9781422284124

How Races Are Classified What is a race? We usually think about members of a race as having the same skin color, facial features, type of hair, and other similar looks. People have often used biology to divide the races, since each type has inherited different genes. Using this idea, anthropologists in the 19th century decided that only three races exist: Caucasoid (white), Mongoloid (yellow or red), and Negroid (black). Today, many scientists consider racial groups less important than ethnic groups, whose members have many different things in common, like culture, language, religion, and social institutions. Americans also use “ethnic” to mean nonwhite minorities, as in “ethnic food” and “ethnic music.” Some crimes against ethnic groups are also called race crimes, because the word “race” is used in a general way. One problem is that few people know exactly what race is. The U.S. Census Bureau divides race into five main classifications: white (including Arabs and North Africans), black or African American, Native American (including South and Central America) and Alaska natives, Asian, and native Hawaiian and other Pacific Islanders. These categories were introduced in 1997. The 2010 census also asked about ethnicity, whether a person was of Hispanic or Latino origin. For the 2020 census, the bureau is considering dropping the categories of race and origin, and allowing people to choose from various categories that better describe them. This is because people are confused about the meaning of race, and many believe that “Hispanic” is a racial description. Throughout history, people have put insulting labels on other races and groups that looked and acted differently from theirs. Even the supposedly enlightened thinkers did this. The Greek philosopher Aristotle (384–322 B . C .) said Asians were lazy. The Swedish physician Carolus Linnaeus (1707–1778) thought whites were gentle, blacks were stubborn, and Asians were greedy. Pierre Crimes are not committed because different races exist. They hap- pen because some people believe the deep-rooted, but wrong, ideas that all members of a race have the same bad characteristics, like being lazy, devious, or slow-witted, and that some races are more intelligent and better than others. Many people believe that the “best” race is their own.

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RACE AND CRIME