Date of Award

2025

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelors

Department

Social Sciences

First Advisor

Toro-Farmer, Gerardo

Area of Concentration

Political Science with Psychology

Abstract

This thesis will analyze and explore the laws, systems, actors and events in the colonies of America that constructed and evolved the concept of race. Specifically, the Anglo colony of Virginia and the colony of Louisiana which went under French, Spanish and Anglo rule, will be examined. The question of what race is and what its purpose is will be tackled in this thesis. Big picture questions like what came first, slavery or racism will also be answered. The original scholarly work on Virginia was used as a guideline of how to go about studying the concepts of race and racism in an effective manner. After picking a more persuasive method of studying race and racism, that method will be applied to studying Louisiana’s racial development. Throughout the thesis, the focus will be geared towards looking at the context, intentions and purpose of laws and systems regarding race. The thesis will show how the construction and attitudes of race under different systems and legal traditions differed. One thing discovered is that race is not an exclusive New World development, but instead, race by skin color is a New World exclusive. This will be shown in the Louisiana chapter when the Old World nobility practices by the French undergo analysis. The reasoning for the development of race by skin color is due to the structure of slave societies in colonial America. The Europeans were the drivers of colonial projects, enslaved Africans made accessible by the slave trade were the labor force and Natives were the original land occupiers. Unlike other systems of hierarchy, the groups in these societies were distinct in their phenotypes, which became permanent markers of inherent value in society. What was found is that a pattern exclusive in both constructions of race was centered around power and resource distribution in societies, and that the group atop the hierarchy is responsible for creating the notion of race. The beliefs that were shared in both systems were fixed inferior qualities in the groups excluded from power, and the belief that mixture between groups should be prohibited. The way race works as a system is by keeping power in one group, and on the other hand, justifying the oppression of the other.

Download

Share

COinS