I hope it's okay to disagree a bit here. I disagree completely with your professor's account of history and the origins of racism. Many ancient and middle age societies, including the Celts, Romans, Egyptians, Babylonians and Phoenecians, among others, had slaves from various places, excluded people and stripped rights based on race, and left extremely racist comments and art in their history (for instance here's a set of sandals from King Tut's tomb. The sandals depict the King's enemies--black Africans and Asians--and they're painted on the shoes so he can trample them (http://heritage-key.com/egypt/sandals-enemy-figures)). Jews (considered a different ethnicity) were forced into ghettos as far back as the Middle Ages. The Japanese enslaved other Japanese around the same time. The slave trade in the Arab world went on for a good thousand years. And nobody ever really felt a need to justify slavery; it was a harsh reality that if your country lost a war or was invaded, your people might be massacred and/or enslaved because there wasn't anyone to disagree with it. So thinking that racism was developed just to justify the African slave trade is a bit far off and absurd(your professor's view, not yours, I know).
I'm not saying any of this to debate or argue, so please don't take it that way...it's just that I felt the need to comment about how off I thought your professor's view was.
I do agree that it's a manmade societal construct in that it's unfortunately always been accepted that societies denigrate those they consider 'others'. And one that we can stop, hopefully. This song from South Pacific sums it up for me. http://www.stlyrics.com/lyrics/southpacific/youvegottobecarefullytaught.htm
You've Got To Be Carefully Taught
Cable: You've got to be taught To hate and fear, You've got to be taught From year to year, It's got to be drummed In your dear little ear You've got to be carefully taught.
You've got to be taught to be afraid Of people whose eyes are oddly made, And people whose skin is a diff'rent shade, You've got to be carefully taught.
You've got to be taught before it's too late, Before you are six or seven or eight, To hate all the people your relatives hate, You've got to be carefully taught
(and sorry I edited this post about a million times!)
no subject
I'm not saying any of this to debate or argue, so please don't take it that way...it's just that I felt the need to comment about how off I thought your professor's view was.
I do agree that it's a manmade societal construct in that it's unfortunately always been accepted that societies denigrate those they consider 'others'. And one that we can stop, hopefully. This song from South Pacific sums it up for me. http://www.stlyrics.com/lyrics/southpacific/youvegottobecarefullytaught.htm
You've Got To Be Carefully Taught
Cable:
You've got to be taught
To hate and fear,
You've got to be taught
From year to year,
It's got to be drummed
In your dear little ear
You've got to be carefully taught.
You've got to be taught to be afraid
Of people whose eyes are oddly made,
And people whose skin is a diff'rent shade,
You've got to be carefully taught.
You've got to be taught before it's too late,
Before you are six or seven or eight,
To hate all the people your relatives hate,
You've got to be carefully taught
(and sorry I edited this post about a million times!)