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My family has been in Texas since we won our independence from Mexico. Both sides of my family lines are very well documented but my ancestry is so mixed up there is really nothing to put other than American. German, Scottish, Irish, Spanish, English, Polish, and French make up most of it. So American to me is the only thing that makes sense to me.
I went to school in Boston for a few years and one of the things I noticed up there and in NYC that is a lot different than here in Texas is how many of the neighborhoods are very Irish, Puerto Rican, Russian, Oriental, Jewish, or whatever. Very different from one another. Here there are very strong hispanic neighborhoods, and some very German rural towns but other than those it seemed much more separated up north were people kinda stuck to their neighborhoods more.
The South largely traces its ancestory back to the American Revolution. The white people in the South are mostly British or French (if speaking of Louisiana). You see pockets of other ancestories, but those two are dominant. And when I say British I am including the famous Scotch-Irish that many Southerners are descended from including myself. I guess Germans are more prevalent in the upper South than the Deep South. I don't have any German ancestory at all; just British and a little French.
Since we have such old roots in this country, of course most of us wouldn't know our ancestory. I think it is ignorant when Northerners pick on Southerners for putting "American" on their census questionaires. If anything, I think Southerners should be proud that our roots go back so far.
What did I write? I never said anything about Blacks identifying themselves as anything. I said "Personally, I feel like lumping Hispanics under Spanish is no better or worse than affixing Afro in front of the ethnicity of most Black people around the world that have no direct link to Africa."
I assume that if I had said it, you'd be able to quote it.
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And I'm disputing and refuting that assertion. There is no comparison. Most Blacks ARE African; indeed, all Blacks in the Diaspora, which includes Spanish-speaking Latin America, ironically, ARE African. As you said, anyone can pick up a language. But many Latin Americans are NOT Spanish. All African vs. NOT All Spanish.
Most blacks have some form of African descent. Most Latin Americans have some form of African and/or Spanish decent. Most of the black dispora that isn't a generation from Africa is not ALL AFRICAN, just as hispanics are not ALL SPANISH. . African is the denonym of Africa. All blacks have African decent, but they are not from Africa, hence they aren't African. Spanish or Spaniard is the denonym of Spain. Most hispanics have Spanish dencent, but are not from Spain. Technically they aren't spanish. Spanish on the other hand is also a the name of a language unlike African (unless you include Afrikaans) and happens to be spoken by the majority of hispanics.
Oh wait . You do know that there is a such thing as Black/Non-White Hispanic and White Hispanic. Hmmmmm, interesting....
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They shouldn't be labeled Spanish because they are NOT Spanish. Roberto Quispe from Bolivia or Juan Carabali from Colombia or Alberto Fujimori from Peru are NOT Spanish.
...and in that sense, the same goes for Black people.
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That is for us Africans to determine, not someone who assumes that any of us "probably couldn't care less."
I didn't know that you could speak for all of "US". GTF with that.
Do you speak English? Why aren't you labeling yourself English?
Well you see... English is a denonym and a language, just like Spanish. The language applies to me, but the denonym doesn't (since I don't live in England). As an "American" I would have to be a little on the denser end to actually think that I was English.
If you did notice (and this is my second time pointing it out), this thread is about Ancestry not language. My post was regarding Ethnicity and Nationality vs. language.
This goes back to my original point, that calling a Hispanic/Latino person Spanish is just like calling a Black person African. Hispanics/Blacks have Spanish/African ancestry, but outside of heredity have little connection to Spain/Africa.
Obviously some Blacks/Hispanics indentify as such and couldn't care less while others take offense to it.
Last edited by WestbankNOLA; 11-06-2010 at 11:28 AM..
I assume most whites in the north don't know there heritage either.
Most southern whites (im assuming all whites) are mutts and have no idea where there country of origin actually is. In my case I have at least 5 countries of origin before America, so American is as accurate as it comes when describing my 4 or 5 nationalities.
In my experience most white Southerners will tell you that they're Irish & Cherokee. I hear that so much. Most are probably Scots-Irish but they don't know the difference
My father's side came from Germany and France. My last name is very German and apparently my German ancestors where the among the first settlers in York County, PA. They worked their down the Appalachians and mingled with the Scots-Irish of southern Appalachia.
My mother's side are the classic Scots-Irish Appalachians that came down from the Virginia mountains and mingled with the Cherokees. My great grandmother was full-blood Cherokee. You can see the Cherokee in my mother...she has dark hair and high cheek bones.
I didn't read through other posts, but for us, we chose American for the following reasons:
First, it's what we are. Nearly every single human in this country is from another country at some point in their family's history. If I'm supposed to go by that I guess I'd be an Irish-Scottish-Native American American. There's no option for that.
Second, by having everyone go by African American, Hispanic American, Chinese American, etc., it's just one more thing that seperates us. If we are going to be a united country we should all be united in our ancestry. In my opinion, the only exception is if someone has moved to this country themselves. Not their family centuries ago. If you were born here, you're American. Why is it so bad for the people of one country to consider themselves of one ancestry?
Last, I'm sick of the PC crap. I'm tired of African American or Native American or Chinese American or whatever. You're American. Your skin may be a different color than mine, but you're still from the same country. Why do we have to divide ourselves up? It's pretty obvious in most cases by looking at someone to know a general area people are from. So why further divide us by labeling our ancestry. I'm not saying you can't still follow the customs of your country. Doesn't matter to me how you honor the 'motherland' if you will. But how about we all become one people and work toward a common goal?
I didn't read through other posts, but for us, we chose American for the following reasons:
First, it's what we are. Nearly every single human in this country is from another country at some point in their family's history. If I'm supposed to go by that I guess I'd be an Irish-Scottish-Native American American. There's no option for that.
Second, by having everyone go by African American, Hispanic American, Chinese American, etc., it's just one more thing that seperates us. If we are going to be a united country we should all be united in our ancestry. In my opinion, the only exception is if someone has moved to this country themselves. Not their family centuries ago. If you were born here, you're American. Why is it so bad for the people of one country to consider themselves of one ancestry?
It wasn't African Americans or other groups, but mostly the former, who set up the separation. Blacks were forcibly separated by law and practice for 400 years, but now it's bad that people call themselves African American?
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Last, I'm sick of the PC crap. I'm tired of African American or Native American or Chinese American or whatever. You're American. Your skin may be a different color than mine, but you're still from the same country. Why do we have to divide ourselves up? It's pretty obvious in most cases by looking at someone to know a general area people are from. So why further divide us by labeling our ancestry. I'm not saying you can't still follow the customs of your country. Doesn't matter to me how you honor the 'motherland' if you will. But how about we all become one people and work toward a common goal?
Just my opinion.
All of this would make perfect sense, if all Americans were treated the same by all other Americans, in every way. If as an American, I could live in any neighborhood I could afford, with other Americans, worship with other Americans, have my kids play, date and marry other Americans, as if we were all the same people, all of this would make perfect sense. But we all know this does not happen.
I didn't read through other posts, but for us, we chose American for the following reasons:
First, it's what we are. Nearly every single human in this country is from another country at some point in their family's history. If I'm supposed to go by that I guess I'd be an Irish-Scottish-Native American American. There's no option for that.
Second, by having everyone go by African American, Hispanic American, Chinese American, etc., it's just one more thing that seperates us. If we are going to be a united country we should all be united in our ancestry. In my opinion, the only exception is if someone has moved to this country themselves. Not their family centuries ago. If you were born here, you're American. Why is it so bad for the people of one country to consider themselves of one ancestry?
Last, I'm sick of the PC crap. I'm tired of African American or Native American or Chinese American or whatever. You're American. Your skin may be a different color than mine, but you're still from the same country. Why do we have to divide ourselves up? It's pretty obvious in most cases by looking at someone to know a general area people are from. So why further divide us by labeling our ancestry. I'm not saying you can't still follow the customs of your country. Doesn't matter to me how you honor the 'motherland' if you will. But how about we all become one people and work toward a common goal?
Just my opinion.
I can only speak on the reason we have the terms African American and Native American. Native American is supposed to be a race, it's the same as Amerindian. That's a racial term not an ethnicity or nationality. So that's always going to stick around just like white, black, asian, etc.
African American is an ethnicity term. Ethnicity has to do with dna I always thought, a specific group within a race, not culture. It's not used to seperated us from other americans like people seem to think. African American is only used to distinguish between us and other black people throughout the world. All other black people had a specific name for their ethnicity and we didn't, all we had to describe us was black (which obviously includes everybody in our race) and black american, which includes every black person who moves here. So African American is only used when distinguishing between us descended from the slaves brought directly to the usa (African Americans), Jamaicans, Haitians and other Caribbeans (whether they live in the usa or not), all the African ethnicities and Black Latinos.
I hope that clears it up for people.
But I don't see the point of the other hyphenated terms, because they aren't seperate ethnicities. Mexican american is not a different ethnicity from mexican, chinese american is not a different ethnicity from chinese. they don't need a seperate name because there is no ethnic difference between them. they should still call their ethnicity just mexican, chinese or whatever. if you live in america we know that's your nationality.
Most countries have different ethnicities or ethnic groups that people proudly claim though, but they also proudly claim their country.
Last edited by Shani NC; 03-18-2011 at 06:16 PM..
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. African is the denonym of Africa. All blacks have African decent, but they are not from Africa, hence they aren't African. Spanish or Spaniard is the denonym of Spain. Most hispanics have Spanish dencent, but are not from Spain. Technically they aren't spanish. Spanish on the other hand is also a the name of a language unlike African (unless you include Afrikaans) and happens to be spoken by the majority of hispanics.
. You do know that there is a such thing as Black/Non-White Hispanic and White Hispanic. Hmmmmm, interesting....
