The Stripped Pajamas”. 
  •  Can we eliminate racism completely and how exactly, considering the answer is “Yes”? 
  •  Scientific research of modern racism and social media campaigns. 
  •  Why do some people believe that the Black Lives Matter movement is controversial? 
  • Male vs female challenges in relation to racial attitudes.

Argumentative Essay Topics About Race 

An argumentative type of writing requires making a clear statement or posing an assumption that will deal with a particular question. As we are dealing with racial prejudice or theories, it is essential to support your writing with at least one piece of evidence to make sure that you can support your opinion and stand for it as you write. Here are some good African American argumentative essay examples of topics and other ideas to consider:

  •  Racism is a mental disorder and cannot be treated with words alone. 
  •  Analysis of the traumatic experiences based on racial prejudice. 
  •  African-American communities and the sense of being inferior are caused by poverty. 
  •  Reading the memoirs of famous people that describe racial issues often provides a distorted image through the lens of a single person. 
  •  There is no academic explanation of racism since every case is different and is often based on personal perceptions. 
  •  The negatives of the post-racial perception as the latent system that advocates racism. 
  •  The link of racial origins to the concept of feminism and gender inequality. 
  •  The military bias and the merits that are earned by the African-American soldiers. 
  •  The media causes a negative image of the Latin and Mexican youth in the United States. 
  •  Does racism exist in kindergarten and why the youngsters do not think about racial prejudice?

Racism Research Paper Topics 

Dealing with The Black Lives Matter essay , you should focus on those aspects of racism that are not often discussed or researched by the media. You can take a particular case study or talk about the reasons why the BLM social campaign has started and whether the timing has been right. Here are some interesting racism topics for research paper that you should consider:

  • The link of criminal offenses to race is an example of the primary injustice .  
  • The socio-emotional burdens of slavery that one can trace among the representatives of the African-American population. 
  • Study of the cardio-vascular diseases among the American youth: a comparison of the Caucasian and Latin representatives. 
  • The race and the politics: dealing with the racial issues and the Trump administration analysis. 
  • The best methods to achieve medical equality for all people: where race has no place to be. 
  • The perception of racism by the young children: the negative side of trying to educate the youngsters. 
  • Racial prejudice in the UK vs the United States: analysis of the core differences. 
  • The prisons in the United States: why do the Blacks constitute the majority? 
  • The culture of Voodoo and the slavery: the link between the occult practices.
  • The native American people and the African Americans: the common woes they share.

Racism in Culture Topics 

Racism topics for essay in culture are always upon the surface because we can encounter them in books, popular political shows, movies, social media, and more. The majority of college students often ignore this aspect because things easily become confusing since one has to take a stand and explain the point. As a way to help you a little bit, we have collected several cultural racism topic ideas to help you start:

  • The perception of wealth by the Black community: why it differs when researched through the lens of past poverty?  
  • The rap music and the cultural constituent of the African-American community. 
  • The moral constituent of the political shows where racial jargon is being used. 
  • Why the racial jokes on television are against the freedom of speech?  
  • The ways how the modern media promotes racism by stirring up the conflict and actually doing harm. 
  • The isolated cases of racism and police violence in the United States as portrayed by the movies. 
  • Playing with the Black musicians: the history of jazz in the United States. 
  • The social distancing and the perception of isolation by the different races. 
  • The cultural multitude in the cartoons by the Disney Corporations: the pros and cons.
  • From assimilation to genocide: can the African American child make it big without living through the cultural bias?

Racism Essay Ideas in Literature 

One of the best ways to study racism is by reading the books by those who have been through it on their own or by studying the explorations by those who can write emotionally and fight for racial equality where racism has no place to be. Keeping all of these challenges in mind, our experts suggest turning to the books as you can explore racism in the literature by focusing on those who are against it and discussing the cases in the classic literature that are quite controversial.

  • The racial controversy of Ernest Hemingway's writing.  
  • The personal attitude of Mark Twain towards slavery and the cultural peculiarities of the times. 
  • The reasons why "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee book has been banned in libraries. 
  • The "Hate You Give" by Angie Thomas and the analysis of the justified and "legit" racism. 
  • Is the poetry by the gangsta rap an example of hidden racism? 
  • Maya Angelou and her timeless poetry. 
  • The portrayal of xenophobia in modern English language literature. 
  • What can we learn from the "Schilder's List" screenplay as we discuss the subject of genocide? 
  • Are there racial elements in "Othello" or Shakespeare's creation is beyond the subject?
  • Kate Chopin's perception of inequality in "Desiree's Baby".

Racism in Science Essay Ideas 

Racism is often studied by scientists because it's not only a cultural point or a social agenda that is driven by personal inferiority and similar factors of mental distortion. Since we can talk about police violence and social campaigns, it is also possible to discuss things through different disciplines. Think over these racism thesis statement ideas by taking a scientific approach and getting a common idea explained:

  • Can physical trauma become a cause for a different perception of race? 
  • Do we inherit racial intolerance from our family members and friends? 
  • Can a white person assimilate and become a part of the primarily Black community? 
  • The people behind the concept of Apartheid: analysis of the critical factors. 
  • Can one prove the fact of the physical damage of the racial injustice that lasted through the years? 
  • The bond between mental diseases and the slavery heritage among the Black people. 
  • Should people carry the blame for the years of social injustice? 
  • How can we explain the metaphysics of race? 
  • What do the different religions tell us about race and the best ways to deal with it? 
  • Ethnic prejudices based on age, gender, and social status vs general racism.

Cinema and Race Topics to Write About 

As a rule, the movies are also a great source for writing an essay on racial issues. Remember to provide the basic information about the movie or include examples with the quotations to help your readers understand all the major points that you make. Here are some ideas that are worth your attention:

  • The negative aspect of the portrayal of racial issues by Hollywood.  
  • Should the disturbing facts and the graphic violence be included in the movies about slavery? 
  • Analysis of the "Green Mile" movie and the perception of equality in our society.  
  • The role of music and culture in the "Django Unchained" movie. 
  • The "Ghosts of Mississippi" and the social aspect of the American South compared to how we perceive it today. 
  • What can we learn from the "Malcolm X" movie created by Spike Lee? 
  • "I am Not Your Negro" movie and the role of education through the movies. 
  • "And the Children Shall Lead" the movie as an example that we are not born racist. 
  • Do we really have the "Black Hollywood" concept in reality? 
  • Do the movies about racial issues only cause even more racial prejudice?

Race and Ethnic Relations 

Another challenging problem is the internal racism and race and ethnicity essay topics that we can observe not only in the United States but all over the world as well. For example, the Black people in the United States and the representatives of the rap music culture will divide themselves between the East Coast and the West Coast where far more than cultural differences exist. The same can be encountered in Afghanistan or in Belgium. Here are some essay topics on race and ethnicity idea samples to consider:

  • The racial or the ethnic conflict? What can we learn from Afghan society? 
  • Religious beliefs divide us based on ethnicity . 
  • What are the major differences between ethnic and racial conflicts? 
  • Why we are able to identify the European Black person and the Black coming from the United States? 
  • Racism and ethnicity's role in sports. 
  • How can an ethnic conflict be resolved with the help of anti-racial methods? 
  • The medical aspect of being an Asian in the United States. 
  • The challenges of learning as an African American person during the 1950s. 
  • The role of the African American people in the Vietnam war and their perception by the locals. 
  • Ethnicity's role in South Africa as the concept of Apartheid has been formed.

Biology and Racial Issues 

If you are majoring in Biology or would like to research this side of the general issue of race, it is essential to think about how we can fight racism in practice by turning to healthcare or the concepts that are historical in their nature. Although we cannot explain slavery per se other than by turning to economics and the rule of power that has no justification, biologists believe that racial challenges can be approached by their core beliefs as well.

  • Can we create an isolated non-racist society in 2022? 
  • If we assume that a social group has never heard of racism, can it occur? 
  • The physical versus cultural differences in the racial inequality cases? 
  • The biological peculiarities of the different races? 
  • Do we carry the cultural heritage of our race? 
  • Interracial marriage through the lens of Biology. 
  • The origins of the racial concept and its evolution. 
  • The core ways how slavery has changed the African-American population. 
  • The linguistic peculiarities of the Latin people. 
  • The resistance of the different races towards vaccination.

Modern Racism Topics to Consider 

In case you would like to deal with a modern subject that deals with racism, you can go beyond the famous Black Lives Matter movement by focusing on the cases of racism in sports or talking about the peacemakers or the famous celebrities who have made a solid difference in the elimination of racism.

  • The Global Citizen campaign is a way to eliminate racial differences. 
  • The heritage of Aretha Franklin and her take on the racial challenges. 
  • The role of the Black Stars in modern society: the pros and cons. 
  • Martin Luther King Day in the modern schools. 
  • How can Instagram help to eliminate racism? 
  • The personality of Michelle Obama as a fighter for peace. 
  • Is a society without racism a utopian idea? 
  • How can comic books help youngsters understand equality? 
  • The controversy in the death of George Floyd. 
  • How can we break down the stereotypes about Mexicans in the United States?

Racial Discrimination Essay Ideas 

If your essay should focus on racial discrimination, you should think about the environment and the type of prejudice that you are facing. For example, it can be in school or at the workplace, at the hospital, or in a movie that you have attended. Here are some discrimination topics research paper ideas that will help you to get started:

  • How can a schoolchild report the case of racism while being a minor?  
  • The discrimination against women's rights during the 1960s. 
  • The employment problem and the chances of the Latin, Asian, and African American applicants. 
  • Do colleges implement a certain selection process against different races? 
  • How can discrimination be eliminated via education? 
  • African-American challenges in sports. 
  • The perception of discrimination, based on racial principles and the laws in the United States. 
  • How can one report racial comments on social media? 
  • Is there discrimination against white people in our society? 
  • Covid-19 and racial discrimination: the lessons we have learned.

Find Even More Essay Topics On Racism by Visiting Our Site 

If you are unsure about what to write about, you can always find an essay on racism by visiting our website. Offering over 150 topic ideas, you can always get in touch with our experts and find another one!

5 Tips to Make Your Essay Perfect

  • Start your essay on racial issues by narrowing things down after you choose the general topic. 
  • Get your facts straight by checking the dates, the names, opinions from both sides of an issue, etc. 
  • Provide examples if you are talking about the general aspects of racism. 
  • Do not use profanity and show due respect even if you are talking about shocking things. The same relates to race and ethnic relations essay topics that are based on religious conflicts. Stay respectful! 
  • Provide references and citations to avoid plagiarism and to keep your ideas supported by at least one piece of evidence.

Recommendations to Help You Get Inspired

Speaking of recommended books and articles to help you start with this subject, you should check " The Ideology of Racism: Misusing Science to Justify Racial Discrimination " by William H. Tucker who is a professor of social sciences at Rutgers University. Once you read this great article, think about the poetry by Maya Angelou as one of the best examples to see the practical side of things.

The other recommendations worth checking include:

- How to be Anti-Racist by Ibram X. Kendi . - White Fragility by Robin Diangelo . - So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo .

The Final Word 

We sincerely believe that our article has helped you to choose the perfect essay subject to stir your writing skills. If you are still feeling stuck and need additional help, our team of writers can assist you in the creation of any essay based on what you would like to explore. You can get in touch with our skilled experts anytime by contacting our essay service for any race and ethnicity topics. Always confidential and plagiarism-free, we can assist you and help you get over the stress!

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Racism: A Very Short Introduction (2nd edn)

Racism: A Very Short Introduction (2nd edn)

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Racism: A Very Short Introduction explores the history of racial ideas and a wide range of racisms—biological, cultural, colourblind, and structural—and illuminates issues that have been the subject of recent debates. Is Islamophobia a form of racism? Is there a new antisemitism? Why has whiteness become an important source of debate? What is intersectionality? What is unconscious or implicit bias, and what is its importance in understanding racial discrimination? This VSI tackles these questions, and also shows why racism is an ongoing problem. Finally, it explains why there has been a resurgence of national populist and far-right movements and explores their implications for the future of racism.

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Essay About Racial Discrimination

Racial discrimination has been ranked as one the most pervasive issue in the world around today. Anyone judged by the skin colour, nationality, religion rather than by the content of character can be very dehumanizing experience that can have lasting effects on an individual’s life (Fischer 2008). Racism disturbs both individual and the learning environment in schools. It generates tension that alter cultural understanding and narrow the educational experiences of all students. According to (Berlak 2009) discrimination occurs in any stage of education from preschool through college and can be practiced by teachers or students. Racism occur in various forms such as teasing, name calling, teasing, verbal abuse and bullying. Therefore this literature review, discusses the types, effects and solution to this unstoppable issue in education system.

Types of Racial Discrimination

Racism is frequently thought of as individual demonstrations of inclination. While discrimination is still particularly a reality, concentrating on individual demonstrations of prejudice can darken the substances that make and keep up racial disparity all the more comprehensively. According to De la luz, there are three types of racial discrimination which are individual racism, instituinal racism and systematic racism. To completely address the effects of racism it is essential to address all parts of racial disparity. Individual racism, likewise called personal racism, is the sort of prejudice that a great many people consider when they consider “racism.” Individual prejudice happens when a man’s convictions, states of mind, and activities depend on inclinations, generalizations, or preferences against another race. Institutional racism refers to an establishment settling on decisions that deliberately single out or hurt ethnic minorities. Systematic racism, is maybe the most upsetting and slightest examined type of racism. It systematizes individual, social, and different sorts of prejudice in ceaseless frameworks. Like institutional prejudice, basic racism centre around associations instead of individuals. However, while institutional racism may intentionally attempt to single out a specific gathering, auxiliary bigotry is unbiased all over. This impartiality makes basic prejudice hard to gauge and significantly more hard to end.

Effects of Racial Discrimination

It is believed that racism is one term that describes the whole issue, however it is a complex system that describes many types of biased behaviours and systems (Jonnes 2018).According to the Human Rights Commission (2017), racism as an act that humiliates human behaviour and affects the life of an individual physically, mentally and socially. It takes various forms such as name calling, comments, jokes, verbal abuse, harassment, bullying or commentary in the media that inflames hostility towards certain groups. In serious case, it results in physical abuse and violence. Racial discrimination is a deadly virus that affects all, individual, families, communities and the learning and working environment. Racism can unpleasantly affect the educational outcomes, individual happiness and self-confidence, cultural identity, school and community relations and most commonly is the student’s behaviour and academic achievements (Kohli, 2017). Hence if it is unaddressed than racism can generate tensions within the school communities and these will affect the educational experiences of all students. It can demoralise students self -confidence and can result in students displaying a range of negative behaviours Students who are disaffected with school are less likely to attend school regularly and more likely to drop out of school earlier than other groups of students. The increase rate of the incidence of absenteeism and stress is due to racism been link to diminished morale and lower productivity (Fields 2014),The presence of racism in schools affects the educational outcomes due to lower participation rates, behavioural problems and feelings of alienation. Hence the educational success depends on the regular sustained attendance of each students and the ability to participate in the classroom. With racism in the learning environment, the balance is disrupted and educational outcomes maybe limited as a result (Triaki 2017).

Moreover, racism could be minimised even though it will decade to erase it from our beautiful world. Advancing positive ethnic and racial character decreases sentiments of detachment or prohibition and enhance students capacity to focus in the classroom. Teachers can enable students to create positive opinions about their ethnic and racial personality by presenting them to assorted good examples, and making a sheltered space for them to commend their disparities. A definitive answer for this issue is diminishing understudy introduction to racial separation and enhancing race relations in the U.S. In the interim, there are ways minding and concerned grown-ups can enable understudies to manage the pressure be minimised even though it will take time to prevent it from being practiced in schools. (Collins 2015).Racism has been around everlastingly however it can be diminished, just with a lot of exertion. Education is the key for some muddled issues we look in this world. Education can change the manner in which people think and lead us to a superior world. We can battle racism with education (Hwang 2008). On the off chance that we instruct and show sympathy, at that point there will be less need to discuss how we can stop racism. It will be difficult to stop racism if racist considerations are still with us. It is dependent upon us to get ready for the future by teaching our family and others on the difficulties of racial discrimination. At exactly that point will we overcome racial discrimination in our societies and schools.

Racial discrimination could be described as a weapon that destroys the society and the education system as whole. It affects the students in various ways that hinder their academic achievement and also affects them mentally, physically and socially. It was also stated that racial discrimination can occur at any stage either preschool, high schools or even tertiary institution. Hence there are possible ways where racism could be minimized even though it will take time to be erased. Therefore education is an important tool in everyone’s life since it can change the world and every individual.        

Racism Sample Essay, with Outline

Published by gudwriter on January 4, 2021 January 4, 2021

Racism in the past and racism today -This is another interesting topic on racism. It offers some interesting insights into how racism was perceived and manifested in various social spheres during the 19th century and how it is different today. You can explore how racism is changing its face. (3 pages)

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Racism Essay Outline

Introduction

Thesis: Racism always has and is still one of the most prevalent social problems affecting the American population and other European countries. It is essential to evaluate how racism has transformed since the 19th century to modern-day forms.

Paragraph 1:

Racism was openly accepted in the 19th century.

  • The whites were superior to the people of color.
  • People of color were slaves to the whites.
  • Slave trade was a legal business.

Paragraph 2:

Modern day racism is hidden but very prevalent in the society.

  • Laws were put in place to end slavery and stop racial discrimination, but no efforts have been made to implement them.
  • American laws favor the whites.

Paragraph 3:

In the 19th century, people of no color had no rights.

  • They were the property of white merchants.
  • They were highly mistreated.
  • They had no freedom of movement.

White people had the right to kill people of color.

Paragraph 4:

Today, there are laws aimed at giving people of color fair treatment, but these laws are ways of justifying the end of racial discrimination.

  • The American criminal justice system treats the whites more reasonably than the people of color.

Paragraph 5:

In the 19th century, people of color had no rights to own property.

  • Today people of color have the right to own property but only in areas free of the white population.
  • People of own color property in areas with low value, while whites own property in valuable areas.

Paragraph 6:

Brutality on people of color was acceptable in the 19th century, but there laws prohibiting the practice today.

  • The police have continued to subject people of color to brutal treatment without facing the wrath of the law.
  • Police brutality is an act of modern racism.

Paragraph 7: 

Even though there are laws protecting the rights of people of color to equal employment and treatment at the workplace, such laws are hardly applied.

  • There still exists workplace discrimination, especially in the United States.
  • Workplace discrimination can take many forms and can take place in various settings.
  • A restate of the thesis statement
  • A summary of the main points
  • A take-away  statement made based on presented facts or information 

Read an essay on Rhetorical Analysis of “Civil Disobedience,” by Henry D. Thoreau .

Racism Essay –  Racism in the Past and Racism Today

Racism has always been and still is one of the most prevalent social problems in the United States and across Europe. It is a social vice that has powerful roots in society, and its elimination has almost proven impossible. Many believe that the world society has worked towards ending this vice, but there is still evidence of racial discrimination in interactions between whites and people of color. The reason that pushes people into believing that racism has ended is that it has changed over the years and taken new forms. It is thus essential to evaluate how racism has transformed since the 19th century to modern-day forms.

In the 19th century, racism was open and acceptable in the American society. During this time, the whites were treated as superiors to people of color (Jahoda, 2009). People of color were a source of labor and servants to the whites. The acceptable name for people of color in the 19th century was slaves (Jahoda, 2009). Slave trade was a multimillion-dollar business that was practiced freely in most parts of the world in the 19th century (Jahoda, 2009). Even people of color themselves knew that they were treated as being inferior to the whites. They could however not oppose this treatment as governments were in support of the situation. As such, racism was an ordinary and acceptable practice during the 19th century.

However, today racism is hidden but very prevalent in the society. After civil rights movements rose in the 19th and 20th centuries and pushed for the emancipation of people of color from slavery, governments acted and ended the practice. Laws were put in place to end it. Policies were made to ensure that people of color had equal rights as whites (Brown, 2004). However, fewer efforts if any have been made to ensure that indeed people of color enjoy the same rights as the whites. The American law still favors whites over people of color (Brown, 2004). In the past, racism was an open practice. However, today it is hidden, and one has to look deep inside social interactions to spot racial discrimination.

In the 19th century, people of color had no rights as they were considered as property of their masters. They were exposed to inhumane treatment such as being beaten overworked (Mosse, 1995). They were not allowed to own property and had no freedom to do as they pleased. During these years, the lives of people of color were dependent on the choices of their owners (Mosse, 1995). Whites had the right to kill people of color who went against their rules. People of color were aware of what would happen to them if they acted against the command of their masters.

In the modern day world, people of color have rights that warrant them equal treatment as whites, but these laws are just a way to justify the end of racial discrimination. In the past, no laws prohibited racial discrimination, and therefore people of color had no issues with the treatment they received from whites (Brown, 2004). However today, with such laws in place, people of color would expect fair treatment, but this has not happened since the 19th century. The American criminal justice system evidences this unfortunate reality. People of color are still treated more harshly by the law than their white counterparts (Brown, 2004). In case a white and black person commits murder, they will be given different sentences with the white person getting a fair one.

In the 19th century, people of color had no rights to own property as they were regarded as property of whites. However, when slavery came to an end, they were given the right to own property. However, these laws allowing for property ownership by people of color did not bring an end to racial discrimination in property ownership (Jahoda, 2009). Whites could not allow people of color to own property in areas where they (whites) resided. History shows that whites cautioned real estate dealers from allowing people of color to own homes in such areas (Jahoda, 2009). The value of land or property owned by people of color would fall, while that of property owned by whites would rise. Today, there are residential areas owned by whites only and people of color can never be allowed to own property in such areas.

Brutality on people of color was a common practice in the 19th century. However, laws were later put in place to stop such treatment (Mosse, 1995). In spite of this, brutality on people of color has continued to spread not just among ordinary white persons but also through the police force. Today, African-American men die as a result of police brutality than from attacks by average white persons, the now famous May 2020 George Floyd’s case being a good example. The American justice system exonerates all-white officers suspected of killing innocent black men (Bonilla, Dietrich & Hall, 2008). Most African-American men live in fear of the police, who are supposed to protect them than they fear white supremacists. Police brutality is one of the most common forms of modern racism.

In yet another reality, even though there are laws protecting the rights of people of color to equal employment and treatment at the workplace, such laws are hardly applied. There still exists workplace discrimination, especially in the United States. Workplace discrimination can take many forms and can take place in various settings, including office buildings in city centers as well as offices in rural villages. Both men and women can suffer from workplace discrimination based on their sex, political opinions, religion, social origin, national extraction, skin color, or race. Noteworthy, discrimination at work denies people opportunities and prevents society from benefitting from what these people could do. In this respect, elimination of workplace discrimination contributes to a better working environment.

Racism continues to be a social threat to people of color in the United States and European countries. Laws put in place to protect these people from racial discrimination are hardly implemented. The police and the justice system are the number one perpetrators of racial discrimination. The only difference between racism in the 19th century and modern-day racism is in the way that it manifests itself.

Bonilla, E., Dietrich, D. R., & Hall, R. E. (2008). Racism in the 21st Century R .

Brown, D. A. (2004). Fighting racism in the twenty-first century.  Wash. & Lee L. Rev. ,  61 , 1485.

Jahoda, G. (2009). Intra‐European racism in nineteenth‐century anthropology.  History and Anthropology ,  20 (1), 37-56.

Mosse, G. L. (1995). Racism and nationalism.  Nations and Nationalism ,  1 (2), 163-173.

Explore a list of the trendy to the most interesting human resources topics .

Racism in the Workplace Essay Outline

Thesis: Racism in the workplace occurs in the form of direct discrimination, indirect discrimination, harassment, victimization, intersectional discrimination, and multicultural discrimination.

Direct discrimination is when a person is treated less favorably as a result of their race, their perceived race, or the race of another person they are related to.

  • Discriminating against someone because of their perceived race is known as discrimination by perception.
  • Discriminating against someone because they are related to another person of a given race is known as discrimination by association.

Indirect racial discrimination is when a working rule, policy, or procedure affects everyone yet disadvantages one group or person owing to their race.

  • It may be less visible than direct discrimination.
  • It applies to any workplace policy, practice, or procedure.
  • Examples are dress code standards and work arrangements.

Racial harassment is when a person encounters offensive behavior based on race.

  • Racist language is the most typical instance of racial harassment in the workplace.
  • It generates an unpleasant, intimidating, demeaning, humiliating, or insulting environment.
  • A person is also considered harassed if they witness a racial harassment incident aimed at someone else.

Victimization occurs when someone receives unfavorable treatment because of their involvement in a discrimination complaint.

  • A person might suffer victimization because they complained of racial prejudice.
  • The vice may also happen to someone gathering data in anticipation of filing a complaint.
  • They could also be victimized because they backed up another person’s complaint.

Intersectional discrimination is discrimination against a person’s personal traits or identity.

  • Examples of the traits include gender, sex, color, class, sexual orientation, religion, ability, and physical appearance.
  • Working Black women have fewer opportunities to meet with senior executives, receive less sponsorship and mentorship, and have fewer training opportunities.
  • Only 4 percent of U.S. C-suite female executives are women of color, and only 1 percent are Black women.

Multiracial persons may encounter microaggressions and/or discrimination related to their ethnic and racial mix.

  • Microaggressions are unintentional, implicit social behaviors or utterances that offend and prejudice others.

Take a look at this informational  death penalty essay .

Racism in the Workplace Essay

Discrimination is the denial of equitable treatment to people based on group membership. Racial discrimination, or racism, is a system of oppression and dominance with a long history that divides and organizes society in a manner that structurally disadvantages particular minority groups based on their assigned race or ethnicity. It is critical to distinguish between racism and other types of discrimination and prejudice that do not stem from the mistreatment of ethnic or racial minority groups. Even though the Civil Rights Act’s Title VII illegalizes workplace discrimination based on national origin, religion, sex, color, and race, racial discrimination still plagues the workplace. Racism in the workplace occurs in the form of direct discrimination, indirect discrimination, harassment, victimization, intersectional discrimination, and multicultural discrimination.

Direct discrimination is when a person is disadvantaged and given less favorable treatment as a result of their race, their perceived race, or the race of another person they are related to. Discriminating against someone because of their perceived race is known as discrimination by perception (Triana et al., 2015). For instance, a racist customer may be served by a Korean-born employee after which the customer may mistake the employee for a Chinese. The customer may, unfortunately, later complain to the leadership organization not to be served by a Chinese again. This constitutes a serious case of discrimination by perception. It is because of the customer’s skewed perception that they racially discriminate against the otherwise innocent employee. Discriminating against someone because they are related to another person of a given race is known as discrimination by association (Triana et al., 2015). This other person could be a colleague, friend, or family member of the racism victim.

Indirect racial discrimination is when a working rule, policy, or procedure affects everyone yet disadvantages one group or person owing to their race. ‘Everyone’ could refer to all employees in an organization or any other set of employees, such as all employees in a specific job or team. Indirect discrimination may be less visible than direct, and may not be intentional in some instances. It applies to any workplace policy, practice, or procedure, whether documented or not. Examples may include dress code standards, work arrangements such as working remotely, the criteria used in hiring, terms, and conditions, and how employees are chosen for layoffs (Colella & King, 2017). A practical example of indirect discrimination is when a cleaning company lists “good written English skills” as one of its criteria for layoffs despite the job not requiring writing. Here, people would get unfairly laid off for lacking English writing skills despite impressive job performance.

Racial harassment is when a person encounters offensive behavior based on race. Racist language is the most typical instance of racial harassment in the workplace. For an act to qualify as harassment, it must have either generated an unpleasant, intimidating, demeaning, humiliating, or insulting environment for the person or violated their dignity (Conley, 2016). A behavior can be considered harassment if it yields one of these outcomes even if that was not the intention. It is also harassment if it never resulted in one of these outcomes but it was intended to (Conley, 2016). The legislation against harassment also applies in situations whereby an individual is harassed because they are perceived to belong to a race they do not belong to. In the same breath, a person is considered harassed if they witness a racial harassment incident aimed at someone else, but ends up harassing them as well.

Victimization occurs when someone receives unfavorable treatment because of their involvement in a discrimination complaint. The legislation also shields a person from victimization when another person believes they are connected to a complaint. A person might suffer victimization because they complained of racial prejudice or they are gathering data in anticipation of filing a complaint. They could also be victimized because they backed up another person’s complaint, made a statement, or provided proof that refuted another person’s complaint, or someone else believes that they have carried out or are considering any of the aforementioned actions (Colella & King, 2017). Being labeled a troublemaker, being excluded, or not being permitted to do certain things are examples of how someone could be victimized. Practically, victimization could involve an employee receiving warning emails from their boss to stop supporting another employee’s racial discrimination complaints. That employee would be muzzled into withdrawing his choice to speak against racial discrimination at their place of work.

Intersectional discrimination is discrimination against a person’s personal traits or identity. Examples of the distinguishing factors here may include gender, sex, color, class, sexual orientation, religion, ability, and physical appearance. For instance, research reveals that working Black women have fewer opportunities to meet with senior executives, receive less sponsorship and mentorship, and have fewer training opportunities (Bagalini, 2020). Compared to their white counterparts, these all lead to fewer opportunities for them to advance their careers. Because of this, while only 21 percent of C-suite executives in the United States are female, only 4 percent are women of color, and only 1 percent are Black women (Bagalini, 2020). This example has two implications. One, the world of work still does not give equal leadership opportunities to men and women. Two, of the few leadership opportunities accorded to women, over 95 percent are occupied by white women, leaving women of color and Black women at a significant disadvantage.

Multiracial persons may encounter microaggressions and/or discrimination related to their ethnic and racial mix. Often, microaggressions are unintentional, implicit social behaviors or utterances that offend and prejudice others. Compared to direct verbal discrimination, they are less explicit (Greig, 2015). Microaggressions are not easy to identify and when they happen, the victim is often chided as being overly sensitive or touchy. That is, microaggressions are often considered “harmless” by those involved when in reality, they cause as much harm as other forms of racial discrimination. Multiracial microaggressions can take many different forms, such as invalidating one’s race, excluding and isolating them, objectifying them, assuming that multiracial persons are monoracial, denying the existence of the multiracial phenomenon, and pathologizing multiracial identity (Greig, 2015).

Workplace racism may occur in many different ways, including directly, indirectly, in the form of harassment, and through victimization. It could also be intersectional or multicultural. Direct discrimination is when someone is explicitly denied equal privileges as others due to their race. Indirect discrimination is when someone is disadvantaged by organizational policy or rule. Harassment is when someone is racially offended or abused based on his race. A person could also be victimized for speaking up against cases of discrimination. On its part, intersectional discrimination is when a person’s attributes are used to prejudice him. In multicultural discrimination, a person may be racially discriminated against due to being of a mixed race. Whatever the form, workplace discrimination is harmful both to victims and organizational success. It should thus be adequately addressed.    

Bagalini, A. (2020, July 22). 5 ways intersectionality affects diversity and inclusion at work . World Economic Forum. https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/07/diversity-inclusion-equality-intersectionality/

Colella, A., & King, E. (2017). The Oxford Handbook of workplace discrimination . Oxford University Press.

Conley, H. (2016). Gower Handbook of discrimination at work . Taylor & Francis.

Greig, A. (2015). Understanding the stressors and types of discrimination that can affect multiracial individuals: Things to address and avoid in psychotherapy practice. Psychotherapy Bulletin, 50 (2), 56-60.

Triana, M. Jayasinghe, M., & Pieper, J. R. (2015). Perceived workplace racial discrimination and its correlates: A meta-analysis. Journal of Organizational Behavior , 36 (4), 491-513.

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