NOTE: The purpose of this document is to provide background information for teachers and is NOT intended to be distributed to students.
- Assimilation
- when one person or group takes on the culture and traditions of a different group—often a larger and/or more powerful group (the dominant group)
- Boarding School
- a school where students both live and receive their basic education
- Brown v. Board of Education (1954)
- the Supreme Court case which ruled that the racial segregation of children in public schools was unlawful/unconstitutional, even if the separate schools were considered equal in quality; it forced the desegregation of schools across the United States
- Busing
- assigning and transporting students to schools within or outside of their local school districts, with the goal of reducing the racial-ethnic segregation in schools
- Civil Rights Movement
- an organized effort by Black people for social justice to end racial discrimination and to gain equal rights under the law in the United States; supported by White allies; timeframe: late 1940’s-1960’s; prominent activists and organizations: Bayard Rustin, Ella Baker, Fannie Lou Hamer, Freedom Riders, John Lewis, Little Rock Nine, Malcolm X, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Medgar Evers, NAACP, SCLC, SNCC
- Colored
- a word that was used to describe Black people; it was often used by White people in a derogatory way
- Culture
- a way of living that is passed down through generations (including language, religion, food, family and gender roles, beliefs, customs, traditions, etc.)
- Deportation
- when people, who are living in the United States without citizenship documentation, are sent back to the country where they are from
- Desegregation
- the process of ending the separation of people because of their race; it took years for some of the states in the United States to agree (e.g, some states and cities refused to let White children go to school with Black students); laws were later passed to integrate schools, restaurants, businesses, and allow interracial marriage
- Discrimination
- the purposeful unjust and unfair treatment of people, usually based on their race, age, or gender; with the purpose of keeping the dominant group in control or power
- Equal Opportunity
- a policy of treating others without discrimination, especially on the basis of their race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, age, religion, etc.
- Ethnic
- sharing a unique culture, language, and/or religion
- Gender Identity
- a person’s sense of being male, female, neither, or both; how they show their identity to those around them
- Great Depression
- timeframe: 1929-1939; a time of worldwide economic struggle; the United States suffered harder and longer; many banks failed, many people lost their homes, and many farmers lost their farms
- Great Migration
- when 6 million African American people moved out of the rural Southern United States to the urban Northeast, Midwest, and West (and some urban parts of the South); occurred between 1916 and 1970
- Identity
- the qualities, characteristics or beliefs that make a person who they are; people’s identities are similar in some ways and different in others; everyone has multiple identities (race, ethnicity, language, gender, sexuality, religion, etc.)
- Immigrant
- a person living in a country that is different from where they were born
- Immigration
- the process of people moving from one country to another
- Indian Agent
- a person from the United States government who was supposed to oversee trading/relations between the government and the Native Americans; many agents were not honest or did not treat the Native Americans fairly or with respect
- Integration
- a result of desegregation; creating more equal opportunities for people regardless of race; developing a culture that combines diverse traditions and beliefs, instead of trying to make the minority culture act as and believe in the majority culture
- Internment
- the imprisonment of people, usually in large groups, without any charges or a trial; occurred in the United States when Japanese Americans were forced to leave their homes and live in internment camps
- Internment Camp
- a prison camp; where people were forced to live together in uninsulated barracks with just cots and no bathrooms or cooking facilities; surrounded by barbed-wire fences and patrolled by armed guards who had instructions to shoot anyone who tried to leave
- Jim Crow Laws
- laws and rules that discriminated against or enforced the segregation of Black people in the United States (i.e. Black people had to use separate drinking fountains, restrooms, medical facilities, theaters, restaurants, railroad cars, buses, and separate schools with old/used textbooks and equipment, etc.); the laws purposely created disadvantages for Black people; Jim Crow was not an actual person, but was the name of a song and dance performed by a White entertainer who wore Blackface
- League of United Latin American Citizens
- the largest Latinx civil rights organization in the United States
- Loving v. Virginia (1967)
- the Supreme Court case which invalidated laws that said Black and White people could not marry each other
- Mendez v. Westminster (1947)
- a court case in California that helped to pave the way for Brown vs. Board of Education (1954); it stated that, “public education must be open to all children by unified school association regardless of lineage,” and that the school districts must cease their “discriminatory practices against the pupils of Mexican descent in the public schools”
- National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)
- an interracial organization that primarily uses the law to work for equal rights and to eliminate racial discrimination; established in 1909; America’s oldest and largest civil rights organization; formed in New York City by White and Black activists; the founding members included W.E.B. Du Bois, Ida Wells-Barnett, Archibald Grimke, Mary Church Terrell, as well as white progressives Mary White Ovington, Henry Moskowitz, William English Walling, and Oswald Garrison Villard
- Native Americans/American Indians
- the first Americans; the people who were living on American lands long before colonists arrived from England
- Negro
- a word that was used to describe Black people; it was often used by White people in a derogatory way
- Oppression
- purposeful harsh and unfair acts, demands, and treatment towards a group of people, over a period of time, with the purpose of keeping the dominant group in control or power
- Permanent Resident
- a person from a different country who has permission from the United States government to live in the United States for a period of time (has a “green card”)
- Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)
- the Supreme Court case which upheld the constitutionality of racial segregation under the “separate but equal” doctrine which holds that certain groups of people can be denied access to public spaces (i.e. restrooms, schools, housing, restaurants, pools, theaters, etc.), as long as they are provided facilities of an “equal” nature
- Protest
- to express objection to or disagreement with something, in a planned and organized way; can include marches and parades, banners and signs, speeches, petitions, and many other methods to show that you disagree with something
- Race
- a way to group people based on their skin color, facial features, hair texture, or ancestry; reinforced and made concrete in the United States during slavery to oppress Black people; different “races” (i.e. Black and White people) have the same genetics
- Racial Segregation
- separating people because of their race; it was legal to do this because of laws created by people who thought White people in America were the superior race; this lead to “separate but equal” policies which implied people of different races had separate but equally good options for things like schools, restaurants, and hospitals; the reality was People of Color had poorer options compared to White people; legal from 1896 (Plessy v. Ferguson) to 1954 (Brown v. Board)
- Racism
- the unfair treatment of people based on the opinion that one race is better than another race or races; a system of advantage based on race; racial prejudice plus social power; individual racism: actions and/or language toward a person that intentionally expresses prejudice, hate, or bias based on race; institutional racism: discriminatory treatment, unfair policies, and inequitable opportunities and impacts, based on race, that are produced and perpetuated by institutions (schools, workplace, mass media, etc.); structural or systemic racism: normalization and legitimization of historical, cultural, institutional, and interpersonal dynamics that routinely advantage White people, while producing cumulative and long-lasting disadvantages for People of Color
- Reservation/Reserve
- the land that Native American tribes had to live on after the United States government took their land for White settlers; Native Americans were forced to live on this land and were not allowed to leave without permission; most Native Americans lost their culture and traditions and many hunters had to become farmers; starvation and disease were common
- Residential Schools
- boarding schools where Native American children were sent to live and receive a basic education in order to be assimilated into American culture (to learn and take on the American customs and ways)
- School Integration
- the act of bringing students of different races together by law; some states and cities refused to let White children go to school with Black students even after the Brown vs. Board of Education ruling
- Separate But Equal
- a policy based on the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) that holds that certain groups of people can be denied access to public spaces (i.e. restrooms, schools, housing, restaurants, pools, theaters, etc.), as long as they are provided facilities of an “equal” nature
- Slur
- an insulting, offensive or degrading remark, often based on an identity group such as race, ethnicity, religion, gender/gender identity or sexual orientation
- Stereotype
- an overly simple, unfair, and untrue belief about a group of people; created and perpetuated by the dominant group in a society
- Strike
- an action taken by a group of workers to stop work until the things and conditions that they ask for are agreed upon
- Undocumented
- when an immigrant lives in the United States without having proper immigration or working papers
- Voter Registration
- the requirement that people must go through to show that they are eligible and able to vote
- Voting Rights Act (1965)
- the law that granted African Americans their constitutional right to vote
- White Privilege
- provides White people with privileges that they do not earn and that People of Color do not receive; is not something that White people necessarily do, create, or enjoy on purpose, but it is something they all benefit from (e.g. seeing themselves in most books, media, toys, dolls, etc., not being followed at stores, seeing themselves and ancestors in curriculum and textbooks, not have to protect their children from individual, systemic, and societal racism, not overly disciplined at school, etc.)