Brenda Njinjoh

Power: Marked and Unmarked

The word power, a five letter word has a lot of meaning. It is a word that is familiar with all generations and definitely has a huge impact towards the future. Previous conflict such a war, slavery, money is a result of particular a group desire to have control over another group. Power comes in different dimensions and can either have a negative or positive impact upon our lives. The interesting thing about power is that it could be used in many ways and can its influence can be seen in all types of groups big, small and communities for instance religious or nonreligious. For instance in a small family, the mother could posses more power over the family. While globally, among all the nations, the United States apparently is the greatest nation. It is a word that we can not eradicate because its force is very great and regardless of our opinions and beliefs will always influence of lives. Those in power or who strive to obtain power always have a reason and intention for their action. At times, some certain characteristics they posses to enforce power is innate, they might feel it is their mission or their duty to convey their action. As I have matured all over the years, I’ve witnessed how power functions and the effective it has on religion, race, the world, class, language, and age, thus, even though at times they are marked and unmarked, they still have an effect upon the our lives.

Religion is a practice that has been around for a very long time. Countless individuals including myself are very religious and cannot live with a divine intervention. The only problem about religion is that there is not one god that every body worships or a single bible nor commandments that people follow, the truth is every religion has its ways and beliefs. Due to the diversity of religion, throughout our history religion has sparked many conflicts between many nations. A tragedy that we are quite familiar with the attack that occurred on September 11, 2000, the bombing of the TwinTowers and Pentagon. From what I remembered, the United States owed Osama Bin Laden money for purchasing oil but he did not get his money back so he decided to attack the United States. Obviously the attack was absolutely wrong specifically because so many innocent people died who had absolutely nothing to do with the main conflict. This crisis left many scars among many in the society. For instance the fact that Osama Bin Ladin is Muslim and his actions were governed in his belief that it was an action that his government wanted him to enforce, other Muslim around the world have to face discrimination. The marked problem in the United States is that Muslim are evil people who dislike American and Christians. For instance there have been countless incidence in the news about how students in school are being tortured by their peers simply because of them being Muslim. This get to show that the certain actions that people perform can leave others with the notion that they have the power to torture other religious groups. In the unmarked category, people seem to forget about the media tend to diminish how other religious groups have conflict. Another example of religion in the marked category is the Catholic Church. Over the years there men and little boys have confessed how they were molested by priest of Catholic Church. The incident is very tragic and undeniable wrong and because of this crisis, they the Catholic Church has a bad reputation. They crisis made people focus more on the bad deeds about the Catholic church and drift away from the positive side of the church. Although there were more than one cases of priest molesting little boys, people will have an assumption that all Catholic priest are the same. Overall, it seems to be that people tend to put more emphasis on towards the negative deeds about religion and seem to forget the good things. In the Muslim community, although Osama Bin Ladin committed an unnecessary act because he believed in his religion that was the proper thing to do, on the other hand, not every Muslim will support and oblige to Osama action. This is the very thing with the Catholic Church, people tend to forget that sin is a common act and every will sin. Although religious are suppose and expected to maintain a proper image, it does not mean that they can not make mistakes too.

Another example of marked and unmarked categories about power is the welfare program. In the United States, there is a group of citizens and immigrants that do not have sufficient money to feed their children. The government decided to help by giving these families, majority of the time, single mother homes a certain amount of money to help buy groceries for their children. In this situation, the controversy has always been that it is unfair that the government is wasting a large sum of money each year to parents that are too lazy to work. The stereotypes of families on welfare are usually Hispanics, immigrants and African Americans. The marked category in this situation would be the Hispanics, immigrants and African American and this is because these are the oppressed group in American society. The media portray African Americans, immigrants and Hispanics as lazy people who can not work hard to support themselves. Since they are lazy, they only want money from the government every month instead of working. The marked categories are the white people because the media does not really portray them as individuals who need or would depend on welfare in order to eat. Instead, in the media, what we see are happy white family who have everything, the money, car, house, perfect family and all. But realistically, the reality is that there is a huge amount of white families who depend on welfare. The amount exceeds the amount of African Americans and Hispanics put together. Also, along time ago, welfare was introduced after the Great Depression when white families did not have enough money to purchase food. The government stepped by making sure that those eligible could receive money every month. As years passed, things changed, there was more equality in the society African Americans, Hispanics and immigrants were also eligible to receive welfare if they qualified. But unfortunately there has been a misunderstanding that only African American, Hispanics and immigrants are taking the government money instead of working hard. What people fail to understand is that every body situation is different, and unfortunately those who depend on welfare do not have the opportunity to progress in society because of the so many other problems that I can not understand.

Eleven years ago, my family and I moved to the United States from Cameroon, a country located in West Africa. The year was 1996 and I was almost 8 years old. Coming to a foreign country and leaving a Cameroon where I understood the norms was very difficult. When I was in Cameroon, I was so anxious to come to America because everybody always said great things about the country. They said how everyone is friendly and how life is so easy there but the truth is when we moved to America, it was very hard. While growing up, I experienced the distribution of power simply because of the way I spoke and by the clothes I wore. I families had extend family members who had established in America. They had children who were very familiar with the norms and what was “cool and uncool”. During family gatherings my cousins would avoid and make fun of me because of the way I spoke. The marked category in this situation would be my accent because coming from a different country, the new people around me did not pronounced the word the very way I did. Since the majority of the kids, spoke and slang and spoke the same way the majority of the kids spoke, they had more power over me. The fact that these kids spoke the way people in America speak would fall in the unmarked category because it is the way everyone speaks. Since they knew they could speak better or proper than me, they felt they were superior and better than me. What they did not understand is that if one of them went to Cameroon or any other foreign country, they would be made mocked at or be suppressed simply because of the way the way the spoke and pronunciation. Also in school, I soon realized the clothes kids wore defiantly had distinguished who more powerful. I remember in Cameroon, we kids wore uniforms so it was very hard to separate the “better and cool kids” from the “poor and uncool kids”. For instance in middle school, the group of kids who wore the named brand jeans, shirts, and the the boys who had the latest Jordan’s and all sort of named brand gears had more power. Then you had a group of kids who couldn’t afford name brand gears, and so at times, they wore ordinary jeans and shoes. The group of kids who could not wear fancy clothes do not choose to dress that way. One of the reasons why they wore ordinary and uncool clothes is because of financial obstacles in the family. In this situation, marked category are the group of kid that could not afford the fancy shoes, or jeans. This is because since they couldn’t afford, these things, they are being mocked and made fun of because of the way they dress. Instead of treating others based on other important things such as personality, kids are being treated simply because of the way they dress. In the unmarked category, the kids who could afford all the fancy shoes, and the most fashionable girls fall in this category because in school they were regarded to have the most power and privilege. Through the clothes they wore, and the group of people they associated with, it was a way of telling others that they were better and superior than others.

Although there a big controversy about race, in the United States and all over the world, it is important to realized that in the African American community there are many ways power is dispersed. For instance, one problem that most black girls face is embracing their natural hair. This is because it is very course and in the media good hair is suppose to the nice, long, soft and sleek type of hair. When black girls put chemicals in their hair, at times, the procedure is not done properly, ones hair can break. So the marked category of the situation are the girls with long hair, while the unmarked cateogory are girls with short hair or girl who wear extensions. This is because they do not fit in with other girls with nice hair, or it could also be that they are trying to be something that they are not. Another example of power in the African American community is the color of one’s complexion. People of color that are light skin versus people that dark skin often face discrimination. In the marked category, dark skin people in media and in the society are perceived to be as unattractive. This is because their complexion is darker than the rest of the people in the society. Due to this adversity, they face discrimination when applying for jobs. Also, socially, black guys are usually attracted to light skin girls because they think they are prettier than dark skin girls. People of color with light skin represent the unmarked category because they society and the media makes them feel that they are better than dark skin people. For instance, in the music videos and in the fashion industry, producers always favor light skin girls over dark skin girls.

The world that we live in is governed by power, it many ways. Through the marked and unmarked category it is obvious who has more power over the other. For instance, the controversy about welfare, dark skin versus light skin, rich versus poor are some of the way power is divided. Perhaps the best way to get rid of the marked and unmarked distribution of power is to educate others and fight for a change.