...BEING AFRICAN AMERICAN Being African American African Americans or who some may refer to as colored, negro, blacks, or even the most derogatory term niggas have had a plight of racism and discrimination since their arrival onto the American soil. African Americans did not migrate from their homes to find new land to explore and/or cultivate but instead were captured by Europeans and taken away from their homelands to a new and unknown land. They were snatched from their homes to be brought to America to work as slaves. In 1619 the first African slave arrives in Virginia to be sold into what would be the dark ages of their existence. Slavery began when the first African slave was brought to the North American colony of Jamestown, Virginia. European settlers in North America was looking to a cheaper labor source than indentured servants which were poor Europeans. After the initial Dutch ship brought 20 Africans ashore the British Colony of Jamestown, slavery spread throughout the other American colonies. Historians believe that and estimated 6-7 million slaves were imported to the New World during the 18th century alone (Staff, History.com, 2009). Initially black slaves worked mainly on plantations cropping tobacco, rice, and indigo. Slaves were counted as 3/5 of a person for the purpose of taxation guaranteeing the right to repossess any person held to service of labor. In the late 18th century the mechanization of the textile industry in England led to a huge demand for...
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...1. Name - Samira Shaikh 2. MKT 103 - Sec. 771 3. Date -April 22, 2012 Topic - Marketing/Advertising to the African American Community 5. My actual word count for this paper - 1,665 I am highly motivated, and I am committed to excellence. Marketers are now able to use tools such as social networking and email marketing to target prospective customers. Social media has made two-way communication easier between organization and customer and is proving valuable when trying to gain more insight into customer’s attitudes and perceptions.Years ago sales professionals had the majority of information, and we as consumers depended on sales professionals to inform and guide us in our decisions. In the past we needed professional sales people as they controlled the knowledge. Then around 1989 and beyond....the Internet changed everything and gave more power to the consumer. When the Internet began to go mainstream it opened the gates of the information super highway to the consumer in ways that had never been seen before. Then technology, computers, software and automation started taking hold and consumers had much more info at their fingertips to guide them, or at least point them in the right direction. Technological advances are enabling marketing professionals to use more specifically targeted digital channels to get their message across and email marketing is a low cost way to get your message directly to consumers. Digital marketing may be on the rise but print...
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...themselves,” (Abraham Lincoln) In the 1800’s free African Americans lived very restricted lives, although they were able to earn money, own property and legally marry, they could no socialize with white people or participate in anything political. The first African Americans came to Jamestown in 1619 and soon after they were enslaved. Slavery in the United States lasted for around 245 years, that is a very long time considering people have been living in America for almost 400 years. Around the early 1800’s most Northern African Americans were no longer slaves but they lived very deprived lives, they were not allowed to vote, have jury duty or socialize...
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...Racial Discrimination on African-Americans in Cleveland Abstract Discrimination is not something that can be rationalized by any argument, but we can track down the consequences of it for African Americans in Cleveland. Our ancestors a century ago laid the ground work for a segregated city by the lake and split it right down the middle with the Cuyahoga River. The east side of Cleveland has been where African Americans lived with the injustices of discrimination against them for a century now and while discrimination is not still potent, you can see the consequences it laid out for the African American community today. While some argue that discrimination has nothing to do with lack of employment or deplorable housing situation, the real truth is that the people who discriminated against them created these circumstances for African Americans. Discrimination in Cleveland: The Consequences of Racial Discrimination on African-Americans in Cleveland Consider the following scenario: A country formed on freedom and rights of individuals eventually deeming one race of individuals as unworthy of those freedoms and rights. This certain race would not be worthy of equal opportunities eventually leading to costs in the quality of life for this race for centuries. It is a curious outcome that an entire country could be built on uplifting ideals and then have double standards in its belief system. This is a scenario that unfolded in the African-American community in America today...
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...A number of African American women are succeeding on the long road to career advancement and leadership positions. Nevertheless, racism and sexism still hinder their efforts for career advancement and leadership positions. Black women are facing an intense combination of discrimination in American institutions. Because we live in a white male-dominated society, it is easy to underestimate African American women’s leadership potential and abilities. African American women are looked at as inferior beings, rather than as equals capable of accomplishing any and everything a man can. The purpose of this research will be to investigate how education influences career advancement and leadership positions of African American...
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...Gender Identity among African Americans Teresa Rucker SOC/338 10/29/13 Dr. A. McDaniel When defining Gender Identity it is said to be a person’s inner sense of being male or female and this sense usually developed during early childhood as a result of parental rearing practices and societal influences and strengthened during puberty by hormonal changes (Dictionary.com). This journey will examine the gender identity among African Americans and highlight the importance of African American women to the women movement. An African American woman will be chosen and a discussion will be done on her importance to the women movement era. Then the journey will end with a discussion on the differences and similarities between African American female and male identity and how has female identity change in the last thirty years. In examining the gender identity among African Americans it is said to be that men exhibit masculine traits and women express feminine traits. Even though African American men and women experience devastating times during slavery their identity roles were different. Black males were the first slaves to be brought to the colonies because they were viewed as being valuable and do to their strength they could perform various duties like building and plowing. Black women were purchased to be field workers. Mainly they worked the fields and this was seen as domestic work for women slaves. In slavery the black women identity was also seen as an economic advantage...
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...ShaQueelah Pierce Criminal Stereotypes of African American Males Watkins - English IV September 1, 2013 As human beings, we do certain actions without even knowing that we have done them, such as stereotyping other races or people by the way they look, talk, walk, or just carry themselves. African Americans, in particular, are a race of people that are stereotyped, but the typical African American males are usually stereotyped negatively. The typical stereotype for African American male is angry and criminals. The research I have conducted, has revealed to me that the criminal stereotype affects people’s memory, and essentially have a bad impact on people’s lives. I have evidence to show that there are people that believes the three issues and why it is not a valid stereotype toward African American males. African American males have gone through a lot of scrutiny throughout history. "In the past twenty-five years, African American males in the United States have gone through various social challenges." Bing lynched and murdered brutally just for their skin color, even the police pulling them over for no apparent reason and also considering the infamous Rodney King beating. Vast majority African American males have been through a lot of unnecessary adversity. Through these pointless social acts, some African American males have drifted toward criminal activities, such as: robbing people or stores, selling drugs, and doing anything to make money...
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...Turning Negative to Positive: African American Portrayal in Media As the day progresses into the late evening hour most of America sits in front of their televisions impatiently waiting to watch their favorite shows. From prime time television to viral videos on YouTube, media has become one of the most influential areas of life. The clothes we wear, slogans we say, and actions we portray are all influenced by media. For example, in 2012 “Ain’t nobody got time for that” became a popular slogan which transcended from a news interview that went viral. Although the slogan was catchy, it became famous more so for the way it was presented. The interviewee was an African American female who was a victim of a house fire. With the female being very passionate and animated while speaking in an urban accent, it provided for great entertainment. Sadly, that news interview lacked the appropriate representation of African Americans. The way media portrays a certain message “can have an inordinate influence on the public’s perception of blacks” (Holt 6). Audiences have been a witness to negative portrayal of African Americans since the days of “blackface”, where Caucasian American actors painted their faces black to depict African Americans. According to blog author Michelle Whalen, “now, more than ever, images of African Americans are transcending racial stereotypes and forging ahead into the fight for equality” (1). In the past two decades, media has been successful in providing positive...
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...poem that was written in 1896, that depicts how African-Americans must disguise their true emotions by smiling, laughing, and going along like their not being discriminated against. During slavery, African-Americans were treated with such humiliation and disrespect, that they had to cover their real emotions just to make their daily lives easier. Also they had to keep quite while being discriminated against, or they would have to face the consequences of being lynched, tortured, or imprisoned. In this close reading, I will elaborate what message Paul Dunbar is trying to convey to the audience, and how “ Wearing the Mask”, can even be applied today. Paul Laurence Dunbar was the first African-American to gain national recognition as a poet. He was born in 1872 in Dayton, Ohio, where he was the son of former slaves. Although Dunbar only lived to be thirty-three years old he was well known for writing short stories, novels, librettos, plays, songs, and poetry. In the article titled , “ Black Naturalism, White Determination Paul Laurence Dunbar’s Naturalist Strategies, it explains, how Dunbar had to create literary strategies that were capable of critiquing the problems African-Americans had to face, but at the same time he would not explicitly confront white readers beliefs regarding blacks. I believe the perfect example of this is “ We Wear the Mask”, because Dunbar is sending subliminal messages of how African-Americans are being discriminated against, but he doesn’t say this...
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...Health Promotion among African Americans Diversity in the nursing profession with caring for patients and their cultures is a very demanding concept for nurses when it involves providing health promotion and sickness prevention based on knowledge. This can be a daily challenge that must be faced with expertise to care for the various style of cultures and beliefs within communities. This paper will focus on African Americans and how this diverse population is recognized in health care Health Status of African Americans The population of African Americans in the United States is approximately 40.8 million (http://www.cdc.gov/minorityhealth/index.html, 2015). African Americans leading reason of death is cardiac disease, cancer, and strokes. The largest death rate is from cardiac disease and stroke compared to other minorities and populations along with the largest percentage of high blood pressure among adults aged 65 and older is 40% of this group. Secondly, obesity among women of African American nature is 58% compared with Mexican American people and the white population. Ultimately, obesity with both male and female adults is common in this minority with 38% of African Americans being prone to this condition. Diabetes is twice as large among this minority then white adults. The HIV infection rate is highest for African Americans compared to other racial minorities. Blacks have the largest death...
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...history African Americans have bravely fought to gain the same rights that white folks had. Even though the constitution grants and promises equal treatment under the law for all men, it sure didn’t feel like it. African Americans felt out of place in their communities due to the fact that they weren’t being treated as equal as whites, especially in the south. The white southerners felt that anything African Americans were trying to obtain was a problem. So why did white southerners restrain African American from having equal rights? The answer to this question lies in the economic field and on a hysteria that African American where going to become more inferior then they are. After African Americans received their freedom, most of the white southerners were angry. They were furious because all the “workers” were gone. Emancipation had hurt the rich white southerners economically because most of their income came from the slaves working in the plantation. During the reconstruction period white southerners had restrained African Americans in many ways and one way was financially. There was a system put in place called share cropping. Share cropping meant African Americans had to work for a certain amount of crop that the white southerners had or they purchase it from them. During this period most of white southerners would not give African Americans the total amount of crop that they work for. Another way that white southerners made it difficult for African Americans to obtain...
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...How far did US presidents hinder rather than help the development of African Civil rights in the period from 1865-12? It can be said that US presidents significantly hindered rather than helped the development of African Civil Rights in the period from 1965-1912 because the Presidents after Andrew Johnson and Ulysses S. Grant did not sustain the 14th Amendment which said that African Americans were equal citizens with equal rights and the 15th Amendment stated the right to vote was not to be denied on the account of race, colour or previous conditions of servitude and loopholes allowed the southern state governments not to enforce the amendments, in which the Amendments were flawed in the fact that the southern states where able to find these loopholes and to exploit these loop holes so that the African Americans did not receive their Civil rights. A major loophole was in the 15th amendment as it did not forbid states to introduce literacy, property and educational tests for would be voters and did not guarantee all men the right to vote and did not outlaw voting discrimination on the grounds of gender and property ownership so southern states devised complex rules and imposed additional voting requirements. Therefore this enabled the southern governments to introduce black codes which included grandfather clauses, poll tax and literacy tests which denied the African Americans of their civil rights such as blacks where banned from schools and not allowed to vote and had no...
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...discussion that will always bring out a debate. Many events have occurred that one would find horrifying just based off racism. Simply being judged or opposed by the color of your skin or ethnic features, something one has simply no control of. All humans are under one race, the human race, yet some still discriminate against others of different backgrounds. “Is racism a permanent feature of American society?” is the matter at hand though. In this article, this question is answered and given many points to view when answering this question. The debate of this question in this article begins with two different viewpoints. There is case that someone who goes by the name Derrick Bell, says yes to racism being a permanent feature in American society and then there is Dinnesh D’Souza who thinks otherwise. The article then goes to show what people believe racism is and ways to end it in American society. Derrick Bell feels that racism is a permanent feature in American society. He feels this way because there are whites that truly won’t let go of the past racial discrimination and will only stand for their color. He gives examples such as lower class whites will stand with upper class white; who don’t have a real interest in helping the lower class, rather join blacks who share the same needs as them. He also says that whites only view blacks as being lower than they are that’s why blacks don’t stand a chance in competing with whites in society. He feels that whites just wont...
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...Justice System July 25, 2013 Black Injustice Today African Americans are still being harassed by the criminal justice system, in a way where the color of their skin may have a disadvantage of their portrayal to law enforcements. Many African Americans have not been receiving the justice they deserve, because they are still people who judged them based on the history of slavery in the nation. They are treated unfair in a country where they based their government off a constitution as the Supreme Law and Declaration of Independence which states “All men are created equal.” But in that simple quote, based on how our society has yet to overcome racism, the country is a place where “All men are created equal” really means “all white men are created equal.” The criminal justice system in the United States tries to portray a fair criminal justice system, but fail to treat everyone equally. According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, the term justice is define as “the maintenance or administration of what is just especially by the impartial adjustment of conflicting claims or the assignment of merited rewards or punishments”, which in a simplified term means that people get what they deserve. They are many cases where African Americans don’t receive the justice they deserve compared to the whites who have an advantage in the criminal justice because of the white supremacy that the nation still portrays. African Americans have been treated unfairly even after slavery ended. One...
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...occurrences between African Americans and Caucasian Americans. This is a small part of life as an African American, there is also a somewhat tainted history of stereotypes and slavery, and finally the fact that social media can be biased corrupting today's view of these people. It is clear to many people that today’s society is still racist. It is clear that racism has not completely been destroyed, which means people can experience it in everyday situations. This can be shown in the case where an apartment manager asks an African American college student, Daniel, not to wear earphones while he strolled the halls. When Daniel was asked, he started to noticed Caucasian students wearing headphones and not having to remove them. This shows that the apartment manager seemed to have held the Caucasian American students over the African American students. This is one of many everyday racist acts. This makes living the life of a modern day African American hard, but so does the long history involved in being African American. I think that if I were to come from an African American background The long history between Caucasian Americans and African Americans affects people today. It is clear that these two groups of people have not treated one another fairly and some people may feel that it is up to the Caucasian Americans to continue making up for their mistakes and wrongdoings towards the African Americans. Some people would agree that living as an African American person in today's...
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