Reflective Essay On Race And Ethnicity

Race has affected me in an interesting way. I have the unique opportunity of being half white and half hispanic. Because of my dual heritage, I have experienced a wide variety of affects from my race. Being of two ethnicities, my experience with race and ethnicity has consisted of a lot of situational ethnicity. This becomes a factor, “when we deliberately assert our ethnicity in some situations while downplaying it in others. Situational ethnicity involves a kind of cost-benefit analysis that symbolic ethnicity does not: we need to appraise each situation to determine whether or not it favors our ethnicity” (Ferris and Stein 218). Growing up I often benefitted from my father’s “white privilege,” without recognizing it as such. “‘White privilege’ is the idea that one group (whites) in a society enjoys certain unearned advantages not available to others

At times this will reveal itself, with my inability to speak much Spanish, and when this happens I sense a slight change in demeanor that isn’t excluding but recognizes the lack of shared background. My different family backgrounds have also taught me about the differences between interaction with my hispanic family and my white family. I love them both equally, but there is a different atmosphere with each of them. In my hispanic family, there is an overwhelming sense of acceptance and family. My grandmother’s family gets together every other year for a family reunion and at these reunions, there is a huge emphasis of family. Half the people don’t even know one another, yet they treat each other as if they had known each other forever. It doesn’t matter who you are or what you’ve done, first and foremost you are family and that is the most important part. With my white family, there is a greater emphasis on loyalty and more intimate