Border Boundaries In America

By definition, a border is “a line separating two political or geographical areas, especially countries, or an edge along or beside something.” In society, borders act as geographic boundaries, but also as boundaries separating people, culture, and ideologies. In the United States of America, borders act as boundaries between both states and cultures. Additionally, boundaries in America stand between itself, and other countries, specifically Mexico. Borderlands, according to its definition, are districts or land surrounded and separated by boundaries. These boundaries, no matter how physical or literal serve the purpose of distinguishing between groups of people and bodies of land. In the United States, this applies its neighboring countries, …show more content…
One way that we define race is being the major division of humankind, having distinct physical characteristics. Race is a social construct that we as humans choose to accept and conform to. Despite being a human-made concept, we give race an esteem level of importance and allow it to dictate much of our society’s structure and norms. The key word in the aforementioned definition of race is “division.” In the United States of America, African Americans and other Americans of color are seemingly divided from white Americans. Despite the outlaw of segregation during the Civil Rights Movement, de facto segregation is very prominent in American states and cities. On the other hand however, the value that’s placed on race, specifically by non-Americans of color acts as a border as well. This border however, exists more as a mental boundary that separates black Americans and white Americans. Acknowledging and emphasizing one’s race tends to lead to the notion that one’s race is drastically different from that of other people. This results in ideological borders. When one is so separated from another, misconceptions and prejudice begins to occur. For example, in Citizen, Claudia Rankine explains an instance where a white person explained that “watching black people” is like watching a foreign film without any translation or subtitles. This exemplifies the mental and ideological division that race creates. Similar to all of the other borders and boundaries mentioned, race is a negative border that only acts as a