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Syndicate
Me neither. But I would say this is probably the first one in several decades. I seem to remember one that was a round up of Linus Pauling's career, and his various achievments and his Nobel Prize. I think Time ran a rather good one on the atomic bomb back in the 40's.
That said, while I agree with your assertion that preaching "colour blindness" is definitely a bad idea, I also don't think that we are talking about colour in the terms of the scientific basis for "sight", "seeing", making "distinctions" between things. That is why I asked my question about snozzles, and so on but really talking about the social, cultural and historical legacy of colour when constructed as a "social" artifact.
I don't see really how this study relates to that at all.
I find it sad (as in sad panda) that you think scientific research on race/racism is not relevant to anti-racism, as science and anti-racism are two things that I like and believe should intersect more often.
As I was saying above I don't see how proving that babies see colours relates to that at all. In my world anti-racism is about the social construction of colour as a social relationship, wherein the colour is meaningful. Not being colour blind is being aware that colour has a specific social and historical context reflected in the way people treat each other. Not "not being colour blind" as a sensory facility.
What would be interesting in that context, as I was saying before, was how babies rate the signifigance of colour in comparison to other physical charachteristics. That might have some value.
I agree with him on this.
It should be in science-humanities.
Scientific research isn't, or at least it shouldn't be, normative in nature. This forum is normative in its very name.
Well then in gods name why was it posted here, if this is an endeavour in scientific exploration, and not in the "science and humanities" forum where it could be free of attempted normative social re-constructions?
But I would assume that the article's authors are science news writers, and they are coming from a scientific perspective, as well as from a political perspective (which I read as progressive). "Newsweek" is not a consistent, sentient being, but it is an organization consisting of many different individuals working in tandem and against each other.
I was confused with your original question, because you asked, "does the study show that babies evaluate the colour distinction on the same level that they notice someone has a big nose?", which seemed really random to me. I didn't think it made sense to conduct a study comparing colour distinction evaluation with distinguishing between nose sizes, as they had little to do with each other. Now I think I understand that you are asking whether skin colour perception is really basic/low level.
Firstly, colour perception is biological, as most humans have specialized retinal cells (in the eye) and brain structures for colour perception, and colour perception is encoded in our genes. Noticing skin colour differences would be like noticing hair colour differences (although some study found that there are brain areas associated with processing "ethnicity" (they mean "race", as ethnicity is based on self-identification, not genetics), "gender" (they mean "sex", as gender is something you identify with, not something based on your body), and age. Then again, there may be brain areas for processing hair colour as part of facial recognition, as the brain has great plasticity.). Anyway, the point is that there is a lot of evidence that skin colour is processed at a basic perceptual level.
The Vittrup study probably has little direct relation to that, but the Newsweek article mentioned
Katz did more, but this part--finding that 6 month olds notice skin colour differences by showing them photographs and seeing how long they stare at them--was done before in a previous study (IIRC). Katz is replicating that part of the study (about race), and then extending it by making her study about race and racism.
Vittrup's study itself failed and was not meant to turn out that way. It was supposed to be about parenting methods to make your children less racist, not about most white parents being unable to talk about race with their children.
But normative claims should be founded on descriptive facts.
Normative claim: "White liberal person, you need to talk to your children about race. You cannot be color blind."
Why? Insert descriptive facts about color blindness not working as a strategy to combat racism.
That would, I think, be a more appropriate place for the insistence that we should be discussing this as a science article from a pro-science point of view.
Restructure, I saw your question and I'll simply say "no," acknowledge your point about being at an impasse, and repeat that I there's not much point to continuing - all I could say would be repitition (except I might figure out how to spell repetition correctly). I'm interested in the media spin, the impact of the article on readership, the reinforcement of assumptions about whiteness that I believe are the inseparable context and subtext here. My understanding of the article is clearly at odds with yours. The sheer number of posts out there saying that people misunderstood the article, well, it says something about the reception of the article. Which also frustrates the authors, it turns out.
I think Newsweek's sincerity on antiracism is pretty much summed up here.
--
"One law for the lion and the ox is oppression" - Blake
I think this forum is meant to have those descriptive facts already assumed as boundary conditions.
I woul have put the article into science-humanities.
I presume SSC didn't do so because he's relatively new. I'm pretty sure I made those kinds of mistakes early on.
I think Newsweek was trolling, and I think SCC is as well.
I am interested in that as well, but I am also interested in scientific research as a tool to understand how racism works. I think the conversation went "off topic" (to you) towards the science as soon as Unionist dismissed the study's validity because it was from Texas. (Those types of dismissals of studies (based on who the researcher is, e.g., "the researcher is a liberal, so the study is biased") usually "troll" me into responding angrily.)
Cool link! Thanks!
Ah. Gotcha. I agree then.
It is rather difficult following this discussion since people keep making reference to "the study". The article is actually written by two(non-academics apparently plugging their book) who actually cite a number of studies.
What I would say about both the authors and the research cited is that is clear that it is situated in a definite white liberal discourse around matters of race/racism. Unionist might be somewhat aghast by the fact that the argument that he is making is post-structural in that he claims the authors/researchers are not coming from a value neutral/objective place but is constructed from a perceivable cultural social and economic position.
What is deeply amusing and ironic is that one of the central claims of the article is that white people have difficulty discussing matters of race and racism all the while the article/research demonstrate the clumsy and confusing manner in which white liberal academics talk about race and racism. It is worth noting in this article RACISM is hardly mentioned at all the term of preference instead is "discrimination". I don't think this omission is entirely unintentional white liberal discourse prefers the latter, more neutral and less threatening and less politically loaded term because it avoids the complexity of dynamics of social and economic power. By avoiding these complexities white liberals can avoid examing their own relationship to power and privilege and the extent to which they benefit from the marginalization of others.I don't think any research that demonstrates that white people have difficulty discussing understanding race/racism is particularly ground breaking.
It is also noticeable that the authors of this article continually conflate the existence of race as an alleged biological reality and that of a social reality. Children do not notice "race" on their own, they do notice physical differences, the meanings they learn to ascribe to these difference is an entirely different process than some independent cognitive processes as suggested in the article.
The first study mentioned also has some obvious unexamined assumptions around racism in suppositions that the primary method of cultural transmission of is through explicitly taught racial attitudes rather than the deep immersion within a white supremist society. The second assumption that relates to what I mentioned earlier is that those best suited to address issues of race/racism are white liberal parents and academics. I think the entire article and the research quoted dismissed this fallacy.
If it's universal as in "a specific group acts a certain way" and remains so regardless of education or experience then it being innate is strongly implied. As I said though this "study" does not offer any such empirical proof in the first place and is so deeply flawed it shouldn't be considered as social 'science' either --not that it says what youre now implying either.
It doesn't. Vittrup's first Racial Attitude Measure showed that the white children developed racist attitudes even when their parents never, or almost never, explicitly talked about race. If the study assumed or "believed" that the primary method of cultural transmission was through explicitly taught racial attitudes, then the first Racial Attitude Measure would have shown no racism among the white children.
I take that as a yes. I don't want to keep talking about this here in this thread, but generally, if a study finds that a specific group acts a certain way, there is no assumption in the study or by the researchers that it is "regardless of experience" unless it is explicitly stated in the study.
Scientific findings are usually *not* about presenting universal laws of nature. Scientists study the effects of both "hereditary" and "environmental" influences on human behaviour. For example, if a study found that black Americans are less healthy than white Americans, the study and researchers are not saying that black Americans are innately less healthy than white Americans, or that it has nothing to do with inequalities in society. They would just be pointing out that there is a correlation for further research. There is no assumption that it is a universal law of nature.
Um, few of us here see ourselves are "liberals" thanks. Second, I don't how how you can now say that "racism" is a less threatening word than "discrimination" is. Third, I myself was only referencing what was in the Newsweek article and thread title and comparing it to what "Restructure" was arguing. The study the authors themselves took part in, regardless of other references, clearly used personal characterizations (nice or mean) in regards to pictures of those who looked more and less like the children tested, therefore it was not simply about being "colour blind" as Restructure was insisting. Fourth, this study was a piece of crap by any standards so theres really no reason to take it seriously anyhow.
Firstly I am not talking about posters here, I am talking about the authors and the various researchers and the assumptions about race/racism that are guiding their research. Secondly I am saying the authors of the article avoid the term racism in favour of the term discrimination because the latter is less threating and loaded.
Please don't take it as anything as this is not a proper sociological study and as anyone remotely knowledgeable on the subject knows sociology is not a proper "science". Comparing it to studies in physical health is not valid at all, even if the postulated causes for relative differences noted between "races" may require some sociological studies to detect if the differences are mostly biological (ie: adaptations to different local environments --value neutral) or societal (ie: poverty and discrimination --value loaded) in cause.
Ah, thank you for clarifying. My apologies then for misreading you.
Thanks for your post, NRK! I'm glad you got it in before this thread is closed for length.
You're shifting your ground again.
The researchers did not find out about the extent of parental discussions around race until after the interventions were carried out. The arcicle does not actually reference what the researchers believed was the prime method for the transmission of cultural values, the fact that they chose the family as the location of intervention implies that they believed at least originally this might be the primary level of transmission. The article itself is definetly unclear not only in defining what race/racism is but also how it is transmitted. The question remains how are white parents supposed to talk coherently about topics that they themselves have little understanding about. I am also questioning the extent to which these white researchers are experts on the topic of race/racism.
You completely misunderstand what I was saying, and no, the study was not a piece of crap by any standards, as you clearly are misunderstanding what was being investigated.
I am arguing that the article argues that the ability to see skin colour is inborn, not that racism is inborn, so it is impossible to be racially "color blind" (unless you really are blind).
I am NOT arguing that the Vittrup study or the Newsweek article is not discussing studies of racism.
No, I am not shifting ground. Go back and read all my comments, carefully.
Yes, but it is reasonable to conclude that if the parents were not having race talks during the intervention even when asked to, they weren't having race talks before the intervention when the first Racial Attitude Measure was administered to their children.
Ridiculous. That they chose the family as the location of intervention only implies that they believed that parenting can improve children's racial attitudes.
Of course the researchers do not believe that the family is the prime method for the transmission of cultural values, as there are tons of research out there about social conditioning. You are assuming that the researchers are ignorant about basic background knowledge in their own field, the kind that they would have to learn in an introductory course. This assumption is completely unwarranted.
Yes, because it is not supposed to be a review article about all the research in the world that has even been done about race and racism, and everything that anyone has ever found. It is just about a few studies about race, racism, and parenting.
This is a good point. However, I think what they were discussing was very basic, like the Sesame Street implied messages but made explicit. Six of the families who talked about race showed improvement, but perhaps those families are more advanced than the others in the first place.
I don't think researchers in general believe that they are the "experts" on a broad topic like race/racism, but they are presented that way by media. However, they are investigating one aspect of race/racism from one angle. Researchers are aware that they are many other researchers in their field carrying out different studies simultaneously. They do not assume that their single study out of hundreds is the definitive one on a topic as broad as race/racism or even race/racism in parenting.
Again, I don't necessarily think what "researchers" think of themselves is relevant to the issue of the placement of this article on the front page of Newsweek. They are perceived to be, and are often posited as "experts", regardless of their own self-perceptions. They are deemed to have "expertise", and their views given weight in that manner simply by the placement of the article in a popular magazine, and on the cover no less, at the level one might expect for an article about the dropping of the atom bomb on Nagasaki. I am sure that Albert Eienstein did not perceive himself to be "the" expert on nuclear physics, and indeed I am sure that he would have passed along that mantle happily to others in his field, but nonetheless that is how he is perceived, and how he is promoted, wether he liked it or not.
The fact that it can be shown that babies can "descriminate" naturally is being given front page coverage on Newsweek, under the title "Is You Baby Racist", and the quite predictable outcome of this "revelation" is unfolding as we speak.
Enough for this thread. Suffice it to say the study was seriously flawed, and probably deliberatly idiotic.