Question

"Race as Class," Herbert J. Gans
Noting that most biologists argue that scientifically there can be no human "races' and that sociologists argue that concepts of race are socially constructed, Gans links the persistent lay definition of "race" to the hierarchy of social class in the U.S. The laity, he claims, notice variations in select physical characteristics and "see" these variations as markers of individual races. The lay public then uses their definitions of race to place individuals in hierarchal categories that correspond to social class locations. Gans further claims that many immigrant groups were "blanched" or "whitened" in the lay imagination once those groups experienced upward mobility. This was not the case, he says for African Americans. While the reasons for this exception are a "mystery" to Gans, he expects it to persist unless class hierarchies finally disappear "in some utopian future."
Gans argues that the lay public uses a perception of select physical variations to define:
a. biology
b. social construction
c. individual races
d. strangers

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