Social Construction (revisited)

Social Construction- The video Race: The Power of an Illusion, Part I, The Difference Between Us uses social construction to show a viewpoint of race. It mentions that race is a way humans view their society as a means to understand its makeup and to separate groups of people based on their own preconceived definitions of race and of a society linked with race. Johnson in the Chapter "Privilege, Oppression, and Difference" in his book Privilege, Power, and Difference very simply remarks that "it's made up" on p.17. He says that social construction is a way to view the world by humans even if it isn't correct and real.


Week 2 addition:
Johnson in chapter 6 What It All Has to Do with Us of his book Privilege, Power, and Difference talks about how individuals and the social system act upon each other, even though they are separate entities. On p. 79 he provides a circular flow chart in which individuals
make the system happen by deciding what is acceptable and unacceptable in terms of your behavior and relations with others. The system, in turn, through the process of socialization and the concept of paths of least resistance shapes the individual's behavior, so it is a recurring cycle of behavior of the individual and social system working upon one another. Socialization is the procces by which individuals learn how to behave in acceptable terms of the system; paths of least resistance are choices for behaviors that will draw the least amount of opposition from the rest of society. This is a view of how social construction works to shape relations between peoples by deciding what is acceptable and what is unacceptable.

Johnson also talks about in chapter 3 Capitalism, Class, and the Matrix of Domination that social construction is based on the economics of class in capitalism. Capitalism favors distributing money to the wealthy, and an unsubstantial few amount of wealth is given to the poor. This creates class division and allows those at the top to do what they want with those at the bottom and decide how to set up the social ladder. Privilege is attained depending on who those at the top view highly, and it depends a lot on the individual's identity collectively. For instance, on p. 52 Johnson talks about how a white man may be privileged in the social ladder, but because he may be homosexual his privileges can be compromised as a result of other facets to his identity.