reflections on racism (from the IUS forum)

The most fascinating and important part of the forum was the historical context/lens supplied by my buddy, James Beeby. Among other things, he made the obvious but important and overlooked point that racism must be ideological if it is not biological. He also supplied the term "scientific racism" to refer to the pseudo-scientific enterprise of using science-like efforts to justify ideology-- e.g., between evolution and eugenics. (More broadly, one should be aware of the possibility of such efforts elsewhere-- from global warming to "creation science".)

Bernadette Olson presented as a Criminal Justice faculty. She helped to make the vital point that race and class are often conflated. In my view, class dominates race as an explanatory factor in these things. People don't often see that and even when they see it, they don't like to say it. (I'm not sure why.) For example, do you find it easier to talk to someone of your class but a different race-- or someone of the same race but a different class?

Psych prof Todd Manson described the origins of individual racism: learned, biological (the value of stereotyping), and it feels good. On stereotyping (what economists call "statistical discrimination"), Manson offered two new concepts for me: "in-group bias" (what economists call "personal discrimination" or favoritism) and "out-group heterogeneity". Both terms are useful generalizations, but both could be over-sold-- if bias is seen as always in favor of "my" groups ("knowing" my group, I might be biased against them in some ways) and if one ignores the heterogeneity one will impose on the groups to which one belongs as well.

Jean Abshire talked about race in the context of politics. It was good stuff, but I've already covered a lot of that here! One new observation for me: African-Americans have a far tighter group identification than other ethnic groups.