Omi And Winot Racial Formation

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“Racial formation refers to the process by which social, economic and political forces determine the content and importance of racial categories, and by which they are in turn shaped by racial meanings” (Garner & Hancock, 471). They argue that race isn’t just a social construction, but the meanings (economic, social and political) that are attached to it are what make it important. Omi and Winot state that racial formation is “a way to think about race, its construction, manipulation and identification “ (Garner & Hancock, 469). As a society, we socially construct race, the definition of it and the rules for race. Social institutions create and enforce boundaries of race and we (society) practice it and apply it to our lives/on others. Then …show more content…
Social institutions help to enforce the boundaries for black-ness. They create a meaning for black-ness and that meaning feeds into the institutions. We create laws, policies and rules to intentionally disadvantage those in minority positions. Racial formation is the social, political and economic construction of race. Racial formation challenges the essentialist views of race. “Omi and Winot’s Racial Formation in the United States provides a way of theorizing race that moves past the notion that race is either a biological fact or an illusion” (Garner & Hancock, 469). The essentialist view is when one views race as genetic (it is inherent; born with); they believe race is a fixed trait. “Racial beliefs operates as an ‘amateur biology’, a way of explaining the variations in ‘human nature’. Differences in skin color and other obvious physical characteristics supposedly provide visible clues to differences lurking underneath. Temperament, sexuality, intelligence, athletic ability, aesthetic preferences are presumed to be fixed” (Garner & Hancock, 472). However, we can ask, what if different people have the same features (physically and …show more content…
“Orientalism is a tool of power that works to distribute knowledge, to control, to manipulate and incorporate notions of a difference into hegemony” (Garner & Hancock, 463). Similar to racial formation in the fact that it is a tool used to control people by grouping them together and creating stereotypes. It is the taking of power away from the less dominant group and placing it into the hands of the dominant group. Like racial formation, orientalism is “constructed through studies, representations, audiences and institutions” (Garner & Hancock, 464). Orientalism is rooted in stereotypes and misrepresentations imposed on by the dominant group. Some of the meanings attached to Orientalism are: savages and backward. In movies, TV and media people from the Middle East are portrayed as evil, having guns and violent. Then these translate to everyday life where we project these media visions onto them and mistreat them. As kids we watch Aladdin and Arabs are portrayed in a bad light and we carry those images into adult hood. These images we see are there to reinforce the idea that “these people” are bad, not like us and evil to make it easier for others to agree with the exerting

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