Relationship between Prejudice and Discrimination

African-Americans and Mexican Americans are the two largest non-white ethnic groups, and some of the problems they face such as marginalization, poverty and ghetto life can be traced back to the early centuries, which is a result of prejudice, discrimination, racism and segregation from the white majority. In the journal article, McDonald focuses on the interaction between the elite whites in Austin Texas, and African American, and the Mexicans Americans during the early twentieth century, during the migration. In this article, McDonald has examined the impact of the migration between 1910 and 1930, on the dominant white race, and their attitude and views, as well as how they treated the minority groups, the non-white ethnics. In addition, he examines the agendas that were emphasized by the African-American and Mexican American leaders, in order to change the situation. The article has addressed the different ways that respective leaders sought to improve their lives respective communities, where the African-American focus on attaining more universal goals, while the Mexicans or Chicanos focused more on multicultural goals. The whole article, examines the transition from a bipartite to a tripartite society, where the Mexicans were the last to enter, especially as laborers, in the fields, for white men, when the demand for cotton rose, and more white people shunned away such jobs and preferred white color jobs in towns.

The change from a two ethnic community to three occurred during the immigration of the Mexican Americans during the 1910s, and 20, and rather than reducing the stratification of the society in to groups, it strengthened, making the white domination stronger. The white man treated all the non-white s as subordinates, and they did the work that the white man did not want or resented, further making them subordinates to the white. In this period when the Mexicans migrated, due to their half-black half white, they were considered white, and allowed to share amenities and social places such as hotel tables with white, until the United States Census Bureau classified them as of the other races. After this declaration, segregation took deeper root, even public schools and low status health facilities were made for Mexican American, since they could no longer be treated as white. Further, residential segregation worsened, and the Mexicans were dispersed largely into two groups, one in little Mexico, while the other was in East Austin. More segregation was evidenced by the establishing of different public service amenities, such as health centers, municipal wards for Mexicans women, and a Mexican park in East Austin. It is during this time that the two nonwhite ethnics encountered each other, and the American cities, and ghetto formation took place out of the prejudice, racism and ethnic violence and segregation of the white race to the minority nonwhites. It is during this time that the two ethnic groups started challenging the racial discrimination and ethnic oppression structures.

The article has concentrated on the period of 1910-1930, and the city of Austin has been used because the population of the two ethnic groups is proportionately equal, and more so, the geographical position of the city is at the border of South’s traditional black belt region, and the newly Mexicanized area of the south west. However, the Mexicans had just reestablished themselves in the first decade of the century, and the blacks were the only non-white group, since others were German and Swedish, who were considered white. However, despite being considered white, they were not allowed political power such as voting in the election, while the black and Mexican had little or limited power in voting. The Mexicans definitions have been varied, and at many times neglected in many studies, where the blacks have been compared to the white in many occasions.

The social structure was changed by the three migrations; one was the trans-border from Mexico, inter-regional and rural urban migration. The main cause of this demographic change was brought about by the change in agriculture where demand for cotton rose, calling for imported labor. In addition, due to the expansion of the railroad, Austin too, benefited from it through access to other markets, and contributed to the need for large-scale farming. Due to lack of land for majority of people especially minority, employment lacked too, and this caused migration to the urban areas. Further, work was divided among the ethnic groups, where the whites refused the tasks they felt were meant for lower caste groups. Soon, most of the whites without land preferred to migrate to town, and the farmers had little choice except to employ the non-whites, though they were not treated as white, since they did not get as much as whites did. The whites viewed the non-whites as their subordinates, who they felt should take advantage of their low standards of living and exploit their muscle to the fullest, at a cheaper cost. Later, when the Austin businessmen felt that there was a potential danger in letting three non-whites run their firms, they took it to themselves to import labor from Mexico, and distribute them to the areas they were needed. The occupations were divided among different ethnic groups, where the white took the prestigious jobs, and those they shunned were given to blacks.

The period of 1910-30 was of intense demographic change in Texas, especially Austin. The black later in 1917 migrated from Austin, wit the aim of getting better payment to support their families. In 1918, the African American leaders were reported that enrollment in school and church for children had gone down in the past year. The leaders emphasized the economic reasons behind the migration from Texas, and the colored welfare board, CWB, which was a blacks leaders’ group with the responsibility of reporting on issues concerning blacks reported that the migration was caused by poor pays, and the blacks wanted better pays. This group further warned that this could not have been the case had they been paid better wages. This illustrated that the main cause was not racism or segregation, but economic reasons. It was further affirmed through a newspaper that the blacks who left were motivated not only by economic reasons, but also, by political and social reasons where the paper reported that the life of one of the blacks who had moved to California felt free, with the privileges of a man.

I agree with the findings, considering that even today, blacks and Mexicans in America are still marginalized, and a big proportion of them live in poverty in the ghettos, while majority of the white are elite. However, it is worth noting that this has reduced over the years, where all have the same rights, and share services together, and all have equal opportunities to employment. I also agree to the fact that the prejudice of the white people caused discrimination, racism, and violence among the races, which could be seen in some cases today. I do agree to the fact that work was divided into races, and ethnicity, where most unskilled jobs were given to the marginalized, and exploitation of cheap labor existed at the time. What more is that during the civil war, the southern side, including Texas fought to retain slave trade, while the northern side fought to abolish. Hence, the article content is in line with this fact, and it is no wonder that up to this time, blacks were still treated almost like slaves, by the white men in the southern side, while in the northern; they might have received better treatment.

However, the article gives only a history of one place, so we do not know how the other areas might have been, whether the treatment was the same elsewhere or not. Yet, the article, has largely generalized the groups, where a reader may tend to believe it was so everywhere, while the truth is that it might not be so, hence, a comparison with another area could have shed light about the views and attitudes of other groups of whites elsewhere towards the minority. More so, it has not clearly elaborated why the blacks moved fro Austin to the places they choose.

More so, the article is only written by one author, who makes its more prone to biases, unlike when many writers come together with different ideas of the same topic, and chances of biasness are reduced. How ever, the writer has managed to overcome this considering that it is a peer reviewed article, which has been proof read by many authors before it is put in is availed on the journal. This makes believable, and doubts of biasness are reduced when the article is peer reviewed, hence it is reliable. More still, to add to its reliability, the author has used credible sources, such as books, which are primary sources, and quite believable. The author has used other primary sources such as statistical data from the bureau of census of the period of time that the article covers, hence making the content more reliable and beyond much doubt, which could have occurred had the writer used sources only written after the period. To affirm the truth of his assertions, or findings, he used more sources such as articles from the paper of the time, citing excerpts from the magazine about what people, blacks wrote as letters to their colleagues, talking about their migration to California. In addition, the writer has used statistical facts, that cannot be disputed, further affirming that this are not his assumptions, but rather, the content is right for what it is. With such sources, which one expects to find in archives, the truth of the findings can easily be evidenced, making the article quite reliable for history students.

However, the article is twenty-five pages long, yet, there are no subheadings to illustrate classification, but rather, and the paper is one long continuous flow, making it look monotonous to the reader. This makes it hard to use it for research, since it does not allow scheming though and one has to go through it all, which makes it to tedious, considering one may not have the time to go through it all. More still, the flow is not consistent to be understood by all readers, since at some point, after reading quite a big part of it, the author adds a sentence stating what the article talks about, which makes the reader feel like the article is now starting, and wonders what was the relevance of the content before that. More still, even after this statement, the content is not direct, rather, one has to get the point from the story told, which makes hard since a new learner may not know the most significant sentences that illustrate the main points. In overall, the flow of the paper is not appealing to people who might be learning this history for the first time. With such an article, it requires a good amount of concentration, to get all the points without loosing track of the pint made earlier, and needs connecting every point together, which makes it a little harder the first time you hear the topic.

Despite the flow of the article, it has provided good knowledge and understanding of where the marginalized ethnicity groups have come from in the past, showing a clear struggle to survive with very little, and having to bear the mistreatment and discrimination. More so, the article has given a clear understanding of why these are the marginalized tribes, or why most of them are poor, and at the same time, a clear picture of ghetto origin has been illustrated properly. The article is quite educative about some of the current trends that we still see today about the two groups, and reading the article gives a clear view of the period it covers.

If I were to write the article, the content would remain the same, however, the flow and structure of the article, to put it either in chronological order, or classify each segment of main point in their own paragraph and use subheading for easier understanding of the whole paper. As I was reading, I enjoyed the content, but had to read several times to put all point together for a summary, which I must say was not as easy as might seem, and was quite involving. Still, when I was reading the content of the article, clear pictures of where racism started came into my mind, and it was easy to see or imagine what it was like at that time for those who were there, and left me wondering how it must have felt to be on either side, marginalized or dominant. It left me craving to learn more about this piece of history, which has been heard in rare occasions, and was the first time I heard it, since I thought after civil war, discrimination reduced tremendously, which I have learned took time, and is still not yet over.