Ethnic Studies Midterm Review

Vocabulary flashcards covering core concepts, court cases, historical movements, and policies from the Ethnic Studies Midterm review notes.

Agency

The ability to make choices and take action, such as organizing protests to challenge unfair laws.

American Indian Movement (AIM)

An Indigenous rights organization formed in 1968 that raised awareness of Native rights and self-determination.

Americanization

Pressure to adopt dominant American culture and practices, such as pressuring Native people to abandon their traditions.

Assimilation

Adopting a dominant group's culture more broadly, sometimes by force, which weakened Indigenous languages and traditions.

Belonging

Feeling accepted by a group; influenced by power dynamics that dictate who is included or excluded.

Black Power

A movement emphasizing and promoting Black pride, self-determination, and community control.

Brown v. Board of Education (1954)

Supreme Court ruling that declared public school segregation unconstitutional; integration faced resistance.

Chinese Exclusion Act (1882)

Federal law that restricted Chinese labor immigration and made anti-Chinese discrimination federal policy.

Civil Rights Movement

An organized fight for racial equality and desegregation in which protests helped challenge segregation.

Cultural Change

Modifications within a culture occurring through innovation or contact with other cultures.

Doctrine of Discovery

A European doctrine used to justify claiming Indigenous lands and supporting colonization.

Dominant Group

A group holding greater social power; historically, White Americans held greater political and economic influence.

Du Bois, W. E. B.

A Black scholar and activist who challenged racism and helped establish the NAACP.

Enculturation

The process of learning the traditions, values, and language of a specific culture or community.

Ethnicity

A social category based on shared culture, ancestry, nationality, language, history, or traditions.

Eurocentrism

Treating European culture and knowledge as the standard, which helped justify devaluing Indigenous traditions.

Executive Order 9066 (1942)

A government order that authorized military exclusion zones, enabling the forced removal and incarceration of Japanese Americans during WWII.

Identity

How people understand who they are, shaped by culture, family, and experiences.

Identity Formation

The development of a person's identity over time through society, family, and community.

Immigration and Nationality Act (1965)

Legislation that ended the national-origins quota system and expanded immigration from Asian countries.

Indian Removal Act (1830)

A law authorizing the forced removal of Native nations that opened ancestral lands to White settlement.

Individual Prejudice

Personal beliefs, attitudes, or opinions held about people based on race.

Intersectionality

The framework showing how overlapping identities (such as race, gender, and class) affect experiences of oppression and create different barriers.

Japanese American Incarceration

The forced removal and imprisonment of Japanese Americans during WWII without individualized proof of disloyalty, causing families to lose homes and freedom.

Jim Crow

Laws and practices enforcing racial segregation and discrimination after slavery, especially in the South, that restricted Black Americans' rights and opportunities.

Juneteenth

June 19, commemorating the 1865 announcement of emancipation in Texas.

Librotraficante Caravan

An activist effort that delivered books banned in Arizona to resist the censorship of ethnic studies.

Malcolm X

An activist who emphasized Black pride, self-determination, and resistance to racial oppression.

Manifest Destiny

The belief that United States expansion across North America was justified, used to support Indigenous land seizure.

Manumission

The act of legally freeing an enslaved person.

Martin Luther King Jr.

A civil rights leader who emphasized nonviolent resistance and civil disobedience to challenge segregation.

Model Minority Stereotype

The false idea and generalization that all Asian Americans are uniformly successful and hardworking, which hides differences and discrimination.

Nonviolent Protest

Peaceful resistance to injustice, such as sit-ins that challenged segregation in public spaces.

Othering

Treating a group as foreign, inferior, or outside the accepted community, which can make exclusion and discrimination seem acceptable.

Ozawa v. United States (1922)

Supreme Court case that denied naturalization to Japanese immigrant Takao Ozawa under racial eligibility laws, demonstrating racial barriers to citizenship.

Page Act (1875)

Immigration legislation that particularly restricted Chinese women's immigration, making family reunification harder.

Performative Activism

Publicly supporting a cause without meaningful action, such as claiming racial equality without changing discriminatory policies.

Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)

Supreme Court decision that upheld racial segregation under the 'separate but equal' doctrine, giving legal support to segregation.

Race

A social category based on perceived physical traits that society creates and gives meaning to.

Racial Disparities

Unequal outcomes and measurable differences between racial groups, such as differences in income, education, and homeownership.

Racial Framing

Ideas and stereotypes that shape how people interpret race, such as blaming Chinese workers for job competition to justify exclusion.

Racial Trauma

The emotional and psychological harm caused by racism.

Reconstruction

The post-Civil War period addressing the South and formerly enslaved people's rights; its decline weakened protections and enabled further oppression.

Red Power Movement

A broader Indigenous activism movement promoting Native rights, pride, and self-determination.

Redlining

The practice of denying mortgages or investment to certain neighborhoods based on race, limiting Black families' ability to build wealth.

Slave Codes

Laws controlling enslaved people's behavior and rights, which strengthened slaveholders' power.

Slavery

An institution where people were legally treated as property and forced to work without freedom.

Social Construction of Identity

The principle that society and culture shape how people understand identity and who they are.

Social Construction of Race

The concept that society creates racial categories and assigns meaning to them, which can influence laws and discrimination.

Socialization

The process of learning social norms and behaviors from family, school, and peers.

Sovereignty

A nation's right to govern itself, as defended by Native nations over their communities and lands.

Structural Change

Changing systems, institutions, or unfair policies that cause inequality, rather than focusing solely on individual attitudes.

Systemic Racism

Racial inequality built directly into laws, institutions, policies, and practices.

Thind v. United States (1923)

Supreme Court case that denied naturalization to Indian immigrant Bhagat Singh Thind under racial eligibility rules, exposing racial restrictions on citizenship.

Three-Fifths Clause

A constitutional clause that counted three-fifths of enslaved people for representation and taxation, increasing slaveholding states' political power without granting enslaved people voting rights.

Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK)

Indigenous environmental knowledge passed down through generations that guides land and resource care.

Trail of Tears

The forced removals of Native peoples, including the Cherokee, that caused deaths, displacement, suffering, and cultural disruption.

Transatlantic Slave Trade

The forced transportation of Africans to the Americas, generating wealth through enslaved labor.

Tulsa Race Massacre (1921)

An event in 1921 where White mobs destroyed Black Greenwood in Tulsa, devastating Black homes, businesses, and wealth.

Wong Kim Ark (1898)

Supreme Court case that affirmed birthright citizenship for a U.S.-born child of Chinese immigrants under the circumstances of the case.

Xenophobia

Fear or hostility toward foreigners that contributed to anti-immigrant discrimination.

Yellow Power

Asian American activism promoting solidarity, pride, and resistance to racism.