Here's a link to a website that you may find interesting, and that you may be able to incorporate into a lesson someday as well.
If we're honest, many of us will admit that we sort people into racial categories based on physical appearance. We think we know whether someone is "Black," "White," Asian," "Latino," or "Native American" just by looking at them. You may have heard people say things like, "Oh, he/she doesn't look Black (or Latino, or Asian, or whatever)."
We also often oversimplify race. Hardly a day goes by without Barack Obama being casually identified as "Black," but most of us know that he had one parent who identified as Black and one as White.
Race is more complex in a lot of ways than many of us think. In fact, "race" does not even exist as a biological concept. Scientifically, there are not identifiable "races" of people. Race is, however a social reality: because we all think it's real, it has real consequences on people's lives.
This activity on this website asks you to look at the faces of 20 people and to try to sort them by what "race" you think each person is. Then you can check to see how, in fact, each person self-identifies. See you you do -- then tell us what you think.
13 comments:
After completing this activity I did terrible on trying to identify race. This cleared the idea that there are is not identifiable "race" Also, while completing the sorting activity I tried to not look for stereotypical looks that people have for different races. Even this did not help me identify any of these people. Each person is so unique and different I struggled trying to match one to a race. I even noticed that when I tried sorting people with a white race like myself, I could not even correctly match what I thought was someone who looked like me.
I think that this website and activity is a great way to begin a lesson on stereotypes of different races and how people are identified by the naked eye.
This activity really hit close to home for me. This activity is pretty much the story of my life when other people try to define my race. I feel that if my picture were part of that activity most people wouldn’t know where to put me. I identify as a Mexican-American, both of my parents were born in Mexico and I was born in Chicago. I have spent most of my life trying to fit in to a specific group, I could be “Mexican” or “white”. I really struggled with this idea all through out school, I wasn’t a real “Mexican” to my white/anglo friends and I wasn’t “Mexican” enough to those friends that were Mexican. This bothered me for a long time and I am ashamed to say that at times I changed who I was around different groups of people. I don’t remember exactly when I stopped trying to fit in to a race but I do know that I am more comfortable with myself when I don’t try to fit in. It would be naive to think that race doesn’t play in our culture, and we do all a races a disservice by not acknowledging them. I believe that race should be acknowledged but should not be a factor by which we judge people.
This activity was quiet the eye opener! I really tried hard and spent some time examining the pictures to put them in the correct racial category. I reluctantly admit that while observing the characteristics, I put the pictures in groups according to stereotypical traits. This included not only the different facial features, but also the hair type and the shade of the people’s skin. I wasn’t too confident in where I placed these pictures, and it showed. I only placed 6 of the photos in the correct spots, and like Julie noted I couldn’t even correctly place the pictures of the people who are identified as being the same race as myself (1/4 pictures correct). I looked around this website and found out that traits don’t follow physical lines. It showed whom out of this group of people had different categorical shades of skin, fingerprint types, and blood types, and there was an even spread of diversity throughout!
Making a connection to the Obama comment about how people call him “black” and he is in fact both black and white, my nieces and nephews are bi-racial as well and they all vary in skin color and features. When my two nieces were about 3 and 4 years old, my sister told me that they got in an argument about who was more Mexican! My one niece thought that she was “more Mexican” than my other niece because she looked more like her father. It is crazy how people start categorizing each other into groups, even at such a young age!
I tried the activity and did horrible. However, I do not feel bad because we're raised to make assumptions about each other. I also made the same assumptions about myself. It wasn't until I was a teenager that I realized my grandfather was from Iran. I was creating a family tree for school and my mom helped me list what country people came over from. When I found out that I am technically Middle Eastern, I really did not believe it. I was raised in a white culture, and only when I was at my grandparents house did I ever eat or hear anything remotely different.
I think as teachers we just need to be aware that our students are individuals. Do not make culturally insensitive comments, but get to know them and appreciate the values they bring to the classroom. Also, challenge your students' assumptions. We do this every social studies class and in my opinion, the challenging activities have been some of the most enjoyable.
I was shocked to see how little I got right when trying to guess the ethnicity of the persons in the activity. This proves that you cannot assume the cultural identity of a person simply by their looks. I thought that I would at least be able to identify the Asian-Americans as well as the Caucasians. In actuality, I had about one or two correct for each group. I found the process of choosing which individual goes into which category extremely difficult and confusing. This reminded me of the activity we did in class with the contemporary pictures of Native Americans. Many of us did not realize that all the pictures were of Native Americans. A few of us were even surprisingly shocked because some did not “look” Native American. It is at times impossible to identify race simply by looking at a picture. There is a whole story that needs to be known first. In addition to the activity, I read the blurbs that were provided with each picture and could identify with the frustration they have about people guessing what ethnicity they are. Nobody ever could guess correctly what ethnicity I am, I have heard it all from Hawaiian, Filipino, bi racial, Japanese, to Chinese. I agree with Katie, that as teachers, we must be culturally sensitive to all our students. This activity was eye opening to say the least and I think would be a great activity to introduce stereotypes and racial identities.
I was very excited to do the activity and I figured that the 20 people profiled would not have ‘typical’ features of their particular race, because that would defeat the whole point of the activity. However, I completed the activity the way it was intended and classified the people based on what they looked like. By doing this, I only got 3 right. I wasn’t surprised because I figured that would be the result to demonstrate that people should not be identified based on looks. What I did find interesting was that censuses were filled out based on how people looked in the past.
I do not think there is anything wrong with thinking someone is a certain identity based on their looks because certain groups do have distinctive traits, generally. I think it becomes a problem when we assume or judge people based on that race. Guessing someone’s ethnicity is not necessarily a bad thing, I do it all the time, but I think it is because I am interested in different ethnicities and cultures so I think it is fun to guess.
Sometimes I will guess when I find out a person’s name and to be honest, I am correct 99% of the time. Plus the response I get when I guess (when I am asked, I do not go up to people asking randomly) is a positive one and they are excited that I guess right. I do not consider myself to be racist because of this but simply interested. I also believe I can classify people based on other qualities besides looks because I know a lot about different ethnicities because of my high interest level of diversity. I would never claim someone belonged to a certain group without knowing for sure or judge someone because of it.
I also understand where Jon is coming from where it is hard to be accepted by certain groups because I have seen that happen all the time with children I have worked with. It hasn’t really happened to me, but I have had people ask where I was from when they find out I speak Spanish. Because I have darker features and can speak Spanish, I have been asked if I am Hispanic. I understand that you cannot judge a book by its cover so to speak and that people to be stereotyped negatively based on it is completely ridiculous. I think the activity would be great to use in the classroom because students may not have realized that people cannot and should not always be classified based on how they look. It would allow for a great conversation.
I too thought that this activity would be fun. As I was categorizing the people, I thought for sure I was on the right track. Little did I know that I was way off. I got very few correct and I was surprised. This helped me realize that you can't just assume you're right by making an assumption that you think fits.
I agree with Julie that this would be a great approach to introducing a diversity lesson. It can really get students thinking about the stereotypes they create and how wrong it is to create stereotypes from the looks of people. For students who face this type of stereotype and have personal experiences with situations such as this can also help students understand one another a little better.
Oh my gosh! I was very surprised by the results on the activity. I thought that I would do alright, but I was very disappointed when I got a 3! I agree with some of my classmates that this would be an excellent attention getter for a diversity lesson. I know that some people get offended when they are referred to as the wrong race. My best friend is Guatemalan, and I know sometimes people say that she is Mexican and that gets her really upset. She would much rather someone calls her Hispanic because that is more general and not incorrect. As teachers we need to make sure that the students in our class feel safe and are able to share their race to their peers. If a teacher notices that students are calling someone by the wrong race, we need to address this. The teacher can simply ask the student individually if that is correct because they at least deserve that from us. I thought this activity was definitely a great way to address diversity and it could be used in class to make a point.
I did this activity a while ago, but I didn't get to post my thoughts down right away. During that time, though, I kept thinking about this activity. It struck me that I only got a couple of the answers right. I thought that I was able to find the Asian race because I myself am Asian, but I only got two out of the four. This helped me realize that I can't and shouldn't make judgement on people who I think look like my own race. This activity was a real eye-opener and I think it would be great to use this in a lesson. It would be a great opening activity for a unit. I think I would even use this with my kindergarten class. People tend to think the younger kids would not be able to grasp the idea of race, but they do. I know that my class would be able to do this activity. However, it would be more effective if they did it as a whole group activity.
This activity really made me think about how I viewed people from appearance. It showed me that just from looking at someone, you do not know thier background or race. Being so quick to judge is not right for anyone to do because you can jump to conclusions that might not be correct. This especially has an effect on us as teachers. When you have people in your classroom that are from a variety of different backgrounds and many races, you cannot be judgemental about how they look. This activity showed me how important it is to go beyond the looks of people. There are so many races that are mixed now because of the US being a "melting pot" and so many different people are having children with people from other races. Looking at these pictures, I learned that race is a factor that many people are discriminated against for. This really makes me feel like I will not be one of those people who categorize people for their race.
When reading through the comments I am surprised that no one has mentioned the pop up box that comes up after you complete the activity. I like others did terrible on the activity, but I had a hard time getting past the information that was given after the activity. The box said that in the 1960s census enumerators classified people exactly like this activity. To classify people's races, they would simply look at pictures. I found this insane! I cannot believe that our census was based on people looking at pictures. I think even now with the "self-classification" that is used many people can fit into more than one category. I think it is hard to "classify" people in the first place.
I also wanted to respond to Molly post about her nieces and nephews arguing about who is more Mexican. I think this ties into classifying people. What defines being Mexican? Is it your style? Your family life? The culture you associate yourself with? The traditions you participate in? Your religion? There are so many things that can make you associate with a culture. In a case of multi racial marriages, if one spouse associates with the other's traditions, religions, etc can they ever be considered part of the other's culture?
Another conversation point that I noticed was points that Katie E and John made. Katie talked about going to her Grandpa's and not noticing anything different. John talked about changing to fit in. I think a lot of traditions and culture identifying aspects have been lost because of the generations of immigrants that wanted to be "American". People were almost ashamed of where they came from because it was not American enough. I know the spelling of my last name is very Polish, but it was changed when my ancestors came here to look more American. I have also had family members change the spelling to Welzin so it looks even more American. All of these events make it hard to classify people. I think this activity is a good eye opener for students to break stereotypes.
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