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View Poll Results: Are these 7 more on the international stage than the other cities of North America?
Yes! 65 91.55%
Nahhh, I don't agree with this for whatever reason 6 8.45%
Voters: 71. You may not vote on this poll

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Old 06-06-2012, 01:53 PM
 
Location: Gatineau, Québec
26,876 posts, read 38,019,680 times
Reputation: 11645

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Quote:
Originally Posted by OyCrumbler View Post
Of course it has something to do with it--because visible minorities consist of pretty much anyone who is not white by the census definition (well, and aboriginal/native/first nation/etc.). It's true that in cases such as Detroit or any city where there is a single group majority that it matters little, but you can break it down further into the spread of minorities.

Also, I'm not sure if you haven't noticed this, but did you realize there's actually a distinct African American culture? Also, ethnicity (which you're including) can include African American as a fairly coherent group.

I think you're bulldozing over a lot of what diversity includes. Also, the point sort of stands that if you're saying American-born this or that when the argument is over native-born versus foreign-born which is really adorable. I feel we should all hold you for a bit.
I would never dispute the uniqueness and authenticity of African-American culture

But I still think that a hypothetical city that is populated by immigrants from 10 different countries (all European), each of which representing 10% of the population, even if they are all white, will be much more culturally diverse than a city with, say, 50% white (Heinz 57 but assimilated) Americans, 30% African-Americans and 20% Mexican-Americans.

In the latter case you'd have three cultures represented (with a lot of overlap between white and black America as well), whereas in the former you could conceivably have 10 completely different cultures present that are all foreign to one another.

The skin tones present in either city wouldn't have any bearing on anything.
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Old 06-06-2012, 01:54 PM
 
Location: Cambridge, MA/London, UK
3,865 posts, read 5,289,162 times
Reputation: 3366
Quote:
Originally Posted by Acajack View Post
While I am certainly willing to believe that NYC has more languages spoken in it than any other city (including Toronto), I am not sure that the claim of 800 languages is really a figure that can be accurately compared to those of other cities here. It seems to me the NYC figure (800) is based on something completely different from the way languages have been counted in the other cities.
I can definitely agree with that. The point is that cities like NYC and London have a lower foreign born percentage than Toronto, but still feel more diverse and are undoubtedly more linguistically diverse.
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Old 06-06-2012, 02:05 PM
 
Location: Gatineau, Québec
26,876 posts, read 38,019,680 times
Reputation: 11645
Quote:
Originally Posted by edwardsyzzurphands View Post
I can definitely agree with that. The point is that cities like NYC and London have a lower foreign born percentage than Toronto, but still feel more diverse and are undoubtedly more linguistically diverse.
Fully agree. "Foreign-born" is a poor measure of a city's cultural diversity for sure. Miami has a higher percentage of foreign-born people than any of the above three cities, yet it certainly isn't more diverse than any of them.
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Old 06-06-2012, 05:24 PM
 
69 posts, read 102,541 times
Reputation: 35
Quote:
Originally Posted by edwardsyzzurphands View Post
I can definitely agree with that. The point is that cities like NYC and London have a lower foreign born percentage than Toronto, but still feel more diverse and are undoubtedly more linguistically diverse.
I doubt it. If you have a link showing they are more linguistically diverse, please do share. I've been to both London and NYC (and will be going to NYC for a week tomorrow morning), and they never "felt more diverse" to me.

Why would you assume they are more "linguistically diverse" just because they have a lower foreign born percentage? Are you basing this statement on any facts, or are you just lying?
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Old 06-06-2012, 05:28 PM
 
69 posts, read 102,541 times
Reputation: 35
Quote:
Originally Posted by OyCrumbler View Post
Of course it has something to do with it--because visible minorities consist of pretty much anyone who is not white by the census definition (well, and aboriginal/native/first nation/etc.). It's true that in cases such as Detroit or any city where there is a single group majority that it matters little, but you can break it down further into the spread of minorities.

Also, I'm not sure if you haven't noticed this, but did you realize there's actually a distinct African American culture? Also, ethnicity (which you're including) can include African American as a fairly coherent group.

I think you're bulldozing over a lot of what diversity includes. Also, the point sort of stands that if you're saying American-born this or that when the argument is over native-born versus foreign-born which is really adorable. I feel we should all hold you for a bit.
Naw....everyone should hold you for a bit. Clearly you need the attention.
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Old 06-06-2012, 08:01 PM
 
Location: Gatineau, Québec
26,876 posts, read 38,019,680 times
Reputation: 11645
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tortorella View Post
I doubt it. If you have a link showing they are more linguistically diverse, please do share. I've been to both London and NYC (and will be going to NYC for a week tomorrow morning), and they never "felt more diverse" to me.

Why would you assume they are more "linguistically diverse" just because they have a lower foreign born percentage? Are you basing this statement on any facts, or are you just lying?
Here is a theory: both are a lot bigger than Toronto. It stands to reason that in those several million extra people they have over Toronto, that there might be speakers of languages that are not represented in Toronto.

Not really that difficult to understand - unless one is one of those people who cannot envision that perhaps some other city is more diverse than Toronto.
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Old 06-06-2012, 11:34 PM
 
Location: Nob Hill, San Francisco, CA
2,342 posts, read 3,989,552 times
Reputation: 1088
1. NYC
2. LA
3. Mexico City
4. San Francisco
5. DC
6. Chicago
7. Toronto
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Old 06-07-2012, 05:58 AM
 
300 posts, read 524,617 times
Reputation: 92
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tortorella View Post
I
Why would you assume they are more "linguistically diverse" just because they have a lower foreign born percentage?
Because NYC and London are much bigger than Toronto, so even if the % foreign born is a little lower, the raw numbers are much, much higher.

And % foreign born isn't an exact proxy for linguistic diversity.

For example, the largest Latin American ethnicity in NYC is Puerto Rican, which isn't counted as foreign-born (Puerto Rico is a U.S. territory), yet shares most of the characteristics of foreign born (distinct language, culture, etc.). So you can't just blindly take the foreign born %.

And there could be non-foreign born with linguistic diversity, such as NYC's huge Orthodox and Hasidic Jewish populations, which tend to (depending on the group) speak Yiddish or Hebrew as first languages.
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Old 06-07-2012, 06:16 AM
 
Location: In the heights
37,133 posts, read 39,380,764 times
Reputation: 21217
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tortorella View Post
Naw....everyone should hold you for a bit. Clearly you need the attention.
Really good rebuttal!
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Old 06-07-2012, 08:50 AM
 
10,839 posts, read 14,722,274 times
Reputation: 7874
Interesting argument here. I need to point out

1) the percentage of so-called visible minority (as it is called in Canada) has less and less to do with diversity nowadays, just because in many cities, the whites are not the absolutely majority any more. There is nothing so special about being "white" vs other colors. . Lower percentage of white people doesn't mean higher diversity. Detroit is a good example. Vancouver, BC has very high percentage of non-white, vastly majority of them being Asian while very few black and latinos. Does that mean diversity? NO.

Question is: how do we look at "white"? Does an immigrant from Estonia who speaks poor English and has little exposure to American culture add less to diversity than a local born Asian who grew up in full American culture? I don't think so.

2) the % of foreign born is even a worse measurement and Toronto loves to talk about it. Foreign born means nothing. If a city has 70% foreign born, 95% of them are from one single country, how does that matter?



No SINGLE percentage is a good indication of diversity. One has to look at how many different backgrounds, cultural, linguistic, racial and their percentages. Simply having few white people or higher foreign born sheds little light. If one has to pick one, probably the number of languages spoken is far more accurate than foreign born/non-white ratios. And in this respect, NYC and London are probably the most diverse cities in the world.
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