Hi Chris, I think the hair scheme is very good. Being so follicely challenged that I can't remember my last bad hair day I suggest u :-) have a look at at the constructions on the boxes. We seem to want more flavors..... they are ever expanding. What about race? E.g. White not Hispanic. Also take a look at other racial constructions used here quatroon, octoroon and around the world that may not be based on skin color. In addition, some racial constructions are not permanent. Here race became permanent in support of the Va chattel slavery law. Before that you could change race based on 1/16 th...
Also, I suggest a look at Our Kind of People: Inside America's Black Upper Class by Lawrence Otis Graham. and Life on the Color Line : The True Story of a White Boy Who Discovered He Was Black by Gregory Howard Williams. Williams is dean of the OSU law school. Del Chris Scheitle wrote: > Hi everyone, > I am prepping an Intro course for later this summer and wanted to get > your thoughts on an exercise I was thinking of doing. The goal is to > show students that our standard conceptions of "race" are arbitrary, > socially constructed, and represent an extreme collapsing of continuous > characteristics (i.e. there is actually a wide range of skin colors, > not just white and black...). > > I was thinking that I could have them try and group themselves into > three 'races' based not on skin color but on hair color with the idea > being that they will run into more of a range of hair colors, not just > pure blonde, brown, etc. Follow questions would be: Where are the > lines drawn? Why don't we categorize by hair color or some other trait > instead of skin color? Couldn't we create more categories besides the > white\black ones...white-white, light white, white, dark white...just > like we could create more hair color categories. Then I would discuss > alternative classification schemes that do recognize more 'races' (the > standard example is Brazil). > > Has anyone else done something like this? Any other ideas? Do you see > any fatal flaws with this exercise? > > Thanks for your feedback! > > Chris > > > > > > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Teaching Sociology" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/teachsoc -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
