Chapter 2: Discrimination

In the ‘doll experiment’ of 1950 (Clark & Clark, 1950), children aged three to seven were given identical dolls with varying shades of skin colour from white to dark brown. The children were able to identify themselves with the doll, based on their own skin colour, showing knowledge of their own skin tone from a young age and an awareness of the differences. This ability to distinguish or discriminate between things is demonstrated through the recognition of differences between one thing and another. As soon as humans form an identity as a child, they associate themselves with a group of people. Their identity is based on various aspects that collectively work together to form a belief of who they are, such as ethnicity, religion, gender, nationality, etc.; most frequently these tend to be based on how they look, what they do, and what they think (their beliefs) that allow them to associate with a group of people and differentiates them from other groups of people. The consequence of drawing this distinction often leads to ‘othering’ people who are not in their group (Brons, 2015), hence distinguishing between those in the group they belong to and those who do not belong to their group. Research respondent P79 shared: “… at times, I have picked up that people tend to use terms like ‘you people’. I sometimes find this offensive and pick up on the uneasiness of the gathering”.