Intersectionality Essay

In the beginning of this course I felt that I knew the basics about racism, privilege, and intersectionality. However as we began our semester I realized I was very ignorant about how these topics relate to each other. These concepts or ideas dictates how we perceive others or our surroundings. These problems and continue to exist and evolve in our society through the process of socialization. The main problem today is that although this cycle of racism or privilege continues to exist in our society we are socialized to ignore the issues in an effort to avoid complication and maintain the status quo. The only way we can contribute to change is by choosing the path of great resistance (Johnson 129).

Our society has the power of influencing us. The main effect of socialization is that social stratification, which has existed in every society. Socialization is the most powerful tool that drives racism. Through this process, not only do we learn social customs, but we are also conditioned or taught about how we should feel about certain people and their role in the society. Since from a young age we are taught what the social norms, it is hard for us to accept those who are different. Thus, racism can be a learned behavior from our

Intersectionality is defined as “a framework for understanding how a variety of oppressions can intersect” (Intersectionality is not a label). Intersectionality explains how one can experience multiple discrimination due to over lapping. For example, currently the media shows that people who are predominantly discriminated against are black, Mexicans, and Muslims. For this reason, in today’s society, to be a woman, black, and Muslim in America is can be extremely overwhelming and challenging. Essentially the level of disadvantage this individual experience is obviously higher than the level of discrimination an average black women or