Author: christiana

Christiana Awode

Prof. Stone 

ENG 1101

October 27, 22

                                                             Bibliography

Research Question: What is structural racism? What effect do structural inequality and structural racism have on the development of people of color in the United States? 

 

Source Entry 1

Braveman, A Paula, “Systemic and Structural Racism: Definitions, Examples, Health Damages, And Approaches to Dismantling”. Health Affairs, 2022.

 

   “Systemic and Structural Racism: Health Damages, And Approaches to Dismantling” by Paula. A Braveman was published in February 2022. Braveman is a Family and Community Medicine and Founding Director Professor of the Center of Health Equity at the University of California. Braveman has studied social determinants of health, and health equity, and her research point to understanding racial and ethnic disparities for more than 25 years.

     Braveman begins by explaining how structural racism relates to the social and political within society, mainly people of color. This type of racism can affect and shape someone’s life for example black people, but this helps and gives white people an advantage. This exists because of white supremacy, white people placing themselves on the top and putting black and other minorities at the bottom. Structural racism plays educational, political, social, and historical roles in all worlds. Braveman states “Structural racism stealthily replicates the racial hierarchy established more than 400 years ago through slavery and colonialism, placing white people at the top and Black people at the bottom” (Braveman 15). So many people of color lives are at risk because of structural racism, whether it’s from being mistreated at school, or not getting a job because you’re black. This affects you by not being able to provide for yourself or your family. 

   Braveman says “Systemic racism is so embedded in systems that it often is assumed to reflect the natural, inevitable order of things” (Braveman12). Racism is invisible people are used to discriminating against others and messing up someone’s mental health. There are multiple authors in this article Elaine Arki, Tina Kudah, and Nicole Hulm the main author is Paula A. Braveman. Braveman is a researcher; I can tell she is curious and wants better for the world. She wants everyone to know and be aware, in the article she gives many examples and quotes on what structural racism is and what people think it is and who the cause is.  

    Her attitude is very straightforward about the subject and wants change, she gives topics that relate to racism, definitions, and even other opinions on different authors. The audience is the world, every race with or without color. Paula published this article in February 2022, created this article to point out the wrong in the world. February is black history month. I guess she dedicated this article to that month. Paula is somehow trying to give a voice to people of color, to show how white supremacy affects and kills people of color. Based on this information this article is a current article/ newsletter, it’s happening today in real life and throughout history, it provides. The author seems calm, doesn’t seem mad or upset about the topic, and seems concerned and tired of this racism. The author gave lots of quotes and definitions, so I know she wants whoever is reading this article to understand what she is writing.

 

                                      Can we do something about racism?

       Yes, in fact, we can do something. Racism has played a huge role in society today, discriminating against another culture or religion has become normalized. Racism happens every day whether it’s at school or a job. People are treated differently due to skin color. We can all make a change but we choose not to because society normalizes it. Throughout my childhood, I experienced and saw secondhand racism and cultural discrimination. I have interest in this question because this is a big issue affecting everyone, and we can do something about it and how we treat others but we haven’t it’s still happening. Racism mostly happens o one race black people, many people have died because of racism against black people, and protests of #blacklivesmatter have gone on about us having our rights. When I go to a store I’m being watched so I don’t “steal”, or I can’t walk out of a store without buying anything without looking suspicious. My nationality is African during my elementary, and middle school, time rumors would go on about Africans being very dark, and I wasn’t so people always had questions about why I was so light. The Ebola virus happened during that time they would say I had the Ebola virus and everyone would stay away from me or be afraid to touch me. Everyone and the teachers had a hard time saying my name, I was so ashamed of being African because of all the discrimination, I never accepted my culture I was embarrassed being African. I expect to see lots of information on how racism has made an individual treat another individual differently. How bad it affects many people’s mental health, and how racism makes it hard for people to find jobs and make money. I’m not surprised to find this there are so many different types of races, and stereotypes about different races, we don’t know what the race culture is. If I find any information different from what I expected I will go into more research. I would keep my topic and write about it anyways. Some articles I read said how racism is changing, and how people are taking time to learn more about a culture.

 

A topic I want to learn more about is racism, police brutality and how bad it is affecting society today.

• Police brutality 
• Racism 
• Abortion 

I know racism is discriminating against someone based on there race, unfair treatments towards an individual. Racism happens everyday whether it’s in school, a student making fun of you because of your skin color or how dark you are, or applying for a job. They jump to conclusions based on your name because it sounds ghetto.

 Can we stop racism?

i’ve learned a lot about police brutality over the pandemic protest over protest went on about black lives matter, over social media like instagram, twitter #blackouttuesday. It was a protest about racism and police brutality against black people. It was a response to the incident of Gerge Floyd, and Breonna taylor. Police brutality is a force of law enforcement against a person, black people have been the race to go through this, so many people black people have lost their lives because of white police men. It’s not only the police it’s everyone discriminating black people, saying there bad, there gang members, they do drugs. Even me as a black personality, when I go into a store I always buy something so the people don’t think I’m stealing. They even follow me around, black people aren’t safe anywhere.

I want to learn more about those two topics, how it has ruined society, and changed how people think today even little kids.