Race and Ethnicity Glossary

Policies designed to increase representation of historically underrepresented groups in education and employment.

The process by which minority group members adopt the cultural norms and practices of the dominant group.

The use of seemingly nonracial explanations to maintain racial inequality, such as appeals to meritocracy or cultural deficiency.

Discrimination based on skin tone, with lighter-skinned individuals receiving preferential treatment over darker-skinned individuals.

An intellectual framework from legal scholarship that examines how laws and institutions perpetuate racial inequality.

The shared cultural identity maintained by people dispersed from their ancestral homeland.

Actions or behaviors that treat individuals or groups unequally based on their membership in a particular social category.

W.E.B. Du Bois's concept of the dual self-perception experienced by African Americans navigating a racist society.

A social identity based on shared cultural heritage, including language, religion, customs, and historical experience.

The tendency to evaluate other cultures according to the standards of one's own culture, often assuming cultural superiority.

Unconscious attitudes or stereotypes that influence behavior and decision-making without conscious awareness.

Racial discrimination operating through the established practices of organizations and institutions.

A framework for understanding how overlapping social identities interact to create unique experiences of privilege or disadvantage.

Brief, commonplace exchanges that communicate hostile or derogatory messages to members of marginalized groups, often unintentionally.

A framework that promotes the coexistence and equal recognition of diverse cultural traditions within a society.

Preconceived attitudes, opinions, or feelings about a group, often based on stereotypes rather than direct experience.

A socially constructed category used to classify people based on perceived physical characteristics such as skin color, hair texture, and facial features.

The theory that capitalism has historically depended on producing racial difference to extract labor and resources from racialized populations.

The sociohistorical process by which racial categories are created, inhabited, transformed, and destroyed.

The enforced separation of racial groups in housing, education, and public life, whether by law (de jure) or in practice (de facto).

A system of advantage and disadvantage based on race, operating at individual, institutional, and structural levels.

The discriminatory denial of financial services to residents of predominantly minority neighborhoods.

A form of colonialism in which the colonizing population permanently occupies Indigenous land, displacing and marginalizing Indigenous peoples.

Racial inequality embedded in the policies, practices, and norms of social institutions, producing disparate outcomes without requiring individual prejudice.

Unearned social advantages that white people benefit from in racially hierarchical societies.