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Race, color and the young child
120
International
Journal
of Intercultural
Relations
half decade’? Lawler’s chapter on individualizing organizations is a well written 1973 piece. but contains little that is exciting and nothing that is new. The brightest spot in this part is Nerd’s treatment of behavior modification. He argues convincingly that there is nothing antihumanistic about behavior modification. and furthermore. he believes this approach has great potential for humanizing organizations. We were convinced of the wisdom of considering these ideas, but unclear as to how, one goes about applying principles of behavior modification in an organization. The final part of the book presents several case studies describing efforts at humanizing organizations. This section also contains little that is new. A selection from Meltzer’s previous work was originally published in 1932. Fritz Steele is always very readable and his chapter should serve as a useful reminder that the physical setting of the work environment is something to be managed. rather than accepted as a (riven. The capstone chapter. “On Organizations of the Future.” is cc \,intage Argyris. Readers who appreciate the writing style and notions of Chris Argyris will find much to admire here: those who do not like his approach will find little to change their opinions. Criticizing a volume which publishes symposia for lack of timeliness may be a somewhat tired complaint. Nevertheless. the editors have added to their already difficult task of keeping the material as recent as possible by including their own old papers. However, timeliness is hardly a fatal flaw. While most of the material was written in the early 1970s and a lot of it before then, in our reading we did not find this particularly disturbing nor did we find ideas to be out-of-date. Our reactions might say something about us. or about the lasting quality of the ideas, or that our science hasn’t moved very far in the last decade. Rr\Biertwl 17~John J. Sher-r~~d trtd Rich-rl W. Wooritmn Purdue University. West Lafayette
RACE, (Chapel
COLOR
AND
J.b-. WILLIAMS Hill: University
THE
YOUNG
CHILD
urd J.K. MORLAND of North Carolina Press,
1976)
In the late 1930s and early 4Os, Kenneth and Mamie Clark published a series of studies that have earned that rather dubious distinction of being called “classic.” In this study, the Clarks appeared to demonstrate that Negro children have rather poor images of themselves and aspired to be
121
Book Reviews
white. As is well known today, these studies were cited by the Supreme Court in the Brown school desegration case and thus moved out of realm of academics into public policy. Whether the particular researchers deserved their fate is immaterial, for us it is enough that a vigorous research effort into racial differences in self-concept was initiated. Beginning in the mid-60s John Williams began a series of studies on the connotations of racial labels. Using well-established semantic differential methodology, he and his colleagues probed the affective meaning of such labels in Afro- and Euro-American children ranging in age from preschool to college and in location from North to South Carolina. It is these studies and succeeding ones which are reported in this interesting book. To someone who has survived the civil rights explosion of the 1960s and the emergence of race differences as a respectable domain of study, the results in this book are not startling; indeed, they almost seem obvious. Both Afro- and Euro-American children attribute negative effect to black-related labels and this effect is seen very early in the child’s development. More important for a generalizable theory is the finding that the effect seems to appear cross-culturally. Thus. one cannot lay the effects at the doorstep of a peculiar American milieu. Rather, it is a phenomenon which develops quite normally and which is reinforced by societal norms later on. The final chapter, “A Developmental Theory of Color and Race Bias, ” is at once the most interesting and most disappointing contribution. The “model” postulates that a bias toward “light” things leads to a color bias of white over black and the two biases result in a race bias of Euros over Afros. Each of these biases is, at the same time, affected by “general cultural influences and subcultural and familial influences.” The model is quite reasonable, but it is not a real model; it is, in truth more a statement of a set of variables (and those not too well specified) and some plausible ways of stating the interrelationships. Before the model can serve as the basis for future research, far more specificity will have to be introduced into the formulation. That is, for example, what variables are we including under “general cultural influences”? And, how are these things to be measured? Despite some flaws, this is a good book. Unfortunately, it is not one that breaks new ground. That may come if the authors pursue the research into the development of a real model of racial bias. Reviewed
by Dan Landis
Purdue University School of Science, Indianapolis
International
Journal
of Intercultural
Relations
half decade’? Lawler’s chapter on individualizing organizations is a well written 1973 piece. but contains little that is exciting and nothing that is new. The brightest spot in this part is Nerd’s treatment of behavior modification. He argues convincingly that there is nothing antihumanistic about behavior modification. and furthermore. he believes this approach has great potential for humanizing organizations. We were convinced of the wisdom of considering these ideas, but unclear as to how, one goes about applying principles of behavior modification in an organization. The final part of the book presents several case studies describing efforts at humanizing organizations. This section also contains little that is new. A selection from Meltzer’s previous work was originally published in 1932. Fritz Steele is always very readable and his chapter should serve as a useful reminder that the physical setting of the work environment is something to be managed. rather than accepted as a (riven. The capstone chapter. “On Organizations of the Future.” is cc \,intage Argyris. Readers who appreciate the writing style and notions of Chris Argyris will find much to admire here: those who do not like his approach will find little to change their opinions. Criticizing a volume which publishes symposia for lack of timeliness may be a somewhat tired complaint. Nevertheless. the editors have added to their already difficult task of keeping the material as recent as possible by including their own old papers. However, timeliness is hardly a fatal flaw. While most of the material was written in the early 1970s and a lot of it before then, in our reading we did not find this particularly disturbing nor did we find ideas to be out-of-date. Our reactions might say something about us. or about the lasting quality of the ideas, or that our science hasn’t moved very far in the last decade. Rr\Biertwl 17~John J. Sher-r~~d trtd Rich-rl W. Wooritmn Purdue University. West Lafayette
RACE, (Chapel
COLOR
AND
J.b-. WILLIAMS Hill: University
THE
YOUNG
CHILD
urd J.K. MORLAND of North Carolina Press,
1976)
In the late 1930s and early 4Os, Kenneth and Mamie Clark published a series of studies that have earned that rather dubious distinction of being called “classic.” In this study, the Clarks appeared to demonstrate that Negro children have rather poor images of themselves and aspired to be
121
Book Reviews
white. As is well known today, these studies were cited by the Supreme Court in the Brown school desegration case and thus moved out of realm of academics into public policy. Whether the particular researchers deserved their fate is immaterial, for us it is enough that a vigorous research effort into racial differences in self-concept was initiated. Beginning in the mid-60s John Williams began a series of studies on the connotations of racial labels. Using well-established semantic differential methodology, he and his colleagues probed the affective meaning of such labels in Afro- and Euro-American children ranging in age from preschool to college and in location from North to South Carolina. It is these studies and succeeding ones which are reported in this interesting book. To someone who has survived the civil rights explosion of the 1960s and the emergence of race differences as a respectable domain of study, the results in this book are not startling; indeed, they almost seem obvious. Both Afro- and Euro-American children attribute negative effect to black-related labels and this effect is seen very early in the child’s development. More important for a generalizable theory is the finding that the effect seems to appear cross-culturally. Thus. one cannot lay the effects at the doorstep of a peculiar American milieu. Rather, it is a phenomenon which develops quite normally and which is reinforced by societal norms later on. The final chapter, “A Developmental Theory of Color and Race Bias, ” is at once the most interesting and most disappointing contribution. The “model” postulates that a bias toward “light” things leads to a color bias of white over black and the two biases result in a race bias of Euros over Afros. Each of these biases is, at the same time, affected by “general cultural influences and subcultural and familial influences.” The model is quite reasonable, but it is not a real model; it is, in truth more a statement of a set of variables (and those not too well specified) and some plausible ways of stating the interrelationships. Before the model can serve as the basis for future research, far more specificity will have to be introduced into the formulation. That is, for example, what variables are we including under “general cultural influences”? And, how are these things to be measured? Despite some flaws, this is a good book. Unfortunately, it is not one that breaks new ground. That may come if the authors pursue the research into the development of a real model of racial bias. Reviewed
by Dan Landis
Purdue University School of Science, Indianapolis