Race is a social classification of modern humans based on any physical (or phenotypic) characteristic, especially skin color, and it is often used to distinguish people from one another. Although the concept of race is arbitrary and based on superficial features, it has profound implications for human societies and continues to shape human interactions in many ways. It has been a central mechanism in the development of human inequality, helping to justify systems of slavery and other forms of oppression.
In the 17th century, when European exploration and colonization of the New World began, it emerged as a folk ideology about differences associated with different groups of people brought together in the triangular slave trade. It became a system for classifying people into hierarchies that informed how they were treated and what rights they could or couldn’t claim.
Eventually, the concept of race received the stamp of scientific legitimacy from Swedish taxonomist Carl Linnaeus and other scientists who used it to define discrete genetic pools of humanity. While these categories are useful to identify the origins of some biological traits, they aren’t an accurate reflection of human variation.
Over time, other anthropologists, historians and social scientists began to recognize that the idea of race is a complex social construct with no biological basis. Some shifted the concept to ethnicity, which is a more precise way of describing a person’s ancestry and is a more valid classification for some cultural groups.
It is important to note that these definitions of races and ethnicities are not mutually exclusive, but they differ in how they are defined and in their meaning. Ethnicity has become more of a focus in the United States because it is more widely accepted as an appropriate way to describe the diversity of our population. Using this term also highlights the fact that many of the social problems that result from the notion of race are rooted in culture, not biology.
A recent example illustrates how confusing and problematic the terminology can be. A Louisiana woman named Susie Guillory Phipps sued to have her birth certificate changed from “Black” to “White,” since the state law was based on the “one drop of black blood” rule, which only allows someone to be considered Black if they have one or more African ancestors.
As we move forward, it is important to recognize the role that racial stereotypes and myths continue to play in our country. They can lead us to a place where people of different racial identities have trouble seeing each other as fellow human beings, and they can thwart efforts to build a society free of racism. To combat this, it is essential to talk openly about the impact of race in our lives, and to engage in discussions with others who are committed to challenging racial stereotypes and myths. This includes those who are working with other communities to create a dialogue on truth, racial healing and transformation.