Race, class, gender, ethnicity, and religion are all variables that impact a person’s identity, worldview, communication style, and behaviors. Applying the sociological imagination to the workplace environment enables a greater understanding of how these factors impact daily interactions and events, with the goals of promoting harmony and resolving conflict. Being aware of race, gender, and religion has helped me function better in teams. The times that I neglected to recognize race, religion, and gender taught me valuable lessons and helped me to become more emotionally and socially intelligent. Race, gender, and religion are all socially constructed variables rather than being absolute categories; therefore it is always important to remember the fluidity of these constructs and to relate to each person individually as opposed to making sweeping generalizations based on stereotypes and assumptions. Moreover, categories and definitions of race, gender, and religion are not monolithic. What it means to be white, black, female, and Jewish will be different for each person. Other factors such as socioeconomic class background, nationality, and age will also factor into issues like personal identity construction. Experiences with discrimination will also have a strong bearing on how a person perceives race, gender, and religion as markers of personal identity or as the screens through which they view the world. Religion, race, and gender can sometimes be visible markers that others use to project their own expectations and beliefs, thereby altering the person’s...
The discursive practices of identity construction continue to influence workplace communication and interpersonal relationships.
Race and Gender Discrimination Multicultural Diversity Sex Discrimination Age Discrimination This paper discusses literature regarding the Equal Employment Opportunity Act which helps protect both applicants and employees from being discriminated against on the basis of their race, religion, age, sex, gender or disabilities. It also discusses and explores the roles of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which is a federal agency that investigates and enforces the laws that were enacted from the EEOA. This
Workplace Diversity "The benefits of diversity cannot be achieved with isolated interventions. To the contrary, a complete organizational culture change is required in order to promote appreciation of individual differences… diversity is a multifaceted reality…" (Martin-Alcazar, et al., 2012) The need for diversity in the workplace has been well established in the literature, but the need for managers and executives to build a culture based on diversity is still on the drawing
(Building and Maintaining a Diverse Workforce) Agencies are required to develop a good understanding of their individual strengths and weaknesses so as to plan their programs to their best advantage. An agency acquires this information by evaluating the views of the employees on diversity issues. Analysis of the trends and projections of the workforce in determination of the skills gaps and necessitates and devising successive planning strategies are crucial moves
Bridgewater, M.J., & Buzzanell, P.M. (2010). Caribbean immigrants' discourses: Cultural, moral, and personal stories about workplace communication in the United Journal Of Business Communication, 47(3), 235-265. doi:10.1177/0021943610369789 This report studies how Caribbean immigrants position themselves and make sense of their overall workplace communication standing. They do so through storytelling a lot of the time. They often adhere to the commonly-cited narrative of the "American Dream" but they also talk about stories that reproduce and
Discrimination in the Modern Workplace With the 21st century workplace ahead of us and a country full of diversity surrounding us, the changing ethnic, racial, age, and gender composition of the workforce will become more evident in the years to come. This modern workplace will bring in a group of diverse employees to accompany tighter labor markets and changing worker demographics. These changes in the modern workplace will have important implications
Workplace discrimination leads to a mismatch between qualified workers and their jobs, and it carries significant economic consequences in the American workplace. Okechukwu, Souza, Davis and Castro (2014) define workplace discrimination as unfair rules and conditions that impair the ability of group members. It is motivated by inferiority and mistreatment of the disadvantaged group over the dominant group. It is based on races and even occurs among disadvantaged groups themselves. For
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