Culture Communication and perceiving others

Racism and Ethnicity

Racism is a word that comes to mean race, because it means belief in the superiority of one ethnicity over another. Theorists have developed race categories based on skin colours, geographical regions and gender, and race may also be a labeling device that provides a basis of identification that slips in and out of the right direction over the various social periods. Ethnicity is referred to as a category of people associated with common characteristics on the basis of a common community that involves beliefs, traditions and values (Bell, & Waters, 2016). This culture includes mutual customs, literature, faith and mutual ancestors. Race and ethnicity, differs in such that race is the characteristics of heritage in which one was born despite the acquired behavior and location and it cannot be altered while ethnicity, is all about the learned cultural manners that are celebrated all over the regions found in the world and can be altered as per somebody’s beliefs and options (Bonilla-Silva, 2015). For example, in the United States has a racially and ethnically diverse population and this was according to the census done that officially recognizes almost six racial groups but the most dominant being the white Americans and black Americans who despite them being identified by the common culture, geographical allocation, beliefs and culture, they totally belong to the different race.

Prejudice and Discrimination

Prejudice is referred to the attitudes, thoughts, beliefs and feelings toward someone that cling to a group and it is based on experience hence it is associated with prejudgment. Discrimination means the consideration in favour of or against a group of people and can be based on age, health, religion, gender and social class. Discrimination differs from prejudice as it is the actions or behaviour that are normally negative towards a group of people or an individual based on race, social class or sex while prejudice is the unfounded attitude that is usually negative towards an individual based on being a member of a certain social group. One, therefore, can be prejudiced toward a certain race but cannot be discriminated against them. For example in the United States we have two dominant ethnicity groups of the white Americans and black Americans in which the words prejudice and discriminations clearly reveals themselves, there is a prejudgment by the white Americans over the black Americans, the feelings that the blacks are naive and inferior in everything they do, and this is the main cause of their discrimination in the various fields and activities of their day to day life from participating in things that boosts the economy of the country (Koffka, 2015).

Stereotypes and Perception

Stereotypes are the generalization about the specified type of individuals or certain ways of behaving intended the entire group of those individuals. It is founded on race, gender, ethnicity or sex and maybe both positive but are frequently negative but it is the generalization that cannot take each an individual into account (Bell, & Waters, 2016). Stereotypes are not created but are recycled from subsidiary groups and reused to describe a subordinate group. Perception can be defined as the interpretation, identification and overview of sensory information for easy understanding and presentation the information. It involves signals which go through the nervous system that results from either chemical or physical stimulation of the sensory system. For example, hearing involves pressure waves and smell the odour as well as the light strikes the eye.

Perception and Personal Experience

Perception has a great impact on prejudice as people are biased against others outside the social group of their own, and that is rated as the perception that deals with emotions. Behavioral bias is connected with discrimination and stereotypes are concerned with the cognitive bias. Perceive on health that is laid on patient’s race and ethnicity has been seen as it affects the poor quality of health care. This is because the physician’s interpretation of patients complains influenced by the race or ethnicity and this shows discrimination during the healthcare process. The feeling of discrimination by the patient in the healthcare process creates a negative attitude towards the medical follow up, and this affects the perception of the patient.

Personal Experience

Personal experience is the human sensory awareness of internal and external actions or the sum of the moment to moment experiences that form empirical union such as an era of life. My personal experience with discrimination according to the principle of Gestalt on the concept of similarity which states that things which share visual characteristics such as color or value will be as belonging together in the viewer’s mind (CCD (Conference), In Rau, & International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction. (2015). For example, the issue of discrimination over the black footballers in the United States is not given the equal rights to participate in various activities in the team. They are taken to be inferior and not eligible to be among the members of the white peoples team, as a result they are discriminated from the majority favors, and they are not even given an opportunity to participate by playing various matches or if they are given that opportunity, and they score then the white members of the team are not celebrating the score.

Summary

In summary, from having contrasted the various words given initially, we can therefore clearly perceive from my own personal experience that there is a big difference between race and ethnicity as well as prejudice and discrimination as it has been revealed in the United States by the two dominant ethnic groups, the white and the black Americans.

References

Bell, J., & Waters, S. (2016). Doing your research project: A guide for first-time researchers.

Bonilla-Silva, E. (2015). Racism without racists: Color-blind racism and the persistence of racial inequality in the United States. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.

CCD (Conference), In Rau, P. L. P., & International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction. (2015). Cross-cultural design: Methods, practice and impact : 7th International Conference, CCD 2015, held as part of HCI International 2015, Los Angeles, CA, USA, August 2-7, 2015, Proceedings.

Koffka, K. (2015). Principles of gestalt psychology. London [u.a.: Routledge.)