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Guess if they were born in another country, they would not be African-American, they'd be Canadian-American or European-American. or could be Caribbean or Jamaiccan.
Guess if they were born in another country, they would not be African-American, they'd be Canadian-American or European-American. or could be Caribbean or Jamaiccan.
I am an American of African descent. I cannot deny one more than the other. But my upbringing is American and I have never been to Africa. Just like an Irish-American can visit Ireland and feel at "home" despite having never visited Ireland before, many blacks feel the same way about Africa and Africans.
I am mostly Irish American. In general I would not feel at all at home in Ireland. I am comfortable there though not as much as I am in London. i am also comfortable in Germany and Holland though less so than in London. I am also more comfortable in Mexico than anywhere in Europe.
I actually grew up a midwestern or border line southern US. Where I grew up the choices were Baptist, Catholic or Black. Irish was not an available choice. And when I went to my last year of high school on Long Island my classmates called me "Rebel". So until reaching adulthood I was basically a white southern guy.
So I would think a Black person would feel much the same about Africa. A fact of genealogy but of little personal impact. Not trying to minimize the personal impact of being Black which I have no doubts is large. But the Africa thing would seem at best of minor historical interest.
I am mostly Irish American. In general I would not feel at all at home in Ireland. I am comfortable there though not as much as I am in London. i am also comfortable in Germany and Holland though less so than in London. I am also more comfortable in Mexico than anywhere in Europe.
I actually grew up a midwestern or border line southern US. Where I grew up the choices were Baptist, Catholic or Black. Irish was not an available choice. And when I went to my last year of high school on Long Island my classmates called me "Rebel". So until reaching adulthood I was basically a white southern guy.
So I would think a Black person would feel much the same about Africa. A fact of genealogy but of little personal impact. Not trying to minimize the personal impact of being Black which I have no doubts is large. But the Africa thing would seem at best of minor historical interest.
That's fair. Anecdotal, of course, but all of my black friends and family feel a special connection to Africa when they visit. Some have even decided to move to Africa after visiting. There is a particularly growing expat community in Ghana, which has deemed 2019 the "year of return."
If a dark-skinned American moves to Africa, are they an American-African or do they revert back to being an African?
This same question could be asked of American white people, who claim they are of a mixture of various Europeans... it does not mean they become each individual mixture when the visit the country that mixture if from.
That's fair. Anecdotal, of course, but all of my black friends and family feel a special connection to Africa when they visit. Some have even decided to move to Africa after visiting. There is a particularly growing expat community in Ghana, which has deemed 2019 the "year of return."
My father might have felt such ties. He was of the first US born generation. I never did. After moving back to NYC I never felt the need to even go back to my home town. Set foot there only once in the next 50 years. The Irish thing was unthinkable. And I was both kinds and a little German. Simply a hopelessly foreign place that I might visit some day. I however became a regular visitor to London and that became my European place of choice.
I preferred it in "back in the day" when xxx-American generally referred to where you were from and was used by those who "just got off the boat". E.g. Someone from Ireland who just immigrated to the US would be an Irish-American, their child would be an American. Once these types of labels became popular to denote race vs country of origin, they pretty much lost all meaning as successive generations generally become more mixed (e.g. my kids could be three different X-American).
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