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Full resolution (TIFF) - On this page / på denna sida - VII. Social Inequality - 30. Effects of Social Inequality - 2. Increasing Isolation - 3. Interracial Contacts
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650 An American Dilemma
They have for generations had less of both patriarchal dependence and
protection. Before the Great Migration accentuated segregation and dis-
crimination, they had, however, established a place for themselves, in
many cases not more isolated and subdued than the several immigrant
groups. Their small numbers, their fairly high educational status, and their
acceptable manners and personal habits in most places prevented a too
severe exclusion. The children ordinarily went to the same schools as did
whites; the grown-ups often belonged to the same churches and other
organizations and not infrequently visited socially. With the formation of
Black Belts in the metropolitan cities, isolation grew. In this particular
respect the conditions of the Negro population in the two regions are
approaching each other.
3. Interracial Contacts
The isolation we are speaking about—caused by all the barriers to con-
tact involved in etiquette, segregation, and discrimination from the side of
the whites and in voluntary withdrawal and resentment from the side of
the Negroes—means a decrease of certain types of contacts between the
two groups and a distortion of the ones that are left. It is useful here to
put the reverse question: What contacts do remain? and what is their
significance for interracial relations? To answer these questions there ought
to be quantitative studies of the sort we have discussed previously.® Since
no such studies have been made, our observations have to be general,
tentative, and in the nature of somewhat schematic hypotheses for further
research.
Negroes constitute about lO per cent of the American population, and
since there has been little^® attempt to segregate them by region, there is
naturally some contact. Of course, Negroes have been concentrated—for
historical reasons—in the South, but there are enough Negroes throughout
the North and in cities of the West for their appearance to be commonly
recognized by the majority of the white inhabitants of these latter areas.
The patterns of segregation and withdrawal are so effective, however, that
even where Negroes are a common sight there is actual contact with them
in practically only three spheres of life: the casual^ the economic and the
criminal.
By casual contacts we mean all those instances where Negro individuals
and white individuals see each other but without the condition of recog-
nizing each other as individuals, or at least for the whites to recognize the
Negroes as individuals. Casual contacts would thus include passing on the
street, passing or remaining briefly in the presence of each other in public
buildings or public vehicles, having visual or auditory contact with each
‘Chapter 29, footnote x.
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