The major categories into which we sort humans — race, class, and gender — in themselves may not be harmful. However, where there are categories, there also seems to be ranking, which leads to such things as racism, sexism, class-based discrimination, etc. This damaging tendency to rank is learned through interaction and encouraged by the distorted picture of the world portrayed in mass media, such as television.

Incorporate the films “La Haine” and “Manufacturing Consent”, along with course lectures and readings on impression management, class, race, gender, and media, into an elegant, well-organized, thesis-driven 7-8 page discussion of ALL OF the following topics:

1) How do we construct a socially stratified reality? Discuss the ways in which we construct our category-driven realities (you may wish to revisit and reference earlier course materials – such as “Five Features of Reality” and materials on Symbolic Interactionism – for this part).

2) Discuss how we engage in impression management to construct certain images for ourselves in terms of race, class, and gender.

3) How and why does discrimination arise, how is it perpetuated, and what are its consequences?

4) What solutions can you imagine? Describe them, and indicate how they might actually come about.

The essay which you construct should be integrated around a thesis. The thesis will be one of your own creation, but it must be one which addresses the above topics. Concepts of impression management, class, race, and gender should be briefly, but clearly, defined