Exam Review 3/16

1. What is the sociological imagination? Designed to allow you to connect your personal

problems to society

2. What's the difference between troubles and issues? An issue is

3. 3 schools of sociology and how they differ in their understandings of race:

a. Conflict theory: who benefits from the exploitation of these groups

b. Symbolic interactionism: emphasize how symbols and our interactions with them

help to create meaning. Why do people find these personally meaningful?

c. Functionalism: Why do racial categories exist and persist?

d. They all look at race from a different angle

4. Describe “The Veil” by WEB DuBois

a. The literal difference in skin color between black and white people

b. Inability for white people to see past a black person’s race

c. Inability of black people to see themselves outside of labels given to them

d. *also study double consciousness*

e. *this can relate to MENA*

5. What does it mean that race is sociologically constructed?

a. Constructed through our interactions in society

b. Race is not a biological term

c. Race has shifting definitions over time

6. What is the difference between race & ethnicity

a. Race: connected to human characteristics/how you look. It’s historically different

and can shift overtime

 b. Ethnicity: culturally based

7. What is optional ethnicity? What makes it different from other forms of ethnicity?

a. Due to intermarriage, one can choose which ethnicity to associate themselves with

b. Normativity: white people can identify with their ethnic background or pass as

“American”

8. What are the characteristics of whiteness?

a. Colorblind ideology

b. Individualism

c. A comfort with the current american society

9. 4 types of unequal race relations (think of examples)

a. Extermination: genocide or other killing of a different group

b. Exclusion: who is let into the society in the first place

c. Expulsion: forced removal from society even if they remain in the nation’s

borders

i. Example: Trail of Tears

d. Oppression: a devalued position within society

10. Define majority group.

a. Outsized power for the group relative to other groups

b. Not just based on numbers (think apartheid South Africa)

11. What makes Native Americans unique as a racial group within American society?

a. Tribal nation status

b. Nation within a nation

c. High intermarriage rate

12. How was the category of Hispanic/Latino shaped?

a. Bottom-up:

i. National Council of La Raza (now UnidosUS) – a Chicano Civil rights

organization who attempted to copy the model of black civil rights
organizations
ii. The Farm Workers movement – Founded by Cesar Chavez and other
Chicano activist (1962-1971)
iii. The Cuban Adjustment Act of 1996 – gave work permits and green card
status to any Cuban native who settled in the US (Dry soil rule)
iv. Puerto Rican migration to New York – at one point was 80% of the New
York Latino population. 11% of all children in New York in 1960
b. Top-down: Census Bureau wants to measure the population

13. What is racial schema?

a. Way of thinking about race that reflects the National way of thinking about race

b. Example: FAFSA, government documents asking about race

14. In more recent history, LatinX has become a term some people have used as an

alternative to Hispanic/Latino. What social factors are most likely to predict preference

for this term?

a. Younger generation

b. Most popular with college education

c. Primarily speak English

15. Please describe the strengths and weaknesses of colorblindness as a perspective on race.

a. Strengths: looks for reasons besides racism to solve societal problems, common

sense approach to overt racism, the goals are generally considered good

b. Weaknesses: race still matters, it’s inadequate to address discrimination which

does not happen at the individual level, cannot address structural racism.
16. Please describe the strengths and weaknesses of anglo conformity as a model of

assimilation.

a.

17. What are the elements, strengths, and weaknesses of antiracism?

a. Elements: sees racism at the institutional level, whiteness is the problem, must be

proactive about solutions

b. Strengths: takes racism seriously, believes colorblindness is inadequate, can

reduce social stigmas of some minorities

c. Weaknesses: diversity programs have little effectiveness, less sympathy for

whites but not more sympathy for racial minorities

18. What are the steps in the mutual accountability model? What are the criticisms of the

model?

a. Define the racial problem

b. Identify the core, where do we agree? What can we build on?

c. Recognize the role that cultural or racial differences can play in how a problem is

perceived.

d. Criticisms:

i. Too much talk about race (colorblind criticism), other differences are

more substantial

ii. Unfair to expect people of color to participate in discussions w/ white

folks around race (AntiR)

iii. The moral obligation to fix disparities is exclusively on white folks

(Antiracism)
 iv. Too nice to white people (Antiracism) (he agrees with this)

19. When considering economic inequality, are the largest percentage of each major group

(white, Black, Hispanic, Asian) middle class?

a. Yes

20. What are issues with using “middle class” a measuring stick?

a. It doesn’t include wealth, or cost of living in areas

b. It doesn't include wealth outside of the immediate family

21. How does educational attainment differ amongst the varied groups in American society?

a. 31% of Americans have college degrees

i. Asian folks over half

ii. White folks 34%

iii. Native American, Hispanic, and Black folks are under the 31%

22. What is intersectionality?

a. Looks at how both race and gender (or religion, class, education, sexuality, SES)

can impact you

23. How does intersectionality help us understand inequality? (Think in class activity looking

at inequality amongst Baylor graduates by degree program)

a. When we look at racial gaps, intersectionality allows us to understand the gaps

within the gaps.

24. What are the differences between endogamy and exogamy?

a. Endogamy: marrying someone within your group

b. Exogamy: marrying someone outside of your group

c. Groups can be religious, racial, cultural, etc.

25. What is marital assimilation?

a. Levels of acceptance in society of exogamous marriage indicate the level of

assimilation in society.

i. The willingness to marry outside of the group

26. What characteristics make someone more likely to interracially date and marry?

a. Race: African Americans are the least likely to date/marry outside of race,

Hispanic and Asian folks are the most likely to date/marry outside of race

b. Religion: highly religious people are less likely

c. Region: living in rural areas increase likelihood of interracially dating

d. Gender: women are less likely to date outside of race

e. Politics: conservatives are less likely to date outside of race

27. What is the most common interracial combo (dating and marriage)?

a. Hispanic & white

28. What are the manifest and latent functions of increasing racial diversity at baylor?

a. Manifest: deliberate function. What is the action designed to do?

i. Making the campus more diverse

b. Latent: neither conscious or deliberate, but produces positive consequences

i. Helping people of color find community, gives opportunities to be more

culturally diverse and learn, increases likelihood of POC coming to Baylor

ii. Legacy students

29. Why are religious spaces often homogenous in terms of race?

 a. A lot of cultural traditions that correspond to racial groups, social groups are of

the same race, voluntary organizations are not racially diverse, they reflect the

neighborhoods they reside in

30. What are the three stages of developing belonging across race?

a. Affinity with congregation: deep meaningful identity

b. Identity orientation: identity shifts to more shared values

c. Ethnic transcendence: religious identity supersedes other identities

31. What are the keys for the contact hypothesis to be effective?

a. Contact must be noncompetitive, nonthreatening, intimate, not superficial, and

should have support from authoritarian figures

32. Over the past 20 years, have multiracial churches become more or less common?

a. More common!

33. What are the criticisms regarding multiracial churches?

a. Sacrifice towards other racial groups especially Black folks giving up more than

the White folks.

b. Length of services

c. Dresscode

d. Reflective of white norms than black norms

34. What are characteristics of those who attend multiracial churches?

a. White people have more progressive attitudes

b. Black & hispanic people have more economic success

c. No single racial culture (celebrates diversity)

d. Black folks tend to care more about immigration

35. What is the issue with saying multiracial churches promote positive racial attitudes?

a. Correlation does not mean causation

b. If you go to a multiracial church, you may already care about race, which this

thinking is then fostered in a multiracial church

36. What are the two types of stratified systems? Be sure to be able to give examples of both

systems.

a. Closed: a system which it’s virtually impossible to move between classes

i. Example: India’s caste system, estate system, slavery

b. Open: one can move up or down

i. Meritocracy: society based on demonstrated merit

ii. Class: social factor + individual achievement

iii. Vertical mobility

iv. Horizontal mobility

37. Please explain the three race model promoted by bonilla-silva.

a. Whites (whites, white passing latinx)

b. Honorary whites (light skin African Americans, Native Americans, Middle

eastern people, light skin Asians)

c. Collective Blacks (less economically successful)

i. Asians, African Americans, Latinos

38. What are the issues with members of the ‘mena’ community being considered white?

a. White people don’t see them as white

b. They want to not be considered white

c. Mostly Muslim
39. What are the differences between expressed race, reflected race, and racial self-

identification?

a. Expressed race: your self racial identification

b. Reflected race: how your race is perceived by strangers

c. Racial self-classification: the race you put/select on a census or survey

40. What are the differences between multi and monoracial individuals?

a. More bicultural

b. Struggle around racial identity

c. Tend to be younger

d. More likely to reject the idea that ability is based on race

e. Better ability to remember faces

41. What are the four types of multiracial identity according to Rockquemore and Brunsma?

What makes them different?

a. Singular identity: exclusively one race (17%)

b. Border identity: exclusively multiracial (62%)

c. Protean identity: fluid movement between identities (5%)

d. Transcendent identity: choose to not identity racially (13%)