Racial Identity and Racial Identifications Essay

Racial Identity and Racial Identifications - Essay ExampleThe two variety methods often ca utilize confusion when it comes to racial identity. Some people may identify themselves with a given up race based on its civilizations. However, this identification may be very polar from the color of their skin. In fact, they may call themselves wispy except phenotypically they are white in color. Misunderstandings and confusions on whether to identify onenesss race using external or internal characteristics have led to the aspect of racial identity being simplified and malformed by some people (Maureen) Simplification, in this case, is whereby an individual tries to sterilize racial identity based on either external or internal characteristics alone. However, the definition fails to disclose racial identity as a complex aspect of human nature may be affected by other factors. Many people would simply define racial identity as to refer to skin color while other would prefer to follo w cultures. Others would even be distorted by the racial identity thing. Distorted in this case meaning these people are merge up and misunderstand the racial identity issue. ... This is a small male child who is trying to identify himself with a certain race. The boy is black in color but the fact that he described himself as black and white highlights the fact that the boy uses both internal and external characteristics of his racial identity. According to the author, the boy has both African and Irish roots. The author tries to convince the boy that he is black because of his skin color, but the boy insists that he is black and white. This shows how the writer simplifies the racial identity issue. Distortion comes in from the point of watch over of two different people that have different expressive styles of defining racial identity. We are, therefore, not in a position to settle which of the two methods is best. Senna Describes herself as black in color but with parents fr om different races. The author writes of having a wasp mother and a black-Mexican father. She also describes herself as a black womanhood thereby introducing the use of external phenotypic characteristics to describe racial identity. Her parents decided to raise her and her other siblings as black. This was not based on their skin color but their own choice. It was some sought of culture that believed that being black was a privilege and that black was beautiful too (Senna). In this case, there is the use of both external and internal characteristics for racial identity. These parents decided to raise their kids as black is a way of teaching the kids that black can be a culture. Therefore, the kids can racially identify themselves as black not only by the color of their skins but also by the type of culture they decide to embrace. This can be a simplified way of racial identification. However, it can be very problematic to adopt for extremists who use color for racial identificati on.