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The most commonly reported European ancestry among White Americans in the last U.S census is German. I would say Germans are very White bread.
The old definition of Anglo in the U.S was limited only to people who draw their ancestry back to the British Isles. Today's definition of Anglo in the U.S basically applies to all White people who do not speak Spanish as a first language, in other words the term Anglo has basically become a shorter way of saying Non Hispanic Whites. In the movie Spanglish for example, Paz Vega's character refers to Adam Sandler's character as an Anglo even though Sandler is not of British ancestry. I myself have been called an Anglo before by some Mexicans.
The way "anglo" is used is totally meaningless. It seems to be a term hispanics came up with to lump all non-hispanics together as though everyone who isn't hispanic came from England. They use it to refer to people of Italian, French, German, Polish, and many other ethnicities and cultural heritages.
I don't know about the Philippines, but in Indonesia the people's race is rather "undefinable" because you got people who look... hmmm.. I don't even know how to explain it. Blond hair and blue eyes are rare but there's a huge spectrum in skin color, hair texture, shape of the eyes, nose, lips, etc. and there's no clear boundaries between the different looks. That is why I agree that you can't classify the humanity into mongoloid, negroid, caucasoid, or whatever else you have.
People in the Phillipines are Mongoloid and many of them are nominally mixed with Caucasoid due to years of Spanish colonial presence. Indonesia is a different story. Most people in the the northern part of Indonesia, closer to the rest of Asia and further from Australia are clearly of majority Mongoloid origin. However, things start to change as your get closer to Australia. The aboriginal inhabitants of Australia (and many inhabitants of Indonesia's islands close to Australia) are a peculiar racial mixture of all of the races; I can only imagine that this has to do with the fact that although the region borders Asia (Mongoloid) it bordered the Indian subcontinent (Caucasoid) and Africa (Negroid) when the Earth was a big mass called Pangea without continents. Even if this is contested, it is an tiny exception and doesn't really put a dent into the Caucasoid/Negroid/Mongoloid distinction that applies to 99% of the rest of the world, and according to many people, to 100% of the world.
The way "anglo" is used is totally meaningless. It seems to be a term hispanics came up with to lump all non-hispanics together as though everyone who isn't hispanic came from England. They use it to refer to people of Italian, French, German, Polish, and many other ethnicities and cultural heritages.
I am just as persistent in correcting Hispanic people in their misuse of "Anglo" as I am in correcting non-Hispanic people in misusing the same term. I am an equal opportunity discriminator and will call anyone out who uses racial or ethnic terms in an incorrect way.
I agree with you and wish people would realize the meaning of what they say and wouldn't just repeat any old thing they hear.
People in the Phillipines are Mongoloid and many of them are nominally mixed with Caucasoid due to years of Spanish colonial presence. Indonesia is a different story. Most people in the the northern part of Indonesia, closer to the rest of Asia and further from Australia are clearly of majority Mongoloid origin. However, things start to change as your get closer to Australia. The aboriginal inhabitants of Australia (and many inhabitants of Indonesia's islands close to Australia) are a peculiar racial mixture of all of the races; I can only imagine that this has to do with the fact that although the region borders Asia (Mongoloid) it bordered the Indian subcontinent (Caucasoid) and Africa (Negroid) when the Earth was a big mass called Pangea without continents. Even if this is contested, it is an tiny exception and doesn't really put a dent into the Caucasoid/Negroid/Mongoloid distinction that applies to 99% of the rest of the world, and according to many people, to 100% of the world.
Lots of distinctly Negroid people in Irian Jaya and parts of the Philippines as well........
People in the Phillipines are Mongoloid and many of them are nominally mixed with Caucasoid due to years of Spanish colonial presence. Indonesia is a different story. Most people in the the northern part of Indonesia, closer to the rest of Asia and further from Australia are clearly of majority Mongoloid origin. However, things start to change as your get closer to Australia. The aboriginal inhabitants of Australia (and many inhabitants of Indonesia's islands close to Australia) are a peculiar racial mixture of all of the races; I can only imagine that this has to do with the fact that although the region borders Asia (Mongoloid) it bordered the Indian subcontinent (Caucasoid) and Africa (Negroid) when the Earth was a big mass called Pangea without continents. Even if this is contested, it is an tiny exception and doesn't really put a dent into the Caucasoid/Negroid/Mongoloid distinction that applies to 99% of the rest of the world, and according to many people, to 100% of the world.
I doubt that it's 99%. Such situation where you cannot classify people doesn't only apply to Indonesia, but a bunch of other countries that I can't even list here. You also see for yourself how many Latinos don't belong to either mongoloid, negroid, caucasoid, etc.
It's also important to note that it's not like each race developed separately and then mixed.
The way it's been taught makes one assume that there was a mongoloid, negroid, and caucasoid breed, each developing separately, and at some time they mixed.
When the humans started to spread from Africa, when did they become mongoloid or caucasoid?
We also know that there is not a single gene that separates negroid from mongoloid from caucasoid.
I used to take such classification of human race for granted, but now that I've seen people from many countries and read some literature about it, I agree that one cannot classify people like that. It's convenient but it is not in line with the truth.
The reason black and white could be separated as races was because the bulk of the early immigrants were from western Europe and western Africa, who of course looked very different.
Then there was a one drop rule, even blacks who had more european features could be kept black.
As said above, white could be kept as a race because the earlier immigrants were overwhelmingly of European origins, but now with the Latin Americans, Middle Easterners, Central, South, Southeast Asians, and Pacific Islanders one is confronted with the "grey areas".
In now way am I compelling you to abandon it if you see such classification to be useful, but as for myself, I try to avoid it because of the reasons I mentioned.
Btw, this understanding helped me to see how you and Jeff Jarrett had different definitions of "white". As I said, I don't think either one of you is wrong. One one extreme is "white = blond blue eyed, classical anthropology's nordic" and on the other extreme "white = classical anthropology's caucasoid". Fact is that most people have a definition of "white" somewhere between those two extremes. Yet there's always going to be endless debates because of different perceptions of what is "white".
Lots of distinctly Negroid people in Irian Jaya and parts of the Philippines as well........
And what many people don't know is that even as far north as Thailand there are "negroids", and as in Indonesia and the Philippines, there are no clear boundaries between them and the other "races".
Neutre, I really appreciate that you have taken time to think about my responses. However, it is clear to me that you do not completely understand some of what I have said, so I will correct you.
1) I have never said or suggested that "white = classical anthropology's Caucasoid." In fact, I have explicitly stated that millions of Caucasoid people are not white. Indians and Pakistanis are, generally speaking, not white. The same can be said about many people from Central Asia and the Middle East. All "white" people are Caucasian, but not all Caucasians are white.
2) The only example that you have given and claimed that the categories of Caucasoid/Negroid/Mongoloid do not apply is Indonesia. I responded to you and explained that many Indonesians are mixed race. However, it concerns me that we are so far into this discussion and you are using mixed-race Latinos to show that the Caucasoid/Negroid/Mongoloid distinction isn't failproof. Again, I have explicitly stated that many Latinos are mixed-race and that all Latinos can trace their race or racial admixture to one, two, or all of the three racial groups.
Again, I appreciate your responses and have enjoyed discussing this with you.
Yet there's always going to be endless debates because of different perceptions of what is "white".
If you live in any city in the U.S where Nonwhites are in the majority (Miami, Detroit, El Paso, Baltimore, etc) and you have never been referred to as a White boy, White girl, Anglo, or Gringo by any of the Nonwhites than you are most likely not White.
If you live in any city in the U.S where Nonwhites are in the majority (Miami, Detroit, El Paso, Baltimore, etc) and you have never been referred to as a White boy, White girl, Anglo, or Gringo by any of the Nonwhites than you are most likely not White.
"White" is kind of inaccurate unless talking about albinos and even they aren't completely white. I think the label white should be tossed. The original race categories were more accurate.
Skin tone and hair color isn't a good criteria at all to use because within a family of full siblings, you can get marked variations. A fair skinned blue eyed blond can have a full sibling that has dark eyes and is brunette.
You can tell by looking at albinos from each "race" that there are some other features that if someone wants to categorize into races, you can at least have certain racial types. Most people from India I think are clearly caucasian because if you bleached them and gave them blond hair and eyes, they would look like other caucasians, and the same for Swedes, if you darkened them, gave them dark eyes and hair they would look like other caucasians.
There aren't really distinct races anyhow -- it's all just one big spectrum. I know people who would be called "white boy" or "anglo" who have a black grandparent or Native American grandparent. An American Indian woman I know has blond grandchildren because her kids were half with a blond father and they married blond "whites". I've seen that with blacks also where 3 out of 4 grandparents were "white", the grandchildren look "white".
I know when I first went to Mexico, I was suprised to see freckle-faced red heads. They are rare in the USA and rarer in Mexico but you can run across them. They aren't always in the upper or middle class, their parents can be brunette -- but there must be a couple Celts somewhere in their lineage.
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