Originally Posted by
Vessna
The concept of race as we understand it now, arouse with the expansion of colonialism and the Trans-Atlantic slave trade. Prior to that, if you look far back enough in history say, your own country, people were referred and categorized not by race but rather their place of origin or ethnicity/nationality. I think to fully understand that this is a concept, you have to realize that there are many interpretations of race. In America, a white person is not just a European person. Being phenotypically North Euro eg having blond hair/light eyes/white skin is not enough for some to call you "white". Because "white" is a colonial term. We had a discussion about it in our Intercultural Communication class. Our professor made us do an experiment. We had to classify people in our class (merely 90 students) as "white" and "non-white". White students classified as "white" everyone who is of European origin eg Italian, Russian, Polish, German etc. Students of color/hispanics only classified as "white" those who were classically colonial Americans e.g. WASPs. All others regardless of European origins were "non-white" to them. I agree with classification based on origins/genetics, but an old concepts of races is open to an interpretation and varies from country to country.
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