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Week 2: Race and European Imperialism

I found it quite interesting today to try and come up a cultural identity marker. That is a hard thing to do. Initially I thought about bringing in something I had sewn, but that seemed too narrow and limiting to my family, and when I thought about it more, limited to the female members of my family. Then I thought about things I associated with Australians: BBQ, thongs, gum nuts, deck chair: these things seemed too cliqued. It is hard, if not impossible, to come up with something that includes all Australians, apart from that we live in Australia. Anyhow I decided on one of my favourite singlet tops because it has a strong link to me and things I associate with Australians. It has flowers printed on it, which I have a strong association with; its a singlet top which I see to symbolise relaxation and being laid back; its a common garment in Australia; its something I would often wear to the beach, which I think is a strong link to Australia.  Like Toni, I considered bringing a photo of my family, but firstly, couldn't find a recent on quickly, and secondly decided I wasn't sure how it could be a cultural identity marker.

I felt a bit peeved at something that the presenter said today. He was talking about the dehumanization of different groups of people. He gave examples of the discourse used for women, Indigenous People and then mentioned that there were terms for the Proletariat and stated "but we don't need to go into that." Isn't this implying support for the superiority of the proletariat, a group of people or race, but not giving examples of dehumanizing them when he has given examples for other groups of people??? It may simply have been a slip or he glanced at the clock and thought he was running behind time. Why am I trying to defend/justify what I heard?????

I found the concept of dehumanizing people through language fascinating. It never occurred to me about how the language used, allowed people, allows us, to justify our actions. I remember an article I read about the use of the word illegal immigrant. The author was trying to make the point, from my understanding, about the influence that language has on our perception. The author wrote a paragraph about some uni students doing an typical activity e.g. Today a group of uni students were seen sitting together under a group of tree's, in a heated discussion. Some of the uni students became quite animated, wildly gesturing and speaking loudly, causing passers by to notice them." Then the author rewrote the paragraph replacing the word uni student with illegal immigrants. Actually, I think it may have been the other way around. The author took an article that used the term illegal immigrants and replaced it with uni students. Anyhow, the point is that it completely changed the way you felt about what was said. It went from sounding alarming and threatening to something not out of the ordinary. My point is that language and choice of words is very powerful. We, that is humans, need to stop and think before we open our mouths.

In the tut today we started to talk about how we classify people. The Tutor mentioned about how a lady she knows classifies people as she walks down the street. I do the same. Sometimes its more like "mmm nice pattern on her top. Wonder where she got it?" "He looks grumpy wonder if he's had a bad day", "My goodness! How tall was that lady!" I find that I do it a lot in uni classes. I try to pigeon hole people. "He always speaks up" "I bet she gets High Distinctions".  I bet other people do the same to me to. "She always speaks up- know it all!" "My goodness, can she never let anyone else say something" "I bet she's boring, look at her daggy clothes." It's again that notion that we make assumptions based on physical characteristics. It would be an interesting experiment to see what we assumed about people if we could only hear them, or only smell them. Thinking about smell, I bet lots of people would smell perfume and think of a clean well presented lady, and cologne, a well dressed man, a person smelling of body odour as an old man or a teenage guy full of hormones. We have such programmed ideas in our heads, such constructed ideas, from media, family, friends, personal experience/observation, books we read. Could we get by without making assumptions and classifying people? How do we un-program ourselves? What program would replace the current program? Would a program replace the current one? What about if you suspect that someone is going to harm you because of their behaviour or appearance, but try not to assume they are going to, and then are harmed? What about the opposite, you don't suspect someone and they do harm you... I think you would feel a lack of trust in your own judgment or assumptions about people...

The reading "Savages" this week was not much of a surprise to me. I had heard of the size of skulls being measured to assign 'intelligence' and likewise with the slope of the forehead. I was also aware that a very dim view of Indigenous Peoples was presented by Europeans in general (as I think most invaders would be likely to do, to justify their actions). I see this as a gross misunderstanding of each other. As mentioned in the tut today, Captain Cook was almost speared because an Indigenous person thought he glared at him and was going to throw in over his shoulder. The invaders (I don't feel entirely comfortable with this word) likewise saw the Aboriginals as backward, primitive etc. because they were different. But isn't it interesting that Settlers still had to use Indigenous People for things e.g. tracking, so they were valued for some things, but obviously not valued enough to be considered equals. I think this is a big part of racism, different people value different qualities. Therefore if you exhibit qualities/skills that I value, then I value you at least as an equal. But if you exhibit qualities or skills that I don't consider of value, then I see you as a lower person. That's not totally accurate because not everyone is like that. Some people are able/willing to acknowledge other people skills or qualities regardless of what value they place on them. They just recognise that they are different but still valuable in their own right. I t's a bit like any kid that doesn't fit into mainstream schooling. Some people say he/she is just dumb and hasn't got a hope of ever being anything and others recognise that they have different skills/qualities than what are required to fit into a mainstream school. Western society seems to have this need to pump people out of system that are the same (as much as possible). Why? Because its too costly to create learning environments that would benefit everyone? What about if you weighed the cost of a person receiving a government payment (pension? Supplement? Not sure what its called) for a significant part of their life, (because they didn't fit into the mainstream school system, and dropped out before they completed year 9 [and to make some leaps negative jumps ahead] and are unemployed because of their low literacy) with the cost of creating learning environments that cater for individuals needs?????? Western society (I wonder if that's a politically correct term?) has a lot to answer for. I feel a bit ashamed that that is part of my past, but that also serves as motivation to makes changes for the future. I CAN make a difference.

Back to skull sizes, I understand the author to be saying that a larger skull equals greater brain capacity or intelligence. This is an interesting concept, particularly as I'm pretty sure that I read that its not the size of your brain but the density that can be an indicator of intelligence. I'm also pretty sure that I've read the Einstein had a small head compared to others.

Posted at 04:17PM Oct 01, 2008 by April W  |