Take Home Questions
1. Ethnic stratification is a rank order of groups, each made up of people withpresumed common cultural or physical characteristics interacting in patterns of dominanceand subordination. To begin with, all systems of ethnic stratification are products of thecontact of previously separated groups. Initial contact may be in the form of conquest,annexation, voluntary immigration, or involuntary immigration. Following contact, groupsengage in competition, view one another ethnocentrically, and, ultimately, one imposes itssuperior power over the others, emerging as the dominant group. Ethnic stratificationsystems are created by the movement of people across national boundaries, usuallybringing with them different languages and cultural systems, or by the establishment ofnew political boundaries. Multiethnic societies are formed through one or a combinationof several contact patterns. The first factor critical to the emergence of ethnicstratification or inequality is Conquest. Conquest is a form of contact in which people ofone society subdue all or part of another society and take on the role of the dominantgroup. European colonialism of the eighteenth and ninet
Inthe end, differential power among the various groups is the most critical of therequirements for the emergence of ethnic stratification. On the pull side, the most appealing societies werethose in need of unskilled labor, like the United States and Canada, which were then in theprimary stages of industrialization. It is the relative power of the migrant and indigenousgroups that determines the eventual nature of ethnic stratification in each of thesesituations. The chief objective of people who emigrate from theirhome society is ordinarily economic betterment though sometimes political or religiousconsiderations play an important role. Such annexationmay occur in a peaceful or a violent manner. Lieberson's theory is that the nature by which diverse ethnic groups initially meethas been shown to be a critical factor in explaining the emergence of ethnic inequality andthe specific patterns it subsequently takes. The chiefsource of ethnic heterogeneity in the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealandhas been voluntary immigration. If a gathered society has a dominant group, then the ethnic groups within thatsociety become subordinate at the point that sovereignty is transferred. When there is a particularly wide power gapbetween competing and ethnocentric groups, the emergent stratification system is likely tobe quite durable. Lieberson maintains that long-term conflict is more likely in societies where the indigenouspopulation at initial contact is subordinate. Following annexation, the most commonpatterns by which ethnic groups come into contact involve immigration. On initial contact, divergent groups willjudge each other in terms of their own culture, ethnocentrically. The negative judgments willdepend on the degree of difference between the groups: The more dissimilar they are, themore negative the judgment. Situations in which the native group wields greaterpower and immigrant groups enter as subordinates produce less overt conflict initially. Noel poses that themore intense the competition, the greater the likelihood of the emergence of ethnicstratification.
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