History Of Race And Ethnicity Essay

Race and Ethnicity
There’s a long and controversial history around the world over race and how people react to and treat others of a different race. Race and ethnicity are important types of diversity in organisations.
Race is defined as the biological heritage, this includes physical characteristics such as skin colour that people use to identify themselves. Many people identify themselves as part of a racial group and such racial classifications are an integral part of a country’s cultural, social and legal environments.
Ethnicity is related to race, but it refers to social traits such as one’s cultural background that are shared by a human population.
The racial and ethnic diversity is South Africa is decreasing. This is because not all

Race & Ethnicity have and is still at the heart of South African history, politics, society and economy. South Africa remains a complex mix of different races, cultural identities, languages and ethnic bonds. During the apartheid period, the government introduced numerous legislations based on racial classification. For example, the legislative basis for racial classification during apartheid was the Population Registration Act no.30 of 1950. This act divided the South African population into three main racial groups namely Whites, Blacks, Indians and Coloured people (people of mixed race).
Race no longer count that much here in South Africa. People are now united. When it comes to politics, whether Whites, Blacks or Coloured, everyone is more than welcome to vote for any political party. When it comes to society people are mixed in terms of race. It is no longer like apartheid where people were separated because of race. The most common characteristics distinguishing various ethnic groups is ancestry, territorial, possession, language, forms of dress, a sense of history and religion. So people who belong to an ethnic group have ancestors that also shared the same culture which is norms, values and also beliefs. This means that culture started long ago and it moves from one generation to the other. People who belong to the same ethnic group stay in

Identities refers to how people classifies themselves. This include gay and lesbians. A gay is a man or a male that behaves like a female. This include having females walk and talk. Lesbian is a female that behaves like a male. This also include walking like a male, cutting hair like males, speaking like male (having a deep voice like that of a man), and dressing clothes for man like trousers and T-shirts.
In South Africa, gays and lesbians are now accepted. A guy and can start behaving like a girl and even dating a fellow guy and even marry each other. Same applies to lesbians, a girl can marry a fellow girl. This is accepted even by the society although it is weird.
Culturally, it is still seen as a taboo and religiously is seen as evil. Culture such as Tsonga, still reject it when people of the sae gender marry each other but since it is allowed in the country there is nothing that can be done to stop it. Years back gays and lesbians were bitten as a way of stopping it but now someone can be arrested for biting gays and lesbian