Edna Blalock's Article: A Theory Of Middleman Minorities

Improved Essays
1.) Edna Bonacich and Blalock introduce their view of what the middleman minority theory is and it is discussed in Bonacich’s article, “A Theory of Middleman Minorities.” Blalock 's defines a middleman minority as racial groups who come to a new country and are placed in the middle between producers and consumers; an overall status gap. Bonacich does not necessarily agree with Blalock. She describes these racial groups as people who do not necessarily want to settle down permanently. This means that these individuals are temporarily in the United States. These individuals are in need to make some money and will soon return back to their homeland. The term she uses is sojourners. When looking both theories, I believe that Blalock 's theory …show more content…
African-Americans stated that they were rude and that they were receiving better treatment when it came to bank and government loans. This assumption was false because in general, banks would reject giving out loans to minorities. Korean-Americans would usually receive loans from family and friends. Korean-Americans were also discriminated against even with college degrees; they were unable to find jobs because of the structural discrimination (Cho 486). African-Americans who were struggling where even more furious, when seeing that Korean-Americans were …show more content…
In Karen Brodkin’s article, “How Did Jews Become White Folks,” she discusses how newly arrived European immigrants were poor, discriminated against and hated. As time passed these individuals became assimilated and soon became “white.” Brodkin discusses how Jews became “white” due to their success and overcoming the social barriers. Jews were hard workers and they considered education of high importance. Brodkin discusses how her parents attended college during the depression and were encouraged by their own parents to pursue a good education (Brodkin 60). They never saw race as apart of an issue and continued to follow their dreams. Jews became “whiter” because of the successful economic prosperity. Jews soon eased their way into being apart of the middle class. Immigrants from northwest and southeast Europe were treated equally because of the benefits they received after the war; and this caused the whitening of Jews (Brodkin 70). “The House I Live In” film captures this affirmative action transformation because it’s message was: it does not matter what ethnicity or religion you were; everyone was white. “The House I Live In” only touched upon ethnic races that were white, like Italian-Americans and Jewish-Americans. They completely disregarded African-Americans; and no people of color were in the film. These Europeans were of similar color were considered just like “everyone

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