Sociology

Judith Butlers work on the notion of performativity is one of the most substantial research in social sciences and particularly appealing to researcher studying the inequalities or distribution in the society, such as discrimination on the basis of race, gender etc (Baldwin, 2004). The paper by Minelle Mahtani and Mary Thomas discuss the issue of social division through racism by using this notion. Both papers discuss the same issue from different perspective with Mahtani discussing how the racism exist in the Canadian society and how people from different ethnicities feel and react to it. Thomas on the other hand, discusses the existence of the concept of racism among teenagers in America by evaluating from her interviews with school students from black and white races and how their performance bolster the division among them despite them having no knowledge about it.

In her paper, Mahtani investigates the complex relationship that is present between performativity and racialization by building up a Butlerian approach to performativity. In the paper, Mahtani has suggest that  while according to Butler, gender is a regulatory function, race can also regarded as a regulatory function which implies that the social performance occurs in a constraint spaces with racial border guards constantly on patrol to tackle any attempt to blur the classification that occurs naturally in the society. Mahtani also mentions the cases of several women of mixed race who gave out complex racialized performance in order to disrupt often offending and dual reading of their racialized identities. As a proof to this, Mahtani has quoted interviewed from a number of mixed raced females who have reworked their identities and disrupt social values associated with the seeing of race ( Mahtani, 2002).
Thomas on the other hand, takes a look at the dynamics and existence of racism in US society and how performances actually enhance the lines of division despite the fact that people often do not want to or do not give importance to act of racism. The paper evaluates the interviews of several female school students from different races, namely black and white, in which they were asked about their reactions to racism in their school. The paper states that although the girls themselves are the practitioners of race, they do not accomplish this in a social-spatial vacuum. They actually face a powerful racialized space which they accept and repeat and embody racialization by invoking normative racial identities. An example provided in this regard, is the grouping of black girls that exist in the lunch room of the school. Another activity that develops the notion of racial identities among the girls is the labeling and policing of black and white girls and through space. The papers suggests that the girls identification of each other by others race and by making it an spectacle in the school space  gives rise to the effect of racialization rather than normal identification of their peers (Thomas, 2005).

These reading are important in providing an understanding of the existance and dynamics of racism and discuss how it affects the society from the notion of performance. These reading highlight how performances by people affect the existence of racism in the society and that the spaces also plays a major role in the racial performance given out by people which either develop or attempt to mitigate racialization in the society.

Having experience multi-ethnicity all my life, I tend to agree with the findings given in both papers. Though performances by people tend to suggest whether they classification in the society or not, I believe that with the concept of racialization will then to melt away as people spend more and more time together in a space. I also have experienced that people are not often concerned with others race but rather the qualities that are attributed with that race. Once these qualities are understood, then people have fewer problems understanding each other. Though both reading attempt to classify the performance of people generally, they actually report their facts from specific environments (Mahtani talks about offices, while Thomas discusses racism among teenagers in school). The readings of the assigned papers raise several questions. First is the identification of factors other than space that play a role in performances. Furthermore, if the performances play a major role in highlighting the division in the society, are their any steps taken to prevent the development of such a space where people generally accept what they see and feel. The highlighting of exceptional instances by Mahtani in her paper also raises this issue and the need of highlighting of such instances in order to make people think about the issue and to show them that individual difference can transform into something significant. I totally agree with Ms. Mahtani on the idea that the performances by some women who rework their identities create emotional and psychic earthquakes by disrupting the social values associated with how race is perceive, these performances may reinvest racial ideals. I also totally agree with the fact that it would be false to assume that all such performances can challenge binary and oppositional modes of racial identification. With regards to Ms. Thomas, I agree with the author on the fact that people often do not recognize the banality of racial production and racist practice, despite their practices. I also totally agree with Ms. Thomas that in society, people are constrained by their identifications and social positioning and that race stills remains at the heart of the spaces they perform in, and also that it is important to understand how people come to accept and reproduce the same authority of race that the constitute the social and spatial meaning (Barker, 2008).

Though both articles look at racism from different perspective, the thing that links them together is the performance. It is through performance in a spatial setting that social function of racism takes place. Both papers can be compared to each other as both papers cover the issue from completely different angles, with Ms. Thomas providing discussing how and why such performances take place while Ms. Mahtani discusses the reaction of such performances. There are several similarities as well that exist between the two reading such as both paper emphasize the fact that in a society, the boundaries of classes are policed by certain people which encourage the racialization among society. Furthermore, both papers mention the fact that people in the society commit racial practices, despite their wariness of racism and that they do not recognize the banality of such activities.