chapter 4 - the colour of law

Question 1

what is the main focus of critical legal studies?

Answer 1

focuses on the inequalities within the law

examines the role of law in creating and enforcing racial categories and the resulting experiences of POC (disadvantaged and oppressed)

Question 2

what is intersectionality

Answer 2

we all have multiple experiences and are made up of multiple identities
- master categories (race, gender, class, ethnicity)

eg. belonging to the group of females, lower class and part of the LGTBQ community

Question 3

is race a social construction or is it fixed and not objective?

Answer 3

race is a social construction

Question 4

what is race?

Answer 4

socially constructed classification of persons that is tied to beliefs about diff in the physical makeup of diff ind

• includes diff cultural characteristics between cultures but also the inequalities
• diff matched up with the standards of the dominant group in power (how they make decisions)
• the categories and the hierarchy of categories are inequitable (cant get hierarchy without cat)

Question 5

what is the discussion of Johann Freidrich Blumenbach ideas of how race is something within your genes and is inherited?

Answer 5

• used just to support and maintain the dominance of the British over the other races around the world
• perpetuates the values, beliefs and morals of the white abled male

Question 6

what are the main interest that drive this idea above?

Answer 6

economics (division of labour)
slavery
colonialism (land and export ideas, lands of the aboriginal and their rights(not even considered)

Question 7

what is racialization?

Answer 7

psychical diff come to assume certain meanings and expectations for human behaviour and interaction

• social meanings that we attribute to race including whiteness
• whiteness becomes the norm and is the base for the and construction creation of all other race

Question 8

what is the basis and main points f the reading ion aboriginal women and their education?

Answer 8

• take about experiences as first nations women
• not possible to carpmentalize any one of my identities as one as they all work simultaneously together
• alienated from learning at the law school she attended
• did readings that did not allow her to contribute or take part within class discussions
• talked about treatment of professors
• make assumptions about the groups of ppl who are the topic of conversation(they were not included)
• the idea of when people talk about a certain race - ppl stare when talking about cultures or groups you are part of POC
• never really explained the right information on aboriginal individuals to be useful in law school and the acc field itself

Question 9

what are the 3 ways the role of law constructs categories of race?

Answer 9

1. racal profilling
2. incarceration
3. immigration

Question 10

what is racial profiling?

Answer 10

using a person’s race or ethnicity as a factor in determining whether they are likely to commit a crime, engage in suspicious activity, or pose a threat, without any evidence or reasonable suspicion to support such a decision

Question 11

what are the 2 types of profiling?

Answer 11

1. begins with specific crime and generalized description of the offender (question those fitting description)
2. application of racial stereotypes to define an offender (young minority men)

Question 12

what race is 1st and 2nd at mist likely being racially profiled?

Answer 12

1. black males
2. latino males

Question 13

what is incarceration?

Answer 13

act of confining a person in a prison, jail, or other correctional facility as a punishment for a crime they have been convicted of or while they await trial

• rate is higher in Canada than most western European countries (117 per 100000)
• main populations - aboriginal and black

Question 14

what are some factors responsible for mass incarceration?

Answer 14

culture of control
interest of political actors
economic benefits

Question 15

what is immigration?

Answer 15

process of entering and settling in a country that is not one’s own, with the intention of staying there permanently or for an extended period

1. laws and policies some argue that it is racist
2. “white canada” policy
   
   1. favours eauropean immigrants
3. 1960s - point system - formally colour blind but racist effects
   
   1. very difficult still
4. 1980s - managing immigration - sanitary coding

Question 16

what is the point system of immigration?

Answer 16

select immigrants based on their language, job and intellectual skills and qualifications, rather than their country of origin or family ties

aimed to attract highly skilled and educated immigrants who could contribute to the American economy and society (video in class on immigration and the process)

Question 17

what is sanitary coding?

Answer 17

policy implemented by the United States to screen potential immigrants for communicable diseases before allowing them to enter the country

Question 18

summary of the immigration video in class

Answer 18

• very heavily involved with headtax which made Chinese pay to come into Canada
  
  • made them work and build the train tracks
  • made many relationship difficulties - apart from family
• whole idea deals with white supremacy

Question 19

what is the feeblemindedness theory?

Answer 19

people who were not able to identify a missing object or complete a certain class we defined as morons and lack intellectual ability

• feebleminded people more likely to commit crimes and become poor
• deemed as hereditary (only within immigrants and African americans)
• used to explain divorce, alcoholism etc.

Question 20

what was the reason for this theories dismissal?

Answer 20

• shoddy and fake science (pseudoscience)
• virtues consistent with racist assumptions
• self interest of the wealthy that perpetuated it

Question 21

what did policy makers do to rid “feebleminded” people?

Answer 21

launched eugenics practices and made women have forced sterilizations to limit their reproduction

• wendell homes who made a bill pass said “three generations of imbiciles are enough” in term of the landmark case to this bill

Question 22

what is “race law”?

Answer 22

laws that maintain racial categories and shape interactions among racial groups

• legal actors struggled to fix these racial boundaries (who is considered white) as they shifted overtime
• boundaries driven by instrumental interests

Question 23

how did delgado and stefancic define this interest convergence phenomena?

Answer 23

material interest produce the concept of race and determine the content of racial categories

Question 24

what was edwards baptist’s main lens?

Answer 24

american slavery and the legal regime were the main ingredients of global capitalism

Question 25

where is the intersection of law, racism and economic interest shown in terms of the textbook?

Answer 25

1. use of criminal justice system to provide black convicts labour to employers
2. racialization of the chinese (anti chinese)
3. in the founding fathers

Question 26

what was the main theme from the race narrative of the chinese?

Answer 26

• chinese workers has the bio capacity ot live off of below sub. wages and were unfair competitors to american men
• also said to require less food and air then normal

Question 27

what is the chinese exclusion law?

Answer 27

suspended the entry of all chinese labourers into the US

Question 28

what was taken fro the examples of a groups racialization as nonwhite based on. economic interests?

Answer 28

• africans declaired inferior in order to enslave them
• american indians dehumanized to facilitate their removal
• chinese became a yellow peril

Question 29

what is a yellow peril?

Answer 29

East Asian peoples were dangerous and uncivilized and that they posed a threat to the racial purity and superiority of Western civilization

Question 30

what brings a change to racial status?

Answer 30

upward mobility (increase in the economic ladder)

• immigrant groups first seen as nonwhite, then experiencing whiteness and then white

Question 31

true or false: if a particular immigrant group is willing to perform low wage work under not good conditions they are seen as non white regardless of skin colour?

Answer 31

true

Question 32

what did penner and saperstein find in their study

Answer 32

racial identification is not fixed

whiteness is a factor correlating to a persons economic status

Question 33

who did mezey say played a big part in producing racial categories and identities?

Answer 33

the US census

additional: also prisons when they sort ppl for housing

Question 34

who did mezey say played a big part in producing racial categories and identities by supplying the options they can chose from?

Answer 34

the US census

additional: also prisons when they sort ppl for housing

Question 35

does the process of racialization and identity construction only apply to the US?

Answer 35

no it happens everywhere (europe)

Question 36

what does it mean to say that racism is ordinary?

Answer 36

it is the usual way that society does business and it is entrenched and difficult to address

Question 37

what two master categories tend to be mutually exclusive to one another?

Answer 37

race and gender (women and POC)

Question 38

what are the 2 reasons why crenshaw believes there is an invisibility of women of colour?

Answer 38

1. blames middle class white women for using their experiences as the standard of womanhood
2. intersectional status (women. of colour) was highlighted in courts only when it disempowered them and became irrelevant when it could have empowered them

Question 39

do the blind see race in the same way as the sighted?

Answer 39

yes as visual cues of race are learned through social practices and interaction

Question 40

what does Rios says is part of a youth control complex in terms of targeting black and latino boys and labelling them as delinquent?

Answer 40

includes:

the juvenile justice system, schools, families, commercial est. and community centers, groups and services that are assumed to help them

Question 41

what does racialization and stigmatization of black and latino “delinquents” depend on?

Answer 41

the perpetuating and entrenched polices and practices that have been at the core of policing and legal institutions

Question 42

what is one consequence of racial profiling, institu. racism and mass incarceration?

Answer 42

fear or crime and race anxieties get tangled

eg. tv shows that show african americans as offenders increases white ppls fears but also african americans

Question 43

what are the 2 barriers to having your rights restored of you are a former felon?

Answer 43

1. still own restitution to victims (cant pay off cause cant get a job)
2. state reduced parole commissions budget

Question 44

what were pagers findings in her study?

Answer 44

• white men with a record and black men without were 3x as likely to find a job over black men who had a record
• white men has comparable job experiences to black men with no record

Question 44

what were pagers findings in her study?

Answer 44

• white men with a record and black men without were 3x as likely to find a job over black men who had a record
• white men has comparable job experiences to black men with no record

Question 45

what is white consciousness?

Answer 45

individual’s awareness of their racial identity as a white person and the ways in which this identity shapes their experiences and perspectives

• conceptualizations of whiteness get constructed as the norm (even violent outlaws become glorified)
• associated with white surpremacy (masters of national space)