Concepts & Ideas
TRUE or FALSE - Race is a biological fact, not a social construct.
Race has no genetic basis; it's socially constructed.
A landlord refuses to rent to certain people because of their race.
Individual racism (bigotry)
19th and 20th-century American legal system that enforced segregation and discrimination against black people and other racialized groups.
Jim Crow Laws
Minimizing or neglecting to acknowledge the contributions of the Coloured Hockey League to the history of hockey in Canada is an example of what?
Whitewashing
How many TAs are there for SOCI 1001: Introduction to Sociology?
9! (8 tutorial TAs + 1 marking TA)
Why is it important to not consider issues like race, class, and gender as separate?
Intersectionality.
All of the schools in a given area have a policy to not admit students of certain "races."
Institutional racism
The practice of denying housing loans to certain racialized areas was called what?
Redlining
A single character used to represent an entire group or culture.
Tokenism
What is your TA's last name?
Quartz
Why do sociologists prefer to use the term "racialization" and "racialized peoples" in discussions of race?
To emphasize that race is a cultural and historical construct.
The process of creating racial categories, defining people within them, and attaching social and political stigmas to them
A news outlet describes protests led by racialized groups as "riots," while describing similar actions by white protesters as "demonstrations."
Individual racism. Someone behind-the-scenes is choosing these labels, and biasedly choosing when to apply them.
The process of taking land and imposing new cultures on Indigenous peoples is known as what?
Settler Colonialism
Why are crime shows, for example, with mostly Black perpetrators harmful?
Negative stereotyping! Crime shows that depict mostly Black suspects/perpetrators reinforce the idea that Black people are more prone to crime.
What program is your TA in? (program and degree level)
EURUS MA
False! It is a term that comes from 19th century "scientific" racism.
How can policing practices appear neutral but still disproportionately affect racialized communities?
Systemic! Neutral-seeming laws (like stop and frisk or traffic enforcement) often target historically segregated neighborhoods and people of colour, producing disparate outcomes.
Who was the famous American sociologist who helped pioneer modern studies on race, blackness, and racism in the US? For 100 bonus points, name one of his books.
W. E. B. Du Bois (1868-1963), author of Black Reconstruction in America, Souls of Black Folk and The Philadelphia Negro.
This 2018 film became a landmark for Black representation in superhero movies.
Black Panther
What city is your TA from?
Montreal
Bourdieu's concept of Habitus refers to?
"A subjective but not individual system of internalised structures, schemes of perception, conception, and action common to all members of the same group or class."
A black patient goes to the Doctor's for a checkup. The doctor, unfamiliar with how skin conditions present differently on dark skin, fails to diagnose a serious skin condition in her patient. The patient thus suffers a worse health outcome than he would have, had he been treated earlier.
Systemic - The problem here is not that the doctor is biased. Rather, that the underrepresentation of black people (black skin, in this case) in her schooling and training has failed to prepare her and others to adequately treat this community.
Discuss how a policy of official multiculturalism simultaneously promotes inclusion but can obscure structural racial inequality.
While promoting cultural diversity, it can depoliticize race and divert attention from systemic inequalities, framing all groups as equal without addressing historical oppression.
Explain how 'White saviour narratives' in the media reinforce racial hierarchies.
They centre White characters as heroes of non-White communities, minimizing the agency of racialized characters and perpetuating stereotypes.
What does your TA research?
Modern Spanish history