What is the difference between ethnicity and religion




















The term ethnicity is usually used to define a group of persons sharing a common cultural heritage. Ethnicity is the collection of cultural behaviors celebrated throughout regions around the world. Difference between Ethnicity and Religion. Key Difference: Ethnicity is a method of classification based upon a common trait of the population, such as a common heritage, a common culture, a shared language or dialect.

On the other hand, a religion is a belief in or the worship a god. Comparison between Ethnicity and Religion: Ethnicity Religion Description The term ethnicity is usually used to define a group of persons sharing a common cultural heritage. Religion is an important component of any cultural heritage. Groups share Language Physical features Customs Traditions Common belief systems, but they are not necessarily a single ethnic group.

Collection Ethnicity is the collection of cultural behaviors celebrated throughout regions around the world. Religion is a collection of beliefs, morals, ethics, and lifestyles.

Understanding Collective Political Violence pp Cite as. This chapter compares motivation of those mobilizing for violent conflict under a religious identity and those mobilizing under an ethnic one. Secondly, I review motivations of religious and ethnic leaders, or mobilizers, and of followers or mobilizees. Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF. Skip to main content. This service is more advanced with JavaScript available.

Advertisement Hide. Authors Authors and affiliations Frances Stewart. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves. This is a preview of subscription content, log in to check access.

Aborisade, O. Politics in Nigeria. London: Longman. Google Scholar. Brown, D. London, New York: Routledge. CrossRef Google Scholar. Brown, G. Horizontal Inequalities and Conflict. Collier, P. Oxford Economic Papers — Daugherty, L. Dudley, S. Fitzgerald, F. Stewart and R. Venugopal eds. Globalization, Self-Determination and Violent Conflict. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Ehrhardt, D. Phil Thesis. The problem occurs when we conflate this social habit with scientific truth — because there is nothing in individuals' genomes that could be used to separate them along such clear racial lines.

In short, variations in human appearance don't equate to genetic difference. They are not naturally occurring groups," Jablonski emphasized. This also exposes the major distinction between race and ethnicity : While race is ascribed to individuals on the basis of physical traits, ethnicity is more frequently chosen by the individual.

And, because it encompasses everything from language, to nationality, culture and religion, it can enable people to take on several identities. Someone might choose to identify themselves as Asian American, British Somali or an Ashkenazi Jew, for instance, drawing on different aspects of their ascribed racial identity, culture, ancestry and religion.

Ethnicity has been used to oppress different groups , as occurred during the Holocaust, or within interethnic conflict of the Rwandan genocide, where ethnicity was used to justify mass killings. Yet, ethnicity can also be a boon for people who feel like they're siloed into one racial group or another, because it offers a degree of agency, Ifekwunigwe said.

That said, those multiple identities can also be difficult for people to claim, such as in the case of multiraciality , which is often not officially recognized. Related: What happened during the Holocaust? Ethnicity and race are also irrevocably intertwined — not only because someone's ascribed race can be part of their chosen ethnicity but also because of other social factors.

These kinds of problems explain why there's a growing push to recognize race, like ethnicity, as a cultural and social construct — something that's a human invention , not an objective reality.

Race and ethnicity may be largely abstract concepts, but that doesn't override their very genuine, real-world influence. These constructs wield "immense power in terms of how societies work," said Ifekwunigwe. Defining people by race, especially, is ingrained in the way that societies are structured, how they function and how they understand their citizens. Consider the fact that the U. Census Bureau officially recognizes five distinct racial groups. The legacy of racial categories has also shaped society in ways that have resulted in vastly different socioeconomic realities for different groups.

That's reflected, for instance, in higher levels of poverty for minority groups, poorer access to education and health care, and greater exposure to crime, environmental injustices and other social ills. What's more, race is still used by some as the motivation for continued discrimination against other groups that are deemed to be "inferior.

It continues to determine people's access to opportunity, privilege and also livelihood in many instances, if we look at health outcomes," she said. One tangible example of health disparity comes from the United States, where data shows that African American women are more than twice as likely to die in childbirth compared with white women.

Perceptions of race even inform the way we construct our own identities — though this isn't always a negative thing. A sense of racial identity in minority groups can foster pride , mutual support and awareness. As the U. Census Bureau website explains , having data about people's self-reported race "is critical in making policy decisions, particularly for civil rights.

All this paints a complex picture, which might leave us pondering how we should view the idea of race and ethnicity: Should we celebrate them, shun them or feel indifferent? There are no easy answers. But one thing is clear: While both are portrayed as a way to understand human diversity, in reality they also wield power as agents of division that don't reflect any scientific truths. What the science does show us is that across all the categories we humans construct for ourselves, we share more in common than we don't.

The real challenge for the future will be to see that, instead of our "differences" alone. Originally published on Live Science.



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