Ask the Scholars

Well first of all we have to understand that it's a rationalization. There are still people who function as if the rationalization is based on truth. There are still people who feel, well, black people have certain kinds of characteristics that I can attribute to them simply because of their race - whether it's genetic or like George says, a product of culture, it's just the way they are.

Now if we realize that all that is a rationalization, that these things happen to people aft...

I think this is what affirmative action is all about, because one way you refute stereotypes and you show competence and capability is to have African Americans and other members of other minorities achieving recognition in this society as a whole and earning the respect of everyone. The Shape of the River, a book by Bowen and Bok about what happened with affirmative action over its first 20 or 30 years of operation, showed that the recipients of affirmative action were high achievers. T...

As an anthropologist, I think social change occurs very slowly. I can't even anticipate what might be the long-range outcome of affirmative action policy, but I think that things are changing regardless of affirmative action, although it helps us along. When you look at a Republican administration that has a Condoleezza Rice and a Colin Powell, you are looking at a phenomenon that most people probably don't recognize as having an impact on themselves or the rest of society. You are looki...

I would add that changing stereotypes is only part of the issue. There's also institutional racism which operates to deny people opportunities, and which, as I said earlier, isn't about individual acts or personal responsibility. One thing I would really like people to understand is how racism hurts the nation as a whole. I think Americans are just now coming to realize that most of the world is not white. Most of the world does not share our assumptions about race. Because most of the w...