Question

Which TWO statements best identify the central ideas of https://www.commonlit.org/en/texts/excerpt-from-honky

Answer 1

Answer:

The two statements which best identify the central ideas seem to be:

1. Race is taught rather than born into someone.

3. Comparison is a helpful tool for framing one's identity.

Explanation:

Dalton Conley (1969) is a sociologist who grew up being a white boy in a community of African American and Hispanic people.

In the excerpt we are analyzing here, Conley explains how race is something that we learn from society. For instance, when he was a child, he wanted to have a sister so badly that he kidnapped a black girl in the playground. As a child, he didn't even know or care about the fact that he and that little girl belonged to different races. It was only later that he learned that he was white and that it meant he was privileged.

He also explains that comparison is what helps us frame things as well as ourselves:

"There is an old saying that you never really know your own language until you study another. It's the same with race and class."

It is through comparison that we find similarities as well as differences. Conley, for instance, compares his experience as a white person to that of Europeans and finds that they are quite different.