Unit 1-5

Prejudice in Action

1) An antipathy based on faulty and inflexible generalizations.2) Can be felt covertly or expressed overtly.3) Can be direct towards a group as a whole, or toward an individual because s/he is a member of that group.

Prejudice(Allport – 1954)

Four Theories ofPrejudice

Exploitation Theory1) Power is a Scarce Source

2) People innately want to keep their power and status

3) So people suppress the social mobility of the out-group

Scapegoating Theory1) Prejudiced People are the True Victims

2) They refuse to accept basic responsibility for some society failure (defeat in war / depression)

3) So they shift focus of responsibility to an out-group

Authoritarian Personality Theory

1) Person comes from a strict authoritarian background2) When that person grows up s/he wants to be the authoritarian of those around them

3) So this person subjects people in an out-group (who are seen as weaker) to their will

Structural Theory1) Social climate either promotes cultural and ethnic tolerance or intolerance

2) Is their obvious equality – if not people will subjugate others around them

3) Is there a definite hierarchy with a clear pecking order?

What Do PeopleWho Are PrejudiceReceive From Their

Prejudice?

Ego-Defense Function

Protects people’s view of themselves on both a personal and social identity level.

Value-Expressive Function

People need to have value and behavioral consistencies in viewing their own cultural values, norms, and practices as the proper & civilized ways of thinking and behaving.

Knowledge Function

1) It takes time and energy to create knowledge

2) People tend to want to defend their knowledge base

3) So, people view others who lack such knowledge as ignorant or deficient

Utilitarian Function

1) Protecting the majority (In-Group) will make things easier on their life

2) In fact, they may be rewarded for doing protecting the in-group

Young Children and Prejudice

Adopting: Overt passing on of prejudice ideals to a child.

Developing: Creating a threatening and suspicious attitude, so that the child creates her or his own prejudices out of suspicion, fear, and hatred towards another person or group of people.

First Stage of Prejudice Children want to be accepted by their parentsChildren learn fears of strangers circumspect

from others.Children notice differences between themselves

and others.Child realizes that a group is hateworthy (even

though the child many not know neither the groups name or its identity).

When PrejudiceMeets

Discrimination

PREJUDICE

DISCRIMINATION

YES

NO

ActiveBigot

YES NO

Fair-Weather Liberal

TimidBigot

ProactiveChangeAgents

The Tolerant

Personality

Tolerance

The capacity for or the practice of recognizing and respecting the beliefs or practices of others.

Liberal: Person who is critical of the status quo, who wants progressive social change

Conservative: Person who wants to maintain the status quo.

Education and Tolerance

Are educated people more tolerant?

Two Reasons Why:

1) Decreases insecurity and anxiety about life.

2) They realize that the welfare of one group is related to the welfare of all groups.

Empathetic Ability

Being able to understand where a person is coming from.

Putting yourself in someone else’s shoes.

Intropunitiveness

Feeling loathing of their in-group for the intolerance that they see their in-group having for outsiders.

Fill out the scale on pages 60 & 61.

Intropunitiveness cont.

White Empathetic Reactions Towards Racism

White Guilt

White Fear of Others

Tolerance for Ambiguity

Personality variable that distinguishes people who can operate effectively in communication situations in which there is a great deal of uncertainty from those who cannot operate effectively in such situations.

Inclusiveness

Being open and welcoming to people, thoughts, ideas, beliefs, and practices that are not your own.

DEALINGWITH

PREJUDICE

1) We must be honest with ourselves – confront our on biases and ethnocentric attitudes.

2) We should question the contents of our stereotypes and check against our actual interactions with out-group members.

3) We should understand how our negative images concerning out-group members affects our biased attitudes and interactions.

4) Use the principle of heterogeneity to break down the broad social categories.

5) We should use mindful qualifying language when describing out-group/others’ behaviors.

6) We should put ourselves in frequent inter-group contact situations to become comfortable with group-based differences.

Story of Leo Frank

Forms of

Prejudice

Familiar & Unfamiliar

a) No Grudges

b) We just don’t know much about others

Real Likes & Dislikes

a) Out-group members are tolerated

b) Certain behaviors are not

Arm’s Length

We act with out-groups on in certain situations.

Ex. work, school, etc…

Tokenism

People who insincerely display acts of accommodation to out-group members.

Symbolic

a) No overt hate or violence

b) People just prefer not to interact with others.

Redneck

Members of certain cultures should be sent back where they came from.

Levels Of

Prejudice

1. Institutional – Jim Crow Laws

2. Collectivism – KKK

3. Individual – One person’s racism

MUTEDGROUPTHEORY

Three Basic Features

1) Language names experiences which determines what is socially recognized

2) Dominant discourse silences, or mutes, groups that are not in society’s mainstream – often are invisible to Dominant Culture

3) Out-groups react to being muted in different fashions

5 Coping Strategies

1. Passing

2. Tomming

3. Shucking

4. Dissembling

5. Transforming