Syllabus: Sociology 128
Winter quarter, 2012 Professor Howard Winant Teaching Assistant: Chandra Russo Time: TTh 330-445PM Place: HSSB 1773 Sections: 45112 W 5:00pm - 5:50pm HSSB 1224 45120 W 6:00pm - 6:50pm HSSB 1224 45138 W 7:00pm - 7:50pm HSSB 1224 Winant email: hwinant@soc.ucsb.edu Winant's office hours: Social Sciences 3308: Tues, 100-300PM Russo email: chandrarusso@umail.ucsb.edu Russo office hours: Thurs, 100-300PM, SSMS (Room Number TBA)
SOCIOLOGY 128: INTERETHNIC RELATIONS
ISSUES OF THE COURSE
This course is about the sociology of race and ethnicity. We place particular emphasis on the dynamics of racism. Because the sociology of race, ethnicity, and racism is so huge, we take a "topics" approach, focusing on some key approaches to the subject. This year we emphasize the Mexican American experience (Gomez's MANIFEST DESTINIES), we study a black family with a white mom (McBride's THE COLOR OF WATER), and we make use of ethnographic tools to study race and racism (Hartigan's RACE IN THE 21ST CENTURY).
Some brief notes about these topics: race, ethnicity, and racism. All these concepts need to be carefully defined and thought about. The meaning of these terms may at first appear obvious, but it is not. One of our key tasks in the course will be to clarify understandings of these and other race-related ideas.
Race shapes both individual identity and social institutions. At its most basic level the race concept is connected to the human body: it links identities and interests -- economic, political, social, and cultural -- to different types of human bodies (sometimes called "phenotypes"). On the level of identity (the "micro-level"), race is a crucial component of one's self-knowledge and knowledge of others: we expect everyone to have a racial identity. Yet at the same time we experience uncertainty and conflict about the meaning of race in our personal lives and our race-based relationships with others. Over the past decades, racial identity has become a more prominent public issue. It is a lot less taken for granted than it used to be, so all of us, whatever our racial group, are forced to think about it more.
On the level of large-scale social structures (the "macro-level"), race is an important factor in the social system. Thus we see economic rewards, political activity, social space, and even cultural tastes being organized on a racial basis. Race is involved in the operation of many key social institutions, for example in the employment decisions of corporations, in electoral campaigns and policy-making within the political system, in education and access to education, in immigration, and in the way society is represented in various cultural forms such as the mass media and the arts. Here in the university we can see that numerous issues have a racial dimension, such as: admissions and faculty hiring, relations with the surrounding neighborhood, content of the curriculum, and tolerance/animosity among student groups.
Ethnicity is often equated with race, but it is different. Although the two concepts overlap to some extent, the concept of ethnicity does not relate to the human body. It is about the cultural identities and differences within and among human groups. The beliefs they share, the gods they worship, their shared (or shared imaginary) history, their music, their language, and even their cuisine, are some of the elements that determine their ethnic identity.
So race and ethnicity are not the same. Yet they are not entirely different either. What is a "racial" characteristic or group at one time or in one place may be an "ethnic" one at another. Some examples: Jews were considered a race in Nazi Germany but they are an ethnic group in the contemporary U.S. The Irish were considered a race when they first immigrated to the U.S. in large numbers (in the 1840s), but they are an ethnic group today. In Africa before the Atlantic slave trade began (around 1530 CE), there was no race; there were no "black people"; instead there were Bakongo, Ovimbundu, Wolof, and numerous other ethnic groups. The slave trade lumped these peoples together according to their appearance. In other words, ethnic groups can be racialized and racial groups can be deracialized or ethnicized.
Racism has various meanings. It can refer to beliefs and attitudes, or what we commonly call prejudice: attributing negative characteristics or values to members of a racially-defined group. It also refers to various types of actions, such as discrimination: treating members of racially-defined groups differently, solely because of their race. Another form of action to which the term racism refers is the violence practiced against individuals or groups because of their race: e.g., lynching (against individuals) or genocide or "ethnic cleansing" (against groups). Finally, racism can refer to social structures, patterns of racial inequality that are the result of injustices practiced in the past, whose legacy continues in the present even if few people deliberately seek to perpetuate it. This is perhaps the most controversial form of racism: it is often called institutional or structural racism. Each of these understandings of racism has its limits in describing the phenomenon, but they are all useful tools for analyzing the complexities of racism in contemporary society.
READING
Laura Gomez. Manifest Destinies: The Making of the Mexican American Race. New York: NYU Press 2007
John Hartigan Jr. Race in the 21st Century: Ethnographic Approaches. New York: Oxford, 2010.
James McBride. The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother. New York: Penguin 2006.
These books are on 2-hr reserve at the Davidson Library. They are available for purchase at the UCEN and IV Bookstores (buy them quickly, because they never order enough). They may also be ordered on line (sometimes at a discount) at http://bigwords.com or http://www.textbooks.com, or at other online outlets of your choice. (Please note: I am not recommending Amazon.com, which is still resisting paying California state taxes and therefore not contributing to the UC system, parks, freeways, health care, etc.)
COURSE REQUIREMENTS
Attendance, Study, Participation: You will not do well in this course if you do not attend regularly and engage with the material. Attendance is taken by means of a sign-up sheet. Class attendance and participation account for 10% of the final grade. Failure to study or attend class will result in poor grades, as surely as night follows day.
Since race and racism are highly emotional topics, students sometimes feel uncertain about saying what is on their minds. They wonder if what they think and feel is "correct" and whether they might offend others. It's logical to feel this way, but it's also important to feel safe enough to speak in class. In more than 30 years of teaching the sociology of race I have rarely encountered an intentional effort by a student to offend anyone else. Therefore I make the following commitment to you: I will protect your right to say anything, even if it is unpopular, so long as you are not making a deliberate effort to put down anyone else. This guarantee is designed to facilitate discussion of sensitive topics in class.
Written Work: This course applies to the undergraduate Writing Requirement and the undergraduate Ethnicity Requirement.
In this class there are a short essay assignment, a take-home midterm exam, and a final research paper. Written work should always be word-processed and double-spaced, with adequate margins. Always keep a copy of all the work you turn in, preferably on a disk as well as in printed form. Assigned reading is due in class on the date listed (see "Schedule of Classes," below).
The short essay assignment is a response to the following prompt:
LAURA GOMEZ SAYS THAT HER BOOK "MANIFEST DESTINIES TELLS THE STORY OF HOW MEXICAN AMERICANS BECAME AN AMERICAN RACIAL GROUP" (Gomez 9). BRIEFLY SUMMARIZE THIS "STORY," AND EXPLAIN HOW IT SHAPED MEXICAN AMERICAN RACIAL IDENTITY IN THE UNITED STATES TODAY.
FEEL FREE TO DEVELOP YOUR OWN VIEWS, BUT BE SURE TO GROUND YOUR PAPER IN READINGS FROM THE TEXT.
Your paper should be an essay of around 4-5 pp. (max: 1250 words), double-spaced, with adequate margins. The short essay assignment is due in class in Week 3 of class, on Tuesday, Jan. 24.
The mid-term exam is a take-home. Based on your readings of the Gomez and McBride texts, you will answer two essay questions from a list of five. Each essay is 4-5 typed or word-processed, double-spaced pages (1000-1250 words each) in length. The exam questions will be available on GauchoSpace on Tuesday, Jan 24 (Week 4 of class); the exam will be due in class on Thursday Feb 16 (Week 6 of class).
The final is not an exam but a written paper based on the Hartigan text and ethnographic research that you will do. The assignment is as follows:
DEVELOP A QUESTION ABOUT RACE THAT YOU CAN EXAMINE VIA A SERIES OF OBSERVATIONS AND INTERVIEWS WITH PEOPLE, EITHER ON OR OFF CAMPUS. DRAW UPON ETHNOGRAPHIC METHODS TO RESEARCH YOUR QUESTION (SEE HARTIGAN, APPENDIX B, PP.198-206). IN INTERVIEWING PEOPLE, LISTEN FOR THE WAYS THEIR THINKING ABOUT RACE MIGHT SURFACE: THROUGH PARTICULAR REMARKS, REFERENCES, STORIES, OR IMAGES. IN OBSERVING PEOPLE, LOOK FOR PATTERNS OF ACTION THAT BEAR ON RACIAL ATTITUDES. ANALYZE THESE COMPONENTS OF YOUR INTERVIEWS AND OBSERVATIONS TO DEVELOP YOUR ASSESSMENT OF HOW OR WHY RACE MATTERS FOR THE PEOPLE WHOM YOU STUDIED. IN YOUR PAPER, RELATE YOUR ETHNOGRAPHIC WORK ON RACE TO THE READINGS OF THE COURSE.
In sections on Wednesday Feb 29 students will hand in a 1-page proposal for their research project. The proposal should contain:
1. PRELIMINARY PROBLEM STATEMENT -- Some examples of possible questions: how Latin@ students view undocumented immigrants; how white students view affirmative action; the experience of mixed-race identity; living in an integrated suburb; views on race and President Obama; views on race and criminal justice...etc.
2. DESCRIPTION OF THE PEOPLE WHO WILL BE INTERVIEWED AND/OR OBSERVED -- At least ten interviews are required.
3. DESCRIPTION OF THE RESEARCH APPROACH -- Summarize your approach to ethnographic methods: interviewing, observation, etc.
4. GOAL OF THE PAPER -- What you hope to find out.
Further guidelines will be provided on GauchoSpace to help you develop your research proposal. The 1-page proposal is not graded.
Your paper is due at Professor Winant's office Tuesday, March 20, between 200 and 400PM. Include a self-addressed, stamped envelope with your final paper.
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When and How to Cite a Text
You will be citing text in all your written assignments for this class. Do so as follows:
When: Not only when you quote, but when you paraphrase or draw an idea from a text, you must cite the source.
How: Place the citation, including the page number, in parenthesis at the appropriate point in your essay. For instance: (Hartigan 2010, 103). Then at the end of the paper, list the work cited, as follows:
For a book: Hartigan, John Jr. Race in the 21st Century: Ethnographic Approaches. New York: Oxford University Press, 2010.
For an article: Goffman, Alice. "On the Run: Wanted Men in a Philadelphia Ghetto." American Sociological Review, Vol. 74, no. 3 (June 2009).
For an internet site: Winant, Howard. "Durban, Globalization, and the World After 9/11: Toward a New Politics." http://www.soc.ucsb.edu/faculty/winant/WCAR-WTO_essay.html. Viewed Dec. 21, 2011.
Do the same thing with all your citations. If you use additional sources, treat them the same way. If you repeat sources, you don't have to repeat the whole citation in the bibliography.
Please be aware that Prof. Winant requires adequate citation of sources: books, articles, internet-based..., there are no exceptions. You have been warned. He takes plagiarism very seriously. If you do not produce your own material, or if you invent ethnographic research rather than actually doing it, you will not only fail the class, but you will also be subject to university disciplinary action, which could include suspension.
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GRADING RULES, LATE AND INCOMPLETE ASSIGNMENTS
Assignments are afforded the following percentages of the final grade:
Attendance: 10%
Short essay assignment: 20%
Mid-Term Exam: 30%
Final Paper: 40%
Attendance is taken in all classes by means of a sign-in sheet.
Failure to complete any assignment gets you a 0% on that assignment. Turning in an assignment late gets you one grade-level reduction on that assignment (e.g., from A- to B+), unless other arrangements are made.
Incompletes ("I" grades) will not be given except by written arrangement with the instructor
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SCHEDULE OF CLASSES
Week 1
Tues, Jan 10
Introduction to the course; discussion of requirements, readings, etc. Discussion of themes of race, ethnicity, and racism
Thurs, Jan 12
Gomez ix-46
Week 2
Tues, Jan 17
Gomez 47-116
Thurs, Jan 19
Gomez 117-161
Week 3
Tues, Jan 24
No assigned reading
"SHORT ESSAY ASSIGNMENT" DUE IN CLASS
Thurs, Jan 26
McBride 1-56
Week 4
Tues, Jan 31
McBride 57-128
Thurs, Feb 2
McBride 129-192
MIDTERM EXAM QUESTIONS AVAILBLE ON GAUCHOSPACE
Week 5
Tuesday, Feb 7
McBride 193-248
Thursday, Feb 9
McBride 249-288
Week 6
Tues, Feb 14
No reading assignment. Work on your midterm exam
Thurs, Feb 16
MIDTERM EXAM DUE IN CLASS
Week 7
Tues, Feb 21
Hartigan vii-26
Thursday, Feb 23
Hartigan 27-53
Week 8
Tues, Feb 28
Hartigan 54-85
Wed, Feb 29
1-PAGE RESEARCH PROJECT PROPOSAL DUE IN SECTIONS
Thurs, March 1
Hartigan 86-116
Week 9
Tues, March 6
Hartigan 117-148
Thurs, March 8
Hartigan 149-181
Week 10
Tues, March 13
Hartigan 182-206
Thurs, March 15
No Reading Assignment; Work on your Final Paper
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Tues, March 20
FINAL PAPER DUE AT PROF. WINANT'S OFFICE, SSMS 3308, BETWEEN 1200 AND 200PM. Include SASE (c. $1.00 stamps) when you hand in the paper.