1. Ethnicity and Nationalism APHG Topic III: Cultural Differences
Reference: Knox Marsten

2. Young and Mixed in America

3. Terms to know apartheid ethnocentrism barrio/barrioization
cultural landscape
cultural shatterbelt
ethnic enclave
ethnic island
ethnic cleansing
ethnic neighbourhood
ethnic homeland
ethnicity
ethnocentrism
ghetto and ghettoization
invasion and succession
nationalism
race
segregation
sense of place
separatism

4. Identity Identity – “how we make sense of ourselves” – Rose
How do we establish identities? - we construct our identities through experiences, emotions connections, and rejections.
An identity is a snapshot of who we are at a point in time
Identities are fluid, constantly changing, shifting, becoming.
Identities vary across scales and affect each other across scales.
Identities are also constructed by identifying against (defining the other and then defining ourselves as “not that.”)

5. So what’s what? Culture Race Ethnicity Nationality
The sum total of the knowledge, attitudes, and habitual behaviour patterns shared and transmitted by the members of a society.
Identity with a group of people who share a biological ancestor; traits are transmitted genetically from parents to children
Racial categories are social and political constructions because they are based on ideas that some biological differences are more important than others.
Example: “Black” is a race
Identity with a group of people who share distinct physical and mental traits as a product of common heredity and cultural traditions
Example: ”African-American” is an ethnicity
Identity with a group of people who share legal attachment and personal allegiance to a particular country
Example: “Canadian” is a nationality

6. Biologically speaking, no such thing as race exists within the human species; however, we tend to categorize race according to visible characteristics of hair, skin, and bone structure
Racial categories are typically imposed on people through:
Residential segregation
Racialized divisions of labor
Racial categories defined by governments
Examples: Chinese and Chinatowns in North American cities

7. Population in the U. S. by Race, 2000 In 2000, the U. S
Population in the U.S. by Race, 2000 In 2000, the U.S. Census Bureau allowed Americans to categorize themselves as one race or more than one race. They asked these two questions:

8. Distribution of Ethnicities
Can be considered at different scales:
Regional:
French are clustered in eastern Canada;
Amerindians in the far north and in specific territories within the US;
Hispanics are clustered in the southwest;
African-Americans in the southeast;
Asian-Americans clustered in the west
State or provincial scale
Urban scale

9. Distribution at the urban scale: Residential Segregation
The “degree to which two or more groups live separately from one another, in different parts of the urban environment.”
Massey and Denton
barrioization > barrio = squatter settlement
= when the population of a neighborhood changes over largely to Hispanics. - cultural landscapes change to reflect changing populations

10. Highest Rate of Residential Segregation for African Americans:
Milwaukee, Wisconsin

11. Lowest Rate of Residential Segregation for Hispanics/Latinos: Baltimore for Asians/Pacific Islanders: Baltimore
Baltimore, Maryland

12. Racial Segregation

13. Ethnic Origin and Visible Minorities, Canada
From 2006 census

16. Identities in Neighborhoods change over time
Invasion and Succession:
A process of neighbourhood change whereby one social or ethnic group succeeds another in a residential area; the displaced group, in turn, invades other areas, creating over time a rippling process of change throughout the city

17. Sense of Place
We infuse places with meaning and feeling, with memories and emotions.
Our sense of place becomes part of our identity and our identity affects the ways we define and experience place.

18. Ethnicity
Ethnicity
identification assigned to a large group of people recognized as sharing the traits of a distinctive common culture; always based on a firm understanding by members of a group that they are in some fundamental ways different from others who don’t share their distinguishing characteristics or cultural heritage
from the Greek word ethnos, meaning nation or people
no single trait denotes ethnicity; group recognition may be based on language, religion, national origin, and/or unique customs
it is estimated that there are about 5000 ethnicities in the world.
Ethnicity is a spatial concept; it is associated with clearly recognized territories – either larger homeland districts or smaller urban or rural enclaves – where the ethnic group forms the primary or exclusive occupants and upon which they have placed distinctive cultural marks
ghetto – an area of a city inhabited by a minority group, sometimes by choice but more often as a result of social, legal, or economic discrimination

19. Immigration Streams
North America
Ethnic diversity in North America is a product of continuous flows of immigrants from nearly all cultures and races of the world.
Canada: 18% foreign-born
USA: 11% foreign-born
Latin America
In almost all South and Central American countries European and other non-Native groups dominate the social and economic hierarchy,
e.g. Colombia, Argentina, Venezuela
In some countries, the Native groups predominate. e.g. Bolivia 71% Native; Peru and Ecuador 40-50% Native

20. Few homelands exist within the North American culture mix, although there are many ethnic neigbourhoods, e.g. Chinatowns, Little Italys.
In some countries, guest workers experience spatial segregation within the host society – by housing markets and public and private restrictions. e.g. Asian and West Indians in London, England
In recent decades there has been a resurgence of cultural pluralism and demand for ethnic autonomy – in the form of political power, structure of the educational system, and minority language rights.

21. Ethnocentrism
A tendency to evaluate other cultures against the standards of one’s own;
Implies superiority

22. Ethnic separatism
In Europe, Asia, and Africa ethnicity and territorial identity are inseparable.
Several ethnicities in Europe claim homelands:
Basques
Bretons
Welsh
Slovenes
Croatians
Bosnians
Non-Slavic ‘nationalities’ of Russia
In South and Southeast Asia, there are many ethnic communities.

23. “Ethnic Cleansing”
When ethnic groups are intermixed and territorial boundaries imprecise, there can be conflict. This conflict can take the form of ethnic cleansing, which is the systematic killing or extermination of an entire people or nation in order to achieve racial or cultural homogeneity.
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Tragically, there are many examples of ethnic cleansing from the past century:
The Armenian genocide
The Holocaust
The Cambodian genocide
The former Yugoslavia
Rwanda
Darfur
Congo

24. Acculturation and Assimilation
Canada in the 1970s
Adopted official policy of multiculturalism designed to reduce tensions between ethnic and language groups
e.g. Toronto – 44% foreign- born routinely sends out property tax notices in six languages:
English
French
Chinese
Italian
Greek
Portuguese
Acculturation: adoption by immigrants of the values, attitudes, ways of behaviour, and speech of the receiving society.
Assimilation: the process through which people lose originally differentiating traits, such as dress, speech particularities or mannerisms, when they come into contact with another society or cutlure
Often measured by the degree of residential segregation
Also by employment segregation and intermarriage

25. In other countries, different attitudes:
Sri Lanka – Sinhalese (75%) and Tamils; Tamils conducted guerilla warfare to defend against threats to culture, rights, and property
India – Kashmir (Muslim)
China – 8.5% ethnic minorities
Tibetans
Mongols
Uighurs
Conflicts in many multi-ethnic states:
Armenia Ethiopia
Azerbaijan Rwanda
Burma Indonesia
Burundi Iraq
Russia
former Yugoslavia

28. Russia’s Yakut region

30. SAKHA Rising ethnic demands as nationalism grows
Huge size – 1/5 of Russia’s land area
Largest minority group in population is Sakha
Turkic people who are sometimes called Yakuts
Ethnic Russians (outnumber the Sakha) and are concentrated in 10 urban areas
Sakha predominate in rural areas

31. SAKHA Rising ethnic demands as nationalism grows
Events of 1990
Declaration of “state sovereignty”
Elected president and parliament
Adopted coat of arms and constitution
Has obtained special rights
Controls mineral rights
Does not allow nuclear testing in Yakutia
1997, withheld some tax revenue from Moscow
1995 survey found most Yakuts more loyal to Sakha than Russia
Surprisingly – a third of all Russians in Yakutia felt the same
Russians continue to emigrate from the region