Question: What does this say in plain English? Where Are We Now? In 1903 sociologist W.E.B Du Bois wrote in his classic book The Souls of Black Folk that "the problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of the color line." Now that we have examined race and ethnicity in the United States, what have we found? Where do we stand 118 years after Du Bois wrote about the problem of the color line? On the one hand, there is cause for hope. Legal segregation is gone. The vicious, "old-fashioned" racism that was so rampant in this country into the 1960's has declined dramatically since that tumultuous time. People of color have made important gains in several spheres of life, such as occupying some important elected positions in and outside of the South, a feat that would have been unimaginable a generation ago. Perhaps most notably, Barack Obama has African ancestry and identifies as African American, and on his election night people across the country wept with joy at the symbolism of his victory. Certainly progress has been made in U.S. racial and ethnic relations. On the other hand, there is also cause for despair. In the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd in 2020, demands for racial justice and reform were pervasive as hundreds of thousands of people protested all over the country. These demands highlighted the work that remains to be done. The old fashioned racism has been replaced by a modern, symbolic racism that still blames people of color for their problems and reduces. Need Assignment Help?