Migration of people from one geographical area to another is happening as people go to look for better livelihoods, furthering education and others for visiting purposes. As a result in one geographical territory there can be so many races of people. For instance in the united states at the moment there are whites, Africans, African Americans and Asians. All these people would like to have equal rights but amongst them there those that are considered to be minority groups. Most of them are deprived of the privileges that the indigenous whites enjoy. However this paper seeks to understand the kinds of interracial organizing.
These types of interracial organizing are coalitions, interracial organizing based on differences as well as organizing based on similarities. Coalition organizing Coalition organizing is whereby people of different races come together to form one big union which is better placed in terms of the bargaining power . according to Sandip Roy it makes more sense for Indians and Asians to form one group for their voices to be heard, for their presence to be felt. She says that when she left India for the United States her identity kept changing as she flew over boundaries.
It changed from the small ethnic group with which she identifies herself with to the continent she comes from. Here the entities have to put down their differences so a to be at one level with the other members and since there is power in numbers, in the United States, whatever grievances they air will not go deaf ears. Coalitions are the only way forward for minorities within minorities, an example of this being homosexuals who are South Asian and living in America. Their sexuality automatically renders them a minority as well as their geographical disposition which can mean being without power. In a coalition, there are always two sides.
One must be on the opposing side. Another illustration of a coalition is where a certain country has many political parties but there being one party that is stronger than the other smaller ones. The smaller ones can decide to merge together and form one alliance so as to oppose the bigger party, a move that usually has a high probability of victory in elections. Similarly coalitions became very essential to the minorities within minorities. The search for a common voice has made the south Asian gays and lesbians, men and women to put their differences apart on the platform of sexuality and ethnicity.
Organizing based on similarities Organizing based on similarities entails grouping by people based on some shared common aspects. According to Julia Sudbury, women can seek to have a collective identity when they look at the history of their groups. The term ‘black’ is used to mean the Asian woman, the Caribbean and the Chinese woman as well as the African woman. The women in each of the following groups will feel connected or will realize that they are one with the other ‘black women’ when they learn that they share the same political struggles.
It is at this time that they also get to learn that they undergo the same type of racism. The racism is seen for instance in education where not much emphasis is put on the education of the girl child while in other cases it is the treatment of children as subnormal. This inculcates the feeling of oneness in women irrespective of their ethnic or other affiliation. Organizing based on differences as the statement suggests does not look into the collective identity. The gaps come inform of gender, color, religious inclination and the origin of a person.
In the United States, according to Chandra Mohanty, 3, there are people who are very discriminative. She talks of how a lecturer like her asks her what she is studying in college and when she will be going back. The man thought that she was a student and most likely did not expect that she was having that post in America. When she says that she teaches women’s studies he keeps rather quiet. Being a feminist is viewed as not being normal in a sense. This lecture decides that there is nothing he has in common with the feminist that can support a conversation.
It is therefore rather easy to see why similar ideals will pull people together especially if they are being shunned by the mainstream society. The shunning and the opposition is also a source of motivation for vowed rebels. It gives their cause more purpose and attracts other likeminded people in these organizations. Being a feminist allows one to feel some comradeship with a fellow feminist so that this similarity in ideals brings these two together with a common purpose. This collective identity aids both men and women define themselves in a society that is multi-segmented into gender, race, representation and ideological patterns.
Any utilization of this kind of strategic unity where women black or of Asian descent creates a commonality that allows the differences in their backgrounds to fade into triviality as they seek to stand against an oppressive system (Julia, S. 33,34). Focus is now shifting from authenticity and racial purity due to the changing objectives of these movements and an attempt to organize black women purely based on the traditional definition is now an outdated phenomenon that is bound to fail dismally.
There are objectives that need to be pursued that have change the nature of organizing like the availability of developmental cash for such groups as well as grants which are given mainly to the bigger and louder groupings. Organizing Based on Differences Organizing based on differences is a modern idea that brings people with different racial and ideological differences but who share similar experiences as a result of where they live. These people cannot be defined by such unidimensional terms.
The feminist movement has attempted to pioneer ways which bring together diverse constituencies that form the women movement in pursuit of a collective political identity. Immigrants of diverse origins namely African, Asian and Caribbean were viewed as homogeneous groups of ‘colored commonwealth citizens. ’ Their differences are nullified by their common challenges and they are compelled to unite in order to survive. Conclusion Interracial organizing has been used as a tool for gaining advantage in an oppressive environment for many minority groups in America and Britain.
These organizations have been used for collective bargaining as well as developing a collective identity. The basis has been coalitions, similarities as well as differences. There have been some inherent weaknesses that have threatened to destabilize these so formed movements but more often than not the common purposes has been greater.
Works Cited
Chandra, T. M. Defining Genealogies: Feminist Reflections on being South Asian in North America p1-5. Julia, S. Reconstruction Multiracial Blackness Women’s Differences and Collective Identity in Britain. p22, 33-37. Sandip Roy