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If Hispanic is not a race, then Asian is not a race either.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Irishtom29
Hispanic isn't a race but a convenient catch all term intended to make it easy for social workers, politicians and the media to categorize people from Spanish speaking countries other than Spain.
White, Black, and Asian are also convenient catch all terms.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BPerone201
I think we're all aware that the term Hispanic can get a bit confusing. But it's closer related to the term race rather than ethnicity. Unless you think Puerto Ricans, Dominicans, Cubans, etc are all the same, then there's not much I can say.
Using my logic, there is no ethnicity or race called American (unless you're referring to the Native Americans) in the first place for me to even consider your nitpick... since race/ethnicity is the discussion here.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BPerone201
So that makes it an ethnicity? That makes absolute no sense!
Should Hispanic just be discarded as a word? So many people like to twist, throw, and stretch the meaning anyway.
MOST African Americans have white blood in them whether you notice it or not, does that make the term "Black" not a race?
This whole race/ethnicity discussion can go on forever. I wish I was never involved, honestly
I guess most people here think race and ethnicity can be neatly separated.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Neutre
It is confusing because "Hispanic" is singled out as an ethnicity, yet "Asian Indian", "Chinese", "Filipino", "Pakistani" are listed as races.
amartinez19 wrote: Take this scenario. Lets say your family would have immigrated to Argentina as many Italians did and then immigrated to the US. You would then be classified as Hispanic. Your daughter is not interracial. Hispanic is not a race.
Originally posted by me:
Take these scenarios. Let's say your family had immigrated to (a) as many (b) did and then immigrated to the US. You would then be classified as (c). Your daughter is not interracial. (c) is not a race.
1.
a: South Africa
b: Dutch, Indians, Indonesians
c: African-American
On the other hand, a lot of native Europeans and Africans look "Asian".
This is an indigenous girl southern Africa, yet she'd pass as a native in SE Asia and Oceania.
African-Americans
Quote:
Originally Posted by Neutre
Ethnicity, culture, and race based on physical characteristics are very closely intertwined.
Theoretically you could separate race and ethnicity (e.g. in the census), but that doesn't work in real life.
Even in the census you encounter all sorts of doubts, like Asians who physically are Black or Caucasian, although they're "100%" Asian. This shows how the so called Asian race is inseparable from ethnicity or culture. And then you also have native Europeans who physically look Asian (I've met a number of native Poles, Hungarians, and Greeks who do) or Black. There are also enough Africans (and African-Americans) who look Caucasian or Asian.
One thing that one forgets is that based solely on physical characteristics you often have these different races within one family or an extended family. I know an Indonesian family who has three kids. The eldest one looks Black with dark skin and black curly hair, her younger siblings are twins, a brother and a sister. He looks Asian with "the eyes" and dark brown wavy hair, whereas she looks Caucasian with light skin and straight dark brown hair. And I'm omitting other physical characteristics such as the shape/form of the nose, lips, hair distribution and density, protrusion of the brow ridge, cheek bones, eye color, stature, fat distribution, and a host of other features.
These cases are common all over the "old world" including Southeast, South, Central (including western China), West Asia, Oceania, Africa (Malagasy people of Madagascar are closer to Hawaiians than to Black Chadians, a lot of Bushmen in southern Africa look more like Asians), Russia, etc. Those Poles that are physically Asian probably have siblings or family who are Caucasian.
Are those people supposed to check different races in spite of them being in the same family?
Are these twins now supposed to check different races?
[See picture in the original post]
The Philippines isn't Spanish speaking anymore. However in the 1980 Census something like 12% of Filipinos identified as Hispanic. Reportedly only 1% of Filipinos identify as Hispanic today.
yea, but they still descend from a spanish speaking heritage, which i believe was the definition given. but thats alright, they are kind of a unique situation.
The only race categories out there are Mongoloids, Negroids and Caucasoids.
There are also Capoids, Australoids, and a bunch of others.
The father of human racial classifications, Johann Friedrich Blumenbach, divided humans into five races.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BelieveInCleve
I believe there's 3 races and everything branches off of them, but that doesn't change the fact that Indians, native americans, most middle eastern people, hispanics (whether it's the darker skinned or simply from that culture and speak the spanish language), etc. none of them are treated or looked at as "white" to the average person, especially by white people. Obvious cultural differences, skin color differences, language differences, etc.
We humans branch off of one race. It was Adam and Eve, not one couple in Africa, another one in Europe, and another one in China.
What's considered a "race" has fluctuated over time, being influenced by historical and societal circumstances.
Americans have a picture in mind upon the mention of the term "White", yet Arabs and Turkic peoples have a whole different picture.
Also, what is considered White in the US has always been subject to change. There were times when Irish and Italians were not considered White just as there were instances when the assertion that Latinos and (Asian) Indians are White was not contested.
The picture of what is Black in the general American mind is also different from what people from large parts of the Old World (the world outside of the Americas) have in mind.
Following what is considered Black (based on physical features) in the American mind, a lot of people from southeast, south, west Asia and Oceania would be Black.
Seeing the world in Black & White + Rest (thus 3 races) has its roots in the American (including Latin American) history. Other people, like the aforementioned Arabs and Turkic peoples for example, have totally different perspectives.
Wow. A discussion about ethnicity of Americans has turned into an anthropological debate.
I like that or at least I'm good with that. I mean if you think of all things a "discussion about ethnicity of Americans" could turn into it turning into anthropology is pretty benign don't you think?
I like that or at least I'm good with that. I mean if you think of all things a "discussion about ethnicity of Americans" could turn into it turning into anthropology is pretty benign don't you think?
I suppose. IMO, there's a lot of gray area when it pertains to race and ethnicity, which is why I wonder why it seems to matter so much.
I don't know. Personally I think Spanish (as in Spain) should be separate from Hispanic/Latino, and in the same list with German, Irish, etc. It makes no sense to include them with Latin Americans IMO.
As mentioned, what is considered "White" has always fluctuated over time. Even today there are differences in people's perceptions of what is "White". Some consider Spaniards to be White while others doubt it. In spite of what people would like to believe, there's no huge difference between the racial composition of Spaniards and that of Moroccans. If you go to Spain, you'll see that some natives (not recent immigrants) physically would pass as Black according to American standards of what is Black.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Neutre
What's considered a "race" has fluctuated over time, being influenced by historical and societal circumstances.
Americans have a picture in mind upon the mention of the term "White", yet Arabs and Turkic peoples have a whole different picture.
Also, what is considered White in the US has always been subject to change. There were times when Irish and Italians were not considered White just as there were instances when the assertion that Latinos and (Asian) Indians are White was not contested.
The picture of what is Black in the general American mind is also different from what people from large parts of the Old World (the world outside of the Americas) have in mind.
Following what is considered Black (based on physical features) in the American mind, a lot of people from southeast, south, west Asia and Oceania would be Black.
Seeing the world in Black & White + Rest (thus 3 races) has its roots in the American (including Latin American) history. Other people, like the aforementioned Arabs and Turkic peoples for example, have totally different perspectives.
Quote:
Originally Posted by David Aguilar
I suppose. IMO, there's a lot of gray area when it pertains to race and ethnicity, which is why I wonder why it seems to matter so much.
If it didn't matter, we should wonder why some Latinos seem to have to defend their "Whiteness".
As mentioned, what is considered "White" has always fluctuated over time. Even today there are differences in people's perceptions of what is "White". Some consider Spaniards to be White while others doubt it. In spite of what people would like to believe, there's no huge difference between the racial composition of Spaniards and that of Moroccans. If you go to Spain, you'll see that some natives (not recent immigrants) physically would pass as Black according to American standards of what is Black.
So Portuguese aren't white either, or are they given a pass? Your point of there being "no huge difference between the racial composition of Spaniards and that of Moroccans" is moot because Moroccans are white too. Just because they are from Africa, it doesn't mean they are black.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Neutre
If it didn't matter, we should wonder why some Latinos seem to have to defend their "Whiteness".
I don't know where you are going with this, but this comment seems very generalized.
One that comes to my mind is Sephardic Jews I think are more likely to be considered "white", by people, than Arabs. However their ancestry, by genetic analysis and folk tradition, is kind of the same. They're both South Semitic. For that matter so are the Maltese and I think the Maltese might be seen as "white" more often than either one.
I imagine there are people out there who would not think of Azeris as Caucasians even though they are in the Caucasus mountains.
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human races
