Linguistic Final (Partially Complete)
2
Intervention (Justice) Paper Draft
Name
Professor
LING 472
Date
Introduction
The impact of linguistic profiling in the housing industry is massive. Its impact on affordable housing shows adverse effects where some races are being denied access to affordable housing. African Americans, Asians, and Hispanics cannot fully access affordable housing due to problems like linguistic profiling. Several interventions can be used to help in fighting the impact of linguistic profiling on affordable housing. Raising awareness will increase enthusiasm and support while stimulating action. The Fair Housing Act of 1968 has not effectively banned discrimination against home searchers. There is a need for policy change as an intervention. Direct action may include nonviolent means like strikes and sit-ins. This paper looks at the three interventions to end the focal injustice.
Raising Awareness
Raising awareness is defined as the process of informing and educating the masses about a topic or issue to influence their attitude, behaviors, and beliefs (Ones, 2005). Raising awareness ensures that people can change their attitudes and start believing in the goal. The education is done to help change any misconception the public may have, which is why they believe in a certain way. Raising awareness can be successful when well planned as it will be an effective tool to gain the trust of the masses while also changing their behavior, attitude, and beliefs.
There are different ways that people can raise awareness. The most common way of raising awareness involves the use of the media. This has been done for decades, where letters are written to local, new agencies or published articles in the media. The use of radio stations to raise awareness has also been effective as people can debate on the issue being raised and engage others during the debates. Television can be used to raise awareness. The current age of information presents more options that can raise awareness. The advancements in technology over the past two decades have introduced other mediums that can effectively raise awareness. Social media offers a platform that one can use to raise awareness. According to Statista (2020), there were 3.6 billion active social media users globally. The number is likely to increase by over 25% by 2025. The global penetration rate of social media is 53.6%. Therefore, social media offers the best platform that can be used to raise awareness about the issue of linguistic profiling and to educate others on its impact on affordable housing.
Different social media platforms can be effectively used to raise awareness of linguistic profiling. Facebook has several social media users, with other platforms also attracting many people. A page can be created on Facebook highlighting the issue. The page members should be encouraged to invite more members to ensure the number of people increases. Brochures can be created to educate the public on the issue and posted on Facebook. Videos will be posted educating the members and others on the issue's impact. The members should be encouraged to shun the practice, as the more people who shun it, the easier it becomes for society to embrace everyone. The videos will also be posted on YouTube to increase the number of educated
people.
Other social media platforms can be effectively used to raise awareness. The use of Twitter in raising awareness will require sponsoring a hashtag like #endlinguisticprofiling. The hashtag will keep running on most pages on Twitter. This attracts the attention of more people who become interested in knowing what linguistic profiling is and its impact on affordable housing. Those impacted by linguistic profiling in accessing affordable housing will post their videos. This is done to change the attitude of the masses and help in behavioral change.
Raising awareness as an intervention will target two generations; millennials and generation Z. The two generations are active on social media, which is the medium being used to raise awareness. Educating the two generations will help end an issue that has been around for decades and has mostly been used by the older generation. The brochure to be posted on Facebook contains information showing the issue's impact.
Policy Change
The Fair Housing Act of 1968 prohibited discrimination on the sale, rental, and financing of housing based on race, religion, national origin, or sex. Linguistic profiling encourages racism and is against the Fair Housing Act of 1968. The legislation has been effective in reducing racism in rental and financing housing. One of the cornerstones has been the increase of minorities owning property (Massey, 2015). However, the number of minorities owning property is still low compared to whites. This shows the legislation has not been fully effective in reducing racism.
Policy change is required as an intervention to help in reducing the issue. There is a need for new legislation which will introduce more punitive measures to the perpetrators of linguistic profiling and those who discriminate against others due to their race or national origin. The punitive aspect of the legislation will discourage those who attempt to discriminate against others and impact their access to affordable housing. In general, policy change is effective in bettering community decisions on issues. Policy change is the best way to help change society (Lagarde, 2012). Some of the resources needed will include human, technical, financial, and material. Human resources are the people who include the politicians and other professionals who will help in driving the policy change. Nongovernmental organizations that deal with discrimination can be engaged to help in increasing the number of resources available. These organizations can also help in providing financial support for the initiative.
Direct Action
Direct action will involve peaceful protests on the issue. Protests have a long history of helping drive change in the United States. Some of the changes made in the 60s were products of protests used in driving change. Peaceful protests are disruptive ad tend to attract more people as they go on. This makes the protests more effective as they will focus on the issue (Chelsea, 2019). The protest aimed to get government attention and response. The protection will also help raise awareness of the issue and, therefore, educate others on the issue. The target audience during the protest will be the government and everybody else. The support of the public will help the protest to be more disruptive. Resources will include brochures and banners. The brochures will be handed out to everyone on the street. They are the same brochures to be posted on social media.
References
Chelsea Whyte. (2019). Do protests work? New Scientist, Volume 242, Issue 3235, Pages 20-21.
https://doi.org/10.1016/S0262-4079(19)31123-6
Lagarde, M. (2012). How to do (or not to do) Assessing the impact of a policy change with routine longitudinal data. Health policy and planning, 27(1), 76-83.
Massey, D. S. (2015, June). The legacy of the 1968 fair housing act. In Sociological Forum (Vol. 30, pp. 571-588).
Ones, D. S. (2005). Personality at work: Raising awareness and correcting misconceptions. Human Performance, 18(4), 389-404.