Is American an Ethnicity?

Obviously American is a nationality that everyone is a part of, but is American an ethnicity?

I had to take a poly sci class as part of the core curriculum and this was one of the debates in the class. The prof asked us what our ethnicity was. Basically I could not think of any group of people I was aligned with so I put American. For example, you could be part of a German ethnic group, but also there is simply German as in you are a citizen of the country. I thought that this could also be true of Americans, but the professor disagreed. I don't really understand why. My heritage in the US/North America goes back to 1741, they immigrated from Germany. I don't really have any other common heritage but what is in this country. I guess my family was originally part of the German heritage, but I have absolutely no idea what that would even mean or how I could possibly feel connected to that group of people. What is your opinion?

I don't think there is an American Ethnicity. Even if there was it would most logically have to be Native American as the American ethnicity. I don't think crossing the Atlantic or Pacific erases a family's ethnicity and changes their kids into a new ethnicity when born on US soil.

digsbe said:

I don't think there is an American Ethnicity. Even if there was it would most logically have to be Native American as the American ethnicity. I don't think crossing the Atlantic or Pacific erases a family's ethnicity and changes their kids into a new ethnicity when born on US soil.

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I would have to disagree.

My ancestors have been in North America since well before the founding of the United States of America. If you go back far enough, all my ancestral lines go back to people who came over from Europe, mostly from England; but by now, my own heritage is so far removed from that of my European ancestors as to make anything to do with Europe entirely irrelevant to who I am.

As far as I am concerned, I am as much a “native American” as any of those to whom this phrase is routinely applied. I am American by nationality, by birth, by heritage; and there is no other place on Earth to where I have any meaningful connection.

I think it is more fair to describe my ethnicity as “American”, than to describe it in any other way.

Well no, other than the natives American of course, ethnicities are defined by a biological and geographical link, as well as language, culture, religion etc. You'd be hard pressed to decide on which of those factors makes an ethnicity in America, when it comes to music, is it Country and Western or Blues that is the ethnic music, is a black guy whose family has been in America since the 1500's not American, ethnicly speaking? Is a Catholic more or less American than a Protestant? Ethnicities depend on shared identifiers, and there's nothing that could be shared in America to define an ethnicity.

spud_meister said:

Well no, other than the natives American of course, ethnicities are defined by a biological and geographical link, as well as language, culture, religion etc. You'd be hard pressed to decide on which of those factors makes an ethnicity in America, when it comes to music, is it Country and Western or Blues that is the ethnic music, is a black guy whose family has been in America since the 1500's not American, ethnicly speaking? Is a Catholic more or less American than a Protestant? Ethnicities depend on shared identifiers, and there's nothing that could be shared in America to define an ethnicity.

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Then perhaps I have no ethnicity at all.

Surely I have more in common with someone who likes “Country and Western” music, or with someone who prefers “Blues” music, or with “a black guy whose family has been in America since the 1500's”; than I have with any European.

Bob Blaylock said:

I would have to disagree.

My ancestors have been in North America since well before the founding of the United States of America. If you go back far enough, all my ancestral lines go back to people who came over from Europe, mostly from England; but by now, my own heritage is so far removed from that of my European ancestors as to make anything to do with Europe entirely irrelevant to who I am.

As far as I am concerned, I am as much a “native American” as any of those to whom this phrase is routinely applied. I am American by nationality, by birth, by heritage; and there is no other place on Earth to where I have any meaningful connection.

I think it is more fair to describe my ethnicity as “American”, than to describe it in any other way.

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American is not an ethnicity, it's a nationality. The US is an eThnically diverse country, to have "American" as one's ethnicity would leave confusions, as "American" might easily be a Korean, Chinese, Indian, Caucasian, Afrian, Hispanic, and so on. One would be confused. If you're of German descent, then you're a German or a Caucasian, but of US nationality

Bob Blaylock said:

Then perhaps I have no ethnicity at all.

Surely I have more in common with someone who likes “Country and Western” music, or with someone who prefers “Blues” music, or with “a black guy whose family has been in America since the 1500's”; than I have with any European.

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Then what makes the US ethnicity?

Bob Blaylock said:

Then perhaps I have no ethnicity at all.

Surely I have more in common with someone who likes “Country and Western” music, or with someone who prefers “Blues” music, or with “a black guy whose family has been in America since the 1500's”; than I have with any European.

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You do have an ethnicity, you may be

- White
- Hispanic
- Asian
- Black
- Arabic
- Dravidian
- Pasific
- Or any mix of the ones above

Take your pick!

Proud South Korean said:

American is not an ethnicity, it's a nationality. The US is an eThnically diverse country, to have "American" as one's ethnicity would leave confusions, as "American" might easily be a Korean, Chinese, Indian, Caucasian, Afrian, Hispanic, and so on. One would be confused. If you're of German descent, then you're a German or a Caucasian, but of US nationality

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I think this is part of the problem with the US today. People used to come the the US, leave their past behind, and embrace "America". There are a lot of people who, like drz-400, who have no real ethnicity, myself included. The diverse backgrounds and culture in the United States is wonderful and extremely important, but putting one's past culture over-and-above the "American" culture isn't working out well for the US. People used to immigrate here and insist that their children spoke only English. Now, people sometimes immigrate here and refuse to speak English. Where did my ancestors come from originally? - England, Germany, Ireland, Scotland - what difference does it make? I am a proud citizen of the United States of America - that should comes first to any ethnicity.

Proud South Korean said:

American is not an ethnicity, it's a nationality. The US is an eThnically diverse country, to have "American" as one's ethnicity would leave confusions, as "American" might easily be a Korean, Chinese, Indian, Caucasian, Afrian, Hispanic, and so on. One would be confused. If you're of German descent, then you're a German or a Caucasian, but of US nationality

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I have to wonder how much meaning there really is to the concept of “ethnicity”.

I suppose it's obvious that there is some meaning. Stand me next to a black guy, and you can see there's a difference. I'm a Caucasian, while he's Negroid. These are two different ancestral lines, that carry different and obvious genetic traits.

But what about President Obama? He's usually identified as “black”, but is he really? His father was a Negro, but his mother was a Caucasian. It would seem to me that this makes him as much “white” as “black”. If you bring culture and heritage into it, he's not really either. By culture and heritage, he has more in common with the average “white” American (being descended through a “white” American mother) than he has with the average “black” American (being descended through a father who was “black”, but not an American at all). But in fact, he has less in common culturally with either the average “black” American or the average “white” American than the average “black” and “white” Americans have with each other.

Of course, here in America, it happens all the time that people of different ethnic backgrounds marry, and have children. I wonder how far away the day is that there will be so much of the population composed of so many different mixed ethnic backgrounds that it ceases to be possible to meaningfully classify most people into specific ethnic groups.

I'm already prepared for that day. When faced with a form that asks for my race, I nearly always check the “other” box and fill in my correct race: “Human”.

Ethnicity is nothing more than a social construct; it doesn't have any objective genetic basis. So if a group of people considers themselves to be of the same ethnicity, then they are. The whole concept of ethnicity varies from one nation to another. In some parts of the world, it's very common for people to identify their ethnicity and their nationality as one and the same (i.e. China, Japan). In other parts of the world - especially in "melting pot" countries like the US - ethnicity is more often defined based on superficial traits like skin color and hair color.

One thing that I find especially interesting about the American concept of ethnicity is the Hispanic/Latino category. We are one of the only places in the world that even considers this to be an ethnic group. If you go anywhere in Latin America, people don't define themselves as Hispanic/Latino...they define themselves as white, black, Asian, Native American, or some combination of these...or by their nationality.

Bob Blaylock said:

But what about President Obama? He's usually identified as “black”, but is he really? His father was a Negro, but his mother was a Caucasian. It would seem to me that this makes him as much “white” as “black”.

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It's incorrect to call him black. He really is multiracial/mixed. More specifically half-black

But I don't think it would be the same to have the first mixed President.

“American” is a nationality. This nationality is composed of a people with various degrees (ascendant-nonexistent) of ethnic self-identity.

Kandahar said:

One thing that I find especially interesting about the American concept of ethnicity is the Hispanic/Latino category. We are one of the only places in the world that even considers this to be an ethnic group. If you go anywhere in Latin America, people don't define themselves as Hispanic/Latino...they define themselves as white, black, Asian, Native American, or some combination of these...or by their nationality.

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They mostly define themselves by nationality. If US did the same, it would just create a big mess.

However, what I find weird is that the category Hispanics include white and black people from Mexico.

If an Italian married couple migrated to brazil, which many have, two generations later a child is born he/she is brazilian by ethnicity as far as they are concerned and would never say italian....why would an American be any different.

lpast said:

If an Italian married couple migrated to brazil, which many have, two generations later a child is born he/she is brazilian by ethnicity as far as they are concerned and would never say italian....why would an American be any different.

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They are no such thing as Italian or Brazilian ethnicity. Ethnicity is a description on how you look, not what you call yourself. Ethnicity is used for statistical purposes.

If a black person moves from Africa to Europe, will his children stop calling themselves black?

Camlon said:

They are no such thing as Italian or Brazilian ethnicity. Ethnicity is a description on how you look, not what you call yourself.

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That's the way it's traditionally defined in Anglophonic countries like yours and mine, but it's not necessarily how people everywhere in the world view ethnicity. There isn't one objectively correct way to define it, considering that how you look is just as arbitrary as where you were born.

If a black person moves from Africa to Europe, will his children stop calling themselves black?

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No, they'd probably START calling themselves black, because that's how their adopted European culture would view them. I bet that most Africans don't even think of themselves as "black" - defining ethnicity by one's skin color is mostly a Eurasian concept. I would suggest that Africans would be far more likely to define themselves by their tribe or their nationality than by their skin color. In fact, Africa is the most heterogeneous place on earth, with far more diversity than the rest of the world combined.

Camlon said:

They mostly define themselves by nationality. If US did the same, it would just create a big mess.

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What would be messy about all of us identifying ourselves as “American”?

Camlon said:

They are no such thing as Italian or Brazilian ethnicity. Ethnicity is a description on how you look, not what you call yourself. Ethnicity is used for statistical purposes.

If a black person moves from Africa to Europe, will his children stop calling themselves black?

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I'm pretty sure "black" isn't an ethnicity. I'm also pretty sure that no one actually looks "black". I know a lot of people in varying degrees of brown, some reddish/brown, some tan, and a lot of peach. I know a whole lot who are red on their neck, brown on their arms and face, and just about the color of vanilla ice cream under their shirts (their wives are sometimes sorta orange), but I'm not sure I'd say they "look" ethnic to me. If an Indian, Pakistani, and Brazilian look the same, does that make them the same ethnicity?

I think "redneck" should be an ethnicity. I think hip-hop may be, too (gang-bangers might be a subset). How about "Southerner" - I think most Southerners would choose that group over whatever European ancestry they might have. My favorite ethnic group would be the "posers". They'd be people who who share in common the tendancy to identify with groups with whom they have little in common in order to feel better about themselves.

Most of the terms we commonly recognize as "ethnicities" are just arbitrary classifications by Westerners based on superficial characteristics. Nothing inherently wrong with that, but that perception of ethnicity is by no means universal. If one were to truly define some ethnicities based on physical characteristics, I like Jared Diamond's two categories: Khoisan (Namibia/Zimbabwe)...and everyone else in the world.

I would agree with those who say that culture is more important than physical traits in defining an ethnicity (although physical traits can sometimes shape culture). If a group of people thinks that they are one ethnicity, then they are.

Most Americans originate from western Europe, so we are, ethnically speaking, western European. Then it delineates from there into sub-categories. Nordic, Germanic, Anglo, etc.

American Indians could be called American though, if we use our name for this continent.

Kandahar said:

That's the way it's traditionally defined in Anglophonic countries like yours and mine, but it's not necessarily how people everywhere in the world view ethnicity. There isn't one objectively correct way to define it, considering that how you look is just as arbitrary as where you were born.

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They can use whatever method they want to identify ethnicity. I don't see why US should adopt a system that would make it impossible to identify different ethnicities, just because someone else does it differently.

I would have reformed it. Ethnicity should be measured through DNA, not through a self-survey.

No, they'd probably START calling themselves black, because that's how their adopted European culture would view them. I bet that most Africans don't even think of themselves as "black" - defining ethnicity by one's skin color is mostly a Eurasian concept. I would suggest that Africans would be far more likely to define themselves by their tribe or their nationality than by their skin color. In fact, Africa is the most heterogeneous place on earth, with far more diversity than the rest of the world combined.

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They may have a lot of names for themselves, but can you quantify that there is a larger difference in DNA. For me, it seems like there is just as large difference between people from Botswana, Zimbabwe and South Africa, as there are between European people.

And again, ethnicity has nothing to do with what you call yourself. That is called cultural heritage.

Bob Blaylock said:

Then perhaps I have no ethnicity at all.

Surely I have more in common with someone who likes “Country and Western” music, or with someone who prefers “Blues” music, or with “a black guy whose family has been in America since the 1500's”; than I have with any European.

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I don't know, which European are you referring to? There are as much variation in Europe as there are in America. There could be a European who likes "Country and Western" or "Blues" music, and hamburger or whatever you like. And there are Americans with preferences that you identify with European, whose ancestry date back as far, if not further, in America as yours.

Your comparison if very narrow, if you look at the wide range of human cultures, you have much more in common with Europeans than a traditional Mongolian, Eskimo, or African. If we look at the history of humanity, the 200 or so years your ancestors have been in America is barely visible on the timeline.

Bob Blaylock said:

What would be messy about all of us identifying ourselves as “American”?

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A little bit hard to quantify demographics and who are living here without measuring demographics. It will make demoghraphics study much more difficult, because they have to use alternative methods to figure it out.

How would you describe white flight, if white people doesn't exists.

Camlon said:

They are no such thing as Italian or Brazilian ethnicity. Ethnicity is a description on how you look, not what you call yourself. Ethnicity is used for statistical purposes.

If a black person moves from Africa to Europe, will his children stop calling themselves black?

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Your confusing ethnicity with race...a black person would not stop calling themselves black because that is their race...