Deracialization Essay ⋆ Political Science Essay Examples ⋆ EssayEmpire

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Deracialization is the process of breaking with practices of representing the Other (individuals or groups) as racialized. Racialization can be understood as a historical and cultural process that leads to the classification, distinction, and qualification of humanity into races, and it consists of representational practices that mark racial difference and signify the racialized Other. French philosopher Michel Foucault refers to this process as fragmentation, which is one of the functions of racism, a technology of power that per mitted modern European colonization. In other words, colonial institutions exercised their power and their domination on colonized societies by creating a racialized Other as different from the Self.

The concepts of race and nation developed in connection with one another. In countries such as the United States, these relationships of power are still expressed in contemporary categories such as those of “people of color,” “community of color,” and “racial minorities,” with which nonwhites are classified as systematically different from whites. Therefore, the process of deracialization would imply the dismantling of both social relationships and the practices of representation that were built on racism, as well as practices that construct or perpetrate stereotypes and binary oppositions, and naturalize difference. The election of President Barack Obama might illustrate the process of deracialization of social relationships in the United States.

Bibliography:

Foucault, Michel. “Cours du 17 mars 1976.” In Il Faut Défendre la Société: Cours au Collège de France (1975–1976), by Michel Foucault, 213–235. Paris: Seuil/Gallimard, 1997.
Hall, Stuart. “The Spectacle of the ‘Other.’” In Representation: Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices, edited by Stuart Hall. London: Sage, 1997.
“The Work of Representation.” In Representation: Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices, edited by Stuart Hall, 13–64. London: Sage, 1997.
Loomba, Ania. Colonialism/Postcolonialism, 2nd ed. London: Routledge, 2005.
Said, Edward W. Orientalism. New York:Vintage Books, 1979.