Ethnicity vs Race

[Keeve]

I'm putting this in GQ (instead of GD) because I am looking for official information, not general opinions.

I am still bothered by the questions on this year's US Census forms.

The following is taken from the Census' "Help" screen for the "Race" question, at http://www.census.gov/iqa/data/topics/race_iqa.html

Two or More Races

If this person considers his/her race to include two or more races, such as "Black-White," "White-Korean," "American Indian-White," mark the boxes for all the racial groups provided.

Two or More Ethnicities

If this person considers himself/herself to be two or more ethnic groups, such as "French-Canadian," "Spanish-Mexican," "Irish-Mexican," mark the "Some other race" box and enter the name of the group in the space provided for the Some other race write-in.
So "Korean" is a "race", and "Irish" is an "ethnicity". This does not help me understand these terms at all.

Suppose someone (and his parents, just to make the question better) grew up in the Korean section of town, and hung out with all the Korean immigrants, and celebrated the holidays that they do, etc etc. Would he have been wrong to enter "Korean" as his "ethnicity"?

Suppose someone knew nothing of Ireland, except that that's where all eight of his great-grandparents came from, resulting in bright red hair for himself and every single one of his cousins. Would he have been wrong to enter "Irish" as his "race"?

I consider myself more Jewish than anything else, and wanted to enter that for one of those questions. Because I could not figure out which one to put it in, I ended up putting it in both. I don't regret doing that, but I am curious to know what the Census Bureau would have preferred. Any thoughts?

[kunilou]

This sounds like a non-answer, but the folks at the Census would like you to define yourself. If you want to call yourself a Hispanic-Pacific Islander-African American even though your name is Kowalski and your parents both trace their lineage to the same village in Eastern Europe, that's up to you.

The Census Bureau got tired of trying to define what "race" and "ethnicity" mean, since they mean something different to just about everyone, so finally they threw up their hands and said "you are what you define yourself as being."

However, it would be courteous to define yourself as the same thing every time you're asked.

[LazarusLong42]

"Race" is supposed to refer to the (completely arbitrary) division of the human race into Caucasoid, Negroid and Mongoloid. Ethnicity is supposed to refer to your sociological heritage.

Personally, I refer to myself as human by race, and American by ethnicity. The Census department, therefore, dislikes me <G>.

LL

[Keeve]

Originally posted by kunilou
The Census Bureau got tired of trying to define what "race" and "ethnicity" mean, since they mean something different to just about everyone, so finally they threw up their hands and said "you are what you define yourself as being."Okay, I'll rephrase it: Why do they ask both questions, instead of just one question? Are there some laws which are based on race, while other laws are based on ethnicity? If so, knowing which laws are which would do a lot towards answering my problem.

[kunilou]

I believe the whole classification system fell apart over "Hispanic."

Hispanics don't really have a language in common (since some speak Portuguese, some speak French and some were brought up speaking English.) They don't have a race in common, they don't have a nationality in common, but, at least in the U.S., they're a somewhat cohesive group. And, just for the record, there were certainly instances of discrimination against Hispanics, because maybe their skin was darker and they spoke limited or accented English.

Remember, the 1964 Civil Rights Act bans discrimination on the grounds of both "race" and "color" as well as national origin, so there has always been the race-ethnicity diad.

[sailor]

Prejudice was never a well thought out thing and was based on a combination of race and culture. The two things got all mixed up and that is where the mess comes from. As kunilou says, Hispanic is the most blatant case of confusion. Hispanics can be of *any* race (from white to black to anything in between) and several languages. No one can agree what "hispanic" means.

Blacks from Cuba are hispanics but not those from Jamaica. Whites can be Hispanic or not. I remember the case of a French woman who had lived in Argentina. She was considered White but her daughter hispanic.

It seems having a latin american origin is the most common test for being considered hispanic. But some people would consider people from Spain and Italy (and even Greece) hispanics, while others do not.

I think it was NY mayor Koch who I once heard saying something to the effect that he considered people from Spain and Italy were taking advantage improperly of programs designed to help Hispanics.

Which reminds me that I know one woman who married a hispanic man and did not intend to take his name until she realized she would become hispanic and be entitled to preference.

IMHO the whole thing is so screwed up i would just scrap it all. Why does the census want to know this anyway?

[Collounsbury]

Originally posted by kunilou
I believe the whole classification system fell apart over "Hispanic."

Hispanics don't really have a language in common (since some speak Portuguese, some speak French and some were brought up speaking English.) They don't have a race in common, they don't have a nationality in common, but, at least in the U.S., they're a somewhat cohesive group. And, just for the record, there were certainly instances of discrimination against Hispanics, because maybe their skin was darker and they spoke limited or accented English.


Typically, French speakers are not included in the category Hispanic (whose root refers to Spanish speakers) although I have seen Brazilians (Portuguese speakers) collapsed under
it.

[Collounsbury]

Originally posted by sailor
Prejudice was never a well thought out thing and was based on a combination of race and culture.

snip

IMHO the whole thing is so screwed up i would just scrap it all. Why does the census want to know this anyway?

Good observations. I would say that the Census people are trying to capture how Americans describe themselves (helps understand what whacky incoherent people people are.) Working with the realization that American society seems to be entering a transition where old 'racial'-ethnic categories are dissolving, the answers to these questions --even if or especially because of their incoherence-- can tell us alot about American society.

Now if you think you're describing something immutable (think those folks who really believe in race), then its going to be a frustrating future for you.

[Yeah]

Most posters seem to think that "the Census people" ask questions based on what they (the Census people) want to know. This isn't the case. The bureaucrats in the Bureau of the Census, like any other bureaucrats working for any agency in the executive branch of the federal government, ask the questions that President, his appointees, and the Congress want them to ask and don't ask the questions that the same people don't want them to ask.

I very much doubt that the demographers and statisticians at the management level of BuCens came up with the extremely problematic classification "Hispanic." More likely the pols made 'em do it.

[parsnip]

Among other folks, there is an entire Affirmative Action industry (vendors, special interest groups, and companies which sell goods and services to the federal, state and other government agencies) waiting for the new Census figures by race/ethnicity, gender, occupation and geographic area.

Contractors are required to evaluate their employee population against the "available workforce" through a multi-step process to determine if the company is required to establish goals to get in line with availability.

It often annoys employees and applicants to be asked to classify themselves, but almost all employers of any size are required to track this, regardless of contractor status.