Introduction
The 21st century has been seen as a century that ushered different political, social, and economic aspects especially in matters concerning racism. At first, race was viewed as an ineluctable and natural framework representing human beings’ differences during this period, issues concerning races such as race discrimination were not evident. During the 19th and 20th centuries, especially due to the effects of slavery and colonialism, racial differences emerged (Henry 15 -25).
The postcolonialism and post-slavery period has been one of the difficult periods because it’s during this period that issues concerning racial discrimination and inequality started to be of concern. However, since the beginning of the 21st century, race and racial ideas have taken different perspectives hence resulting in more problematic concepts than ever before.
Race consciousness significance on racial equity
Some of the key aspects that have played key roles in the activation of race consciousness include the enactment of civil rights and black power movements. Race consciousness has resulted in the development of a mentality among the minorities that some of the challenges such as the oppression of the minor races can be opposed and resisted and hence such groups started using race consciousness as a weapon of fighting racial inequality.
Race consciousness has resulted in the incorporation and normalization of racial groups’ especially the ones that had conflicts during the colonial or slavery period. One way through which various states have managed to promote racial consciousness is through the deployment of anti-racialist policies and idioms on certain issues such as racial pluralism, diversity, multiculturalism, and racial equality (Tully & Senjek 45-78).
Rather than promoting racial equity race consciousness has highly prompted racial inequality each race viewing its group in a more positive perspective than the other.
The promotion of race consciousness has had both positive and negative significance in the fight for racial equality. It’s due to the promotion of race consciousness that certain different transnational racial movements and other cultural forms such as pathetic developed. Some of the international communities that have experienced the effects of race consciousness include the US and South Africa. In the US, race consciousness resulted in its segregation and the emergence of Negro and non Negro racial groups while in South Africa; it resulted in the mushrooming of racial tyranny systems called apartheid.
The US Negro movement was one of the results of the development of race consciousness in the state (Henry 65-78). The movement’s main objective was to eliminate the stereotype associated with races especially black races after their successful turn from the slavery era.
Racial consciousness has failed in its fight towards racial equality and rather promoted racial discrimination. In modern settings, when a white man talks of the whites to the blacks it means more than color. Race consciousness leads to some race groups being referred to as inferior and hence promoting racial inequality.
Race consciousness has only resulted in a politicized fight towards racial equality in the US and other states such as South Africa. The race consciousness effect can be compared with the Double consciousness model theory that shows how the black race concept is compromised of three cognitive compositions ‘me’, ‘I’, and ‘we’.
In the US, the effects of race consciousness contributed greatly to the development of neo-conservatism with racial ideology roots as a way of countering racial discrimination that resulted due to race consciousness. The development of race consciousness can be related to psychological theories on racism which state that the psychological process is the manifest social perception of a particular stereotype (McIntosh 125-135). According to this theory, it can be concluded that race consciousness developed due to the stereotype that some racial groups especially the African’s were facing. It’s due to the stereotype and discrimination that they face that they started racial movements and anti-racism campaigns which are the key contributors to the development of race consciousness.
However, to some aspect, race consciousness has to lead to the development of non-racialism classes and colorblindness especially in the current generation as a way of ratifying all the racial inequalities and injustices that were done to race groups previously.
Race consciousness has however played an important role in emphasizing the fact that race-based identities are uncertain, problematic, and are easily overridden by other forms of solidarity. This has been proved true by the many racial equality movements that have been formed in various states that in the end ended up being translated to political groups even before achieving justice on race equality.
Conclusion
The development of race consciousness has resulted in a varying debate on its significance in fighting racial inequality. Race consciousnesses have resulted in the development of civil rights laws and policies to help counter the consequences of many years of racism in states such as the US and African countries. Race consciousness can be viewed as one of the solutions that can help heal the wounds caused by other races during the colonialism and slavery era. In a different perspective, race consciousness can be viewed as a politicized form of fighting racial inequality. Race consciousness has been used by different racial groups as a form of showing their might or domination over others. Hence it can be concluded that race consciousness has had both positive and negative significance in the fight for racial equality.
Works cited
Henry, Louis.”Race” as the trope of the world Excerpted from Gates, H. L.ed “Race,” Writing and difference Chicago: University of Chicago (er),1985,1986.
McIntosh, Peggy. White Privilege and male privilege: A Personal Account of Coming to See Correspondences through work in Women’s studies Center for Research on women, Wellesley College(er), 1988.
Tully ,Sheila & Senjek ,Roger. The enduring inequalities of race. Gregory and sanjak,eds Race Gates,1996.