Semester Personal Reflection: How did this course impact your perspective and understanding of prejudice and discrimination in the real world?

Semester Personal Reflection
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Semester Personal Reflection
How did this course impact your perspective and understanding of prejudice and discrimination in the real world? Did it broaden, deepen, or change your viewpoint of the topics we covered? If so, how? What do you think you will take away from your experience this semester that you can apply in your academic and personal life?
When I heard the words prejudice and discrimination, my mind immediately thought of the extreme conditions or instances that could fit under both terms. I thought of the slavery period as well as the prejudicial policies and moments in the history of the United States. For example, my mind would think of the Jim Crow laws and how they discriminated against African Americans. I would marvel at the way the government would enable such treatment of its own citizens from whom it still expected taxes every year. However, the more I read and discover these terms, the more I understand that prejudice and discrimination live in the subtle acts and sentiments that people direct towards other people. For example, people have used stereotypes to discriminate or assert their prejudice. They have also taken notice of certain physical attributes that certain communities or ethnic backgrounds share. Such instances are quite subtle and may often go unnoticed but are part of prejudice and discrimination. Other people have been found to speak highly of their ethnic backgrounds while assuming a higher position compared to other ethnic backgrounds. All these instances are part of prejudice and discrimination. However, such are rarely mentioned because we have come to expect the extreme as prejudice and discrimination. In taking this class, I got to understand the subtlety of prejudice and discrimination and how I could be a perpetrator of the same. Therefore, this course helped broaden my understanding of both terms while also making it easier for me to become part of the solution to society's prejudice and discrimination problem.
One of the things that stood out for me in this class involved the ideas of in-groups and out-groups. Throughout the lessons involving in-groups and out-groups, I got to understand how prejudice and discrimination happens. Most of us do not know how prejudice and discrimination happens. The universal thinking is that people hate each other and thus decide to discriminate. However, this class helped me understand that there is a logical explanation for the onset of these two terms. First, I got to understand how in-group favoritism works. It was made apparent to me that everyone has the potential to act in prejudice, especially when we are in our ethnic groups. The reason here is that there is a commonness in everyone, and therefore, it would be difficult to notice when someone is acting in prejudice or is being discriminative towards other people. By understanding the above, I started noticing how I have also been part of the problem, especially when I am around people from my ethnic background. I realized that the main problem in society involves the lack of understanding of the dynamics of prejudice and discrimination. Therefore, many of us are part of the problem and help enhance it instead of trying or...