Question

What are the main key components of ethnicity? Please provide three examples to support your definition. What are the defining variables of race? Provide three examples to support your definition.

Answer 1

• Ethnic identity is separate from one’s personal identity as an individual, although the two may reciprocally influence each other. 4 major components of ethnic identity:
• Ethnic awareness (understanding of one’s own and other groups)
• Ethnic self-identification (label used for one’s own group)
• Ethnic attitudes (feelings about own and other groups)
• Ethnic behaviors (behavior patterns specific to an ethnic group)
• Ethnicity is state of belonging to a social group that has a common national or cultural tradition.This is, by definition, a fluid concept; ethnic groups can be broadly or narrowly construed.
• For example, they can be as broad as "Native American" or as narrow as "Cherokee". Another example is the Indian subcontinent — Indians may be considered one ethnic group but there are actually dozens of cultural traditions and subgroups like Gujarati, Punjabi, Bengali, and Tamil that are also bona fide ethnic groups. Yet another example is people in Great Britain — they may be considered British, or more precisely English, Scottish or Welsh.
• Broadly speaking, a person's ethnicity is their heritage and ancestral roots. Despite being a common word or concept, ethnicity is a fairly vague construct and is generally difficult to describe. This is due in part to differing contexts. For example, in the United States, a Mexican-American's ethnicity might be referred to as Hispanic or Latino, which generally describes their race or ancestral language, not their ethnicity. In another country, that same person's ethnicity might be described as Mexican, referring to their culture and heritage.
• Ethnicity is also a preferential term to describe the difference between humans rather than ‘race’. This is because race is a now a discredited term that divided all peoples based on the idea of skin colour and superiority. There is only one ‘race’, the human race as we are essentially genetically identical. For example, there is no French ‘race’ but the French people could be described as a separate ethnic group.
  
• Race is defined according to physical features, geographic origin or common biological heritage.Race refers to a person's physical characteristics, such as bone structure and skin, hair, or eye color.An example of race is brown, white, or black skin
• Race presumes shared biological or genetic traits, whether actual or asserted. In the early 19th century, racial differences were ascribed significance in areas of intelligence, health, and personality.
• In most cases, race is unitary — i.e., a person belongs to one race — but may claim ethnic membership in multiple groups. For example, Barack Obama is racially black in spite of his mother being caucasian.
• The word "Asian" used in a racial context in the United States refers to people of Southeast Asian origin, including a vast variety of ethnic backgrounds, such as Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Vietnamese.