Title:
Taking sides : clashing views on controversial issues in race and ethnicity
Edition:
5th ed.
Publication Information:
New York, NY : McGraw-Hill/Dushkin 2005
ISBN:
9780072917352
Available:*
Library | Item Barcode | Call Number | Material Type | Item Category 1 | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Searching... | 30000010126918 | E184.A1 T34 2005 | Open Access Book | Book | Searching... |
Searching... | 30000010120458 | E184.A1 T34 2005 | Open Access Book | Book | Searching... |
On Order
Summary
Summary
Designed to introduce students to controversies in race and ethnicity. The pro and con readings discuss issues such as: social identities and cultural conflict; immigration, segregation and leadership; affirmative action and legal issues; and new policies.
Table of Contents
| Part 1 Classical Issues in Race and Ethnicity |
| Issue 1 Do We need a Common American Identity? |
| YESArthur M. Schlesinger Jr., from ldquo;E Pluribus Unumrdquo; The Disuniting of America: Reflections on a Multicultural Society (New York: W.W. Norton Co. 1992) |
| NOMichael Walzer, from ldquo;What Does It Mean to Be An 'American'?rdquo; Social Research (Fall 1990) and Arthur Schlesinger Jr. , historian, asserts that America needs a common identity. In that context he views multiculturalism as an attack on the basic values that have made America what it is today. Michael Waltzer , professor at the Center of Advanced Study Princeton, makes the pluralist argument that America cannot avoid its multicultural identity. He explores the ways in which citizenship and nationality are compatible with the preservation of one's ethnic identity, culture and community |
| Issue 2 Is Immigration Good for America? |
| YESDavid Cole, from ldquo;The New Know Nothingism: Five Myths About Immigrationrdquo; The Nation (October 17, 1994) |
| NOPeter Brimelow, from Alien Nation: Common Sense About America's Immigration Disaster (Random House 1995) and David Cole , law professor, critically examines and rebuffs significant myths alleging substantial destructive sociocultural and economic impacts of immigrants and policies in this field. Peter Brimelow , Senior Editor at Forbes and the National Review magazines, argues that the United States is being overrun by a growing tide of aliens who are changing the character and composition of the nation |
| Issue 3 Race Relations in the 19th Century: Will Accommodation Insure Progess? |
| YESBooker T. Washington, from ldquo;The Atlanta Exposition Addressrdquo; from Atlanta Letter (September 18, 1895) |
| NOW.E.B. DuBois, from ldquo;Of Mr. Booker T. Washington and Others,rdquo; from Souls of Black Folk ((New York: Fawcett, 1968) pp.42-54) and Booker T. Washington , the premier black leader of the period 1896-1915 argues that with the embrace of significant norms of the white culture, the race could make progress in the American South. W.E.B. DuBois , the leading black intellectual and progressive social activist of the first half of the twentieth century, viewed Washington's program as too limited for Black progress in the United States |
| Issue 4 Does White Identity Define America? |
| YESLillian B. Rubin, from ldquo;Is This a White Country, or What?rdquo; in Families on the Fault Line (harper Perennial, 1995) |
| NOEllis Cose, from ldquo;What's White, Anyway?rdquo; Newsweek (September 18, 2000) and Lillian B. Rubin , senior research fellow at the Institute for Study of Social Change at Berkeley, contrasts current immigrants who are mostly non-white with nineteenth-century European immigrants, almost all of whom were white. She notes that among many descendants of European immigrants currently there is a fear of whites becoming a minority. For these descendants, American identity has always been associated with being white. Ellis Cose , an African American journalist, argues that the traditional boundaries that determine race and skin color are not what they once were. Although he does not specifically cite ethnicity, Cose furthers the claim that American identity today is an expanding category |
| Part 2 Race, Prejudice and Racial Minorities |
| Issue 5 Is Skin Color A Proper Determinant of Racial Identity? |
| YESHoward Zinn, from ldquo;Drawing the Color Linerdquo; from A People's History of the United States (Harper Collins 1980) |
| NOMarvin Harris, from ldquo;How Our Skins Got Their Colorrdquo; from Our Kind: Who We Are. Where We Came From and Where We Are Going (Harper Collins 1989) and Howard Zinn , eminent historian, asserts that the black skin of the earliest African American was employed by whites to differentiate and establish them as members of a separate, distinct, and inferior race. Marvin Harris , a leading anthropologist, views skin color as a biological phenomenon, and thus he explains differences in skin color as a biological adaptation of humans for dealing with the potentially harmful solar radiation that we face |
| Issue 6 Is Race Prejudice a Product of Group Position? |
| YESHerbert Blumer, from ldquo;Race Prejudice as a Sense of Group Positionrdquo; The Pacific Sociological Review (Spring 1958) |
| NOGordon Allport, from ldquo;The Young Childrdquo; The Nature of Prejudice (Perseus Books, 1979) and Herbert Blumer , a sociologist, asserts that prejudice exists in a sense of group position rather than as an attitude based on individual feelings. Gordon Allport , a psychologist, makes the case that prejudice is the result of a three-stage learning process |
| Issue 7 Are Definitions of Race Just Political? |
| YESLawrence Wright, from ldquo;One Drop of Bloodrdquo; The New Yorker July, 1993 (Wendy Weil Agency, Inc.) |
| NOClara Rodriguez and Hectore Cordero-Guzman, from ldquo;Placing Race in Contextrdquo; Ethnic and Racial Studies 15, 4, pp. 523-541, October, 1992 (Routledge) and Lawrence Wright , a writer for The New Yorker , demonstrates the influence of politics on census categories of race and ethnicity. In the 1990s, multiracial groups who did not fit into the government's traditional categories of race and ethnicity began to challenge them as too narrow and inaccurate. Clara Rodriguez , a professor of sociology at Fordham University, and Hector Cordero-Guzman ,an associate professor and chair of the Department of Black and Hispanic Studies at Baruch College of the City University of New York, suggest that race is a much more complex concept. Using responses by Puerto Ricans to questions about racial identity, they argue that racial identity is ldquo;more contextually influenced, determined and defined.rdquo; |
| Issue 8 Do Minorities Engage in Self-Segregation? |
| YESBeverly Tatum, from ldquo;Identity Development in Adolescencerdquo; in Why are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? (Basic Books, 1977) |
| NOPeter Beinart, from ldquo;Degree of Separation at Yalerdquo; The New Republic (November 3, 1997) and Beverly Daniel Tatum , an African American psychologist, examines identity development among adolescents, especially black youths, and the behavioral outcomes of this phenomenon. She argues that black adolescents' tendency to view themselves in racial terms is due to the totality of personal and environmental responses that they receive from the larger society. Peter Beinart , Senior Editor for The New Republic , examines the complexity of the issues of multiculturalism and diversity on the nation's campuses and in contrast, he asserts that one examine how a broad spectrum of groups responds to the challenges of identity and "fitting in" within increasingly multicultural and diverse communities |
| Issue 9 Are Asian Americans a Model Minority? |
| YESDavid A. Bell, from ldquo;America's Greatest Success Story: The Triumph of Asian-Americansrdquo; The New Republic (July 15 & 22, 1985) |
