Tej Johnson

Pre-AP English
Mrs. Shutt
6 May 2016

Racial Segregation
Segregation: an idea that many believed to have ended decades ago with integration
laws, is now on the rise in popularity among North American cities. In recent years, racial
segregation has been making a comeback from the graveyard all across the nation. Two
sources that support this idea are the two population demographic maps and the segregation
video about american schools.
Demographic maps are great ways of portraying cohorts that exist in a specific area. The
first map portrays Tuscaloosa, Alabama as a very separated city in relation to the ethnic make
up. The cartographer of the map intentionally used distinct colors to show the different races of
white, African- American, Asian, and Latino. Upon examination, it can be seen that the orange
color, latinos, is heavily concentrated in the southwest part while there is little to no blue, whites,
in that region of the city. This is just one example of the segregation in the area but it is evident
throughout the city whether it be blacks and whites, latinos and asian, or latinos and whites.
These color clusters show the different races are very separated and do not coexist at all. The
second map shows the city of Los Angeles, California. The map shows the concentration of
latinos in the southeast part of the city while blacks are in the north and asians and whites are
generally on the east and west respectively. The city is clearly divided into ethnoburbs,
suburban ethnic clusters consisting of residential areas and business districts in large American
metropolitan areas. These ethnoburbs can be seen as sectors of the city, each sector coming in
contact with the center of the city or central business district and expanding outward in different

directions. This illustration makes it apparent that there is segregation occurring in these two
cities.
In the video, Racial Segregation in American Schools: Return to the 1960s, a reporter
ventures to a high school in Alabama and interviews the principal, a sports coach, and has
accounts of students that attended the school at the time. The video uses pathos by showing a
scene at the school graduation where there is not even one white kid in the room full of
graduates and their parents. This scene connects to peoples emotions because by showing
them first hand how bad the segregation is, it makes it more surreal for the audience that is not
actually there to experience it first hand. Secondly, there was an interview with the principle of
the school, who also is black. He tells of the time he went to the school as a student and they
had laws for desegregation and how the races were carefully integrated into the school. This
history and personal experience gives him credibility to talk on how integration has changed at
the school. As of recently however, these laws were taken out of place no longer making it
mandatory to ship white students out to lack schools to promote desegregation. This created an
environment where the school being shown was full of black kids and only two white students in
the entire school. This terrible ratio also connects to peoples emotion and supports the
argument and has logic in explaining the ethnic makeup of the school to show how bad the
segregation is.
Sadly enough, the dream of full ethnic integration across the nation is fading from many
peoples minds as rates of segregation increase and ratios between the races in schools
becomes less parallel. Not only does this create disunity within the cities themselves, eventually
the nation as a whole will go through numerous problems with less sense of nationalism among
the people. High racial violence rates should be expected as people become more grouped
together with their own race. The maps use distinct colors to show segregation while the video
used ethos, pathos, and logos to get the argument across. It doesn't look like a very bright
future for this nation if these problems are not effectively addressed in a timely fashion.