# "American" = white? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 28, 2009, 5:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766 "2009-02-28T05:11:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2009, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/41 "2009-03-01T03:41:38Z")
I’m always hearing about…insert name here …Americans but have never ever heard anyone call themselves English Americans,why is this? ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2009, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/42 "2009-03-01T03:46:49Z")
I think relatively few Americans are strictly English or Irish or German or African or whatever, even if you restrict the definition to be historically recent. I am - _that I know of_ - English, Irish, German, and Native American. Who knows what else I might be. I prefer either American or mutt. ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2009, 3:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/43 "2009-03-01T03:52:56Z")
I kind of lost my primary point about the British Indian thing there, which is that “British Indian” has become a culture of it’s own that is distinct from both British culture and Indian culture. The term is used as an indicator of cultural identity- much like “African American”- not as a commentary about national alligiences. It’s something so distinct that my bosses could identify as it despite having spent their childhoods in Africa, most of their adult years in America, and really not a lot of time in either Britain or India. ---
**Author:** ![Vox\_Imperatoris](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Vox\_Imperatoris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Vox_Imperatoris)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2009, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/44 "2009-03-01T03:53:20Z")
> [@Lust4Life](#): > > I’m always hearing about…insert name here ..Americans but have never ever heard anyone call themselves English Americans,why is this? How often do you hear even black people, the most common use of this terminology, call themselves “African-American” in conversation? German-American? Italian-American? It’s just not a thing that comes up very often. I mean, my preschool teacher was an English-American (I actually called the world “the weld” for a short time, and we played a game, pass the parcel, we called “pass the passel” :D), but there never would have been cause for her or her U.S.-born children to refer to herself as “English-American”, except maybe on a Census form. Valete, Vox Imperatoris ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2009, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/45 "2009-03-01T04:06:35Z")
Yeah, Lust4Life, Vox brings up a good point. Do you live in America? Hyphenated-Americans are terms newscasters and celebrities use to be ultra-PC. You don’t hear them much on the streets. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2009, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/46 "2009-03-01T06:39:04Z")
> [@Cisco](#): > > Yeah, Lust4Life, Vox brings up a good point. Do you live in America? Hyphenated-Americans are terms newscasters and celebrities use to be ultra-PC. You don’t hear them much on the streets. No I’m a Brit but everyone knows that all Italian Americans are in the Mafia,all Swedish Americans are built like brick outhouses and all Irish Americans have red hair and freckles ,get drunk alot and fight:) ---
**Author:** ![The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9fc348/32.png) [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Flying_Dutchman)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2009, 6:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/47 "2009-03-01T06:54:24Z")
> [@even\_sven](#): > > Well, why shouldn’t he identify himself as whatever he feels is most accurate? When he says “British Indian” you know right away what he means. And indeed, if he had just said he was “British” you’d probably lose a little bit of the understanding about where his post was coming from. > [@even\_sven](#): > > I kind of lost my primary point about the British Indian thing there, which is that “British Indian” has become a culture of it’s own that is distinct from both British culture and Indian culture. The term is used as an indicator of cultural identity- much like “African American”- not as a commentary about national alligiences. My concern is merely for the negative impact that I expect the language to have on British society. We use language to affect society’s attitudes. Remember stewardesses? Those good looking dumb blondes. I wonder how calling Indians of British citizenship “qualified Indians” won’t suggest that they aren’t real Brits. I wonder if the OP feels totally accepted as British as the Anglo-Saxons around him. If that is the case, I withdraw my concern. Assuming that is not the case, I would prefer the OP and everyone else to label him an Indian Brit rather than a British Indian. No need to drop the ethnic modifier. The former suggests a qualified Brit while the latter suggests a qualified Indian. Whats more important to your society of allegience, your ethnicity or your citizenship ? ---
**Author:** ![SomeBodyUK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@SomeBodyUK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SomeBodyUK)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2009, 7:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/48 "2009-03-01T07:33:35Z")
> [@](#): > > I wonder if the OP feels totally accepted as British as the Anglo-Saxons around him. If that is the case, I withdraw my concern. I do feel British. I feel even more British upon settling in the US > [@](#): > > Assuming that is not the case, I would prefer the OP and everyone else to label him an Indian Brit rather than a British Indian. No need to drop the ethnic modifier. The former suggests a qualified Brit while the latter suggests a qualified Indian. Whats more important to your society of allegience, your ethnicity or your citizenship ? The naming convention used in UK is different to the US. British Indian means that the person is British, with an Indian ethnicity. USA equivlaent would be Indian-American. My ethnicity doesn’t change, my citizenship can. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2009, 8:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/49 "2009-03-01T08:27:04Z")
I worked with a second or third generation born in England “Indian"whos family had been thrown out of Uganda by Idi Amin who when watching me wash up some cups and plates said"You British always wash up like that” and he refered to India,though he’d never been there as “home”. Personally I consider people descended from those from the sub continent as totally British but have cultural differences from other Brits in much the same way as Scots,Welsh or northeners. Thinking on it I dont actually consider “Indian,Indians” as being very foreign and I have actually been there. By contrast a German or a Frenchperson much as I love them are more foreign then they are though geographically much neare to the U.K. ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2009, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/50 "2009-03-01T17:09:34Z")
> [@Lust4Life](#): > > No I’m a Brit but everyone knows that all Italian Americans are in the Mafia,all Swedish Americans are built like brick outhouses and all Irish Americans have red hair and freckles ,get drunk alot and fight:) I can see how those stereotypes (and the impression that everyone always calls black people African Americans) get exported in our print and media, but they’re really not that prominent among people in the US. If anything, they’re probably a little more common in New England and the rust belt. Out here they’re more or less unheard of. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2009, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/51 "2009-03-01T19:17:35Z")
> [@devilsknew](#): > > Actually, I would argue that no genome in Europe is untouched by the Viking seed. As the most far reaching, invading, and intrepid Germanic tribe/influence/settlers, I would say that even the Italians, Spanish, and Greeks have viking blood and culture by Warring rights. But you could claim the same for Mongolian ancestry, and no one goes around claiming we are all proto-Mongolians. ---
**Author:** ![A\_Dodgy\_Dude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a87d85/32.png) [@A\_Dodgy\_Dude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A_Dodgy_Dude)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2009, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/52 "2009-03-01T19:19:10Z")
I’m Irish-American. I was born in the Bronx, both my parents were born in Ireland. When in Ireland I find I have the mindset “I am American,” and when home (in NYC) I find I have the mindset, “I am Irish.” I don’t know if that helps the submitter any, but there you have it. ---
**Author:** ![devilsknew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4da419/32.png) [@devilsknew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/devilsknew)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2009, 3:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/53 "2009-03-02T03:15:54Z")
> [@devilsknew](#): > > It does stand though, that Caucasians (Basically Viking stock), Blacks (Ivory coast tribe Africans), and Hispanics (Mediterraneaen and Aboriginal Populations) own equal rights to the last 500 years of the Americas Heritage. > [@Dangerosa](#): > > But you could claim the same for Mongolian ancestry, and no one goes around claiming we are all proto-Mongolians. Yes, but there was no Mongol King of England. There have, however, been a couple [Viking Kings of England](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canute_the_Great). And my claim is that in very general terms the Caucasians (Read: English) who had a major hand in founding and colonizing the Americas were of a major number belonging to that [Viking Stock](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viking#Genetic_legacy) by heritage. ---
**Author:** ![SomeBodyUK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@SomeBodyUK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SomeBodyUK)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2009, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/54 "2009-03-02T04:03:20Z")
> [@A\_Dodgy\_Dude](#): > > I’m Irish-American. I was born in the Bronx, both my parents were born in Ireland. > > When in Ireland I find I have the mindset “I am American,” and when home (in NYC) I find I have the mindset, “I am Irish.” > > I don’t know if that helps the submitter any, but there you have it. Same goes for me - in UK, I’m Asian or Indian. Outside UK I’m British. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2009, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/55 "2009-03-02T04:22:49Z")
> [@Lust4Life](#): > > No I’m a Brit but everyone knows that all Italian Americans are in the Mafia,all Swedish Americans are built like brick outhouses and all Irish Americans have red hair and freckles ,get drunk alot and fight:) Okay, I’m an American American (ie: mutt), know Italians who are in or, because of their wives, out of the Organization, go to a Scandinavian church (Not so much brick outhouses as taller than me, including the women. At today’s baptism the wife was a full head above her German husband.), and of partial Irish heritage (Raised-Irish Dad went to the wake of an Irish girlfriend’s father. Her brothers disapproved of his presence at such a solemn (As if! It were an IRISH wake!) occasion so he left them draped over their father’s coffin.), which really does speak for itself, though we are mellowing. So, yeah, some cliches have a basis in fact. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2009, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/56 "2009-03-03T15:45:32Z")
> [@devilsknew](#): > > And my claim is that in very general terms the Caucasians (Read: English) who had a major hand in founding and colonizing the Americas were of a major number belonging to that [Viking Stock](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viking#Genetic_legacy) by heritage. Where’s your evidence for that claim? There was at least as much American settlement from southern England and below the old Danelaw as there was from above it. ---
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2009, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/57 "2009-03-03T19:01:44Z")
Well… I can’t hardly say much about other families, but mine’s been here since 1700, and we got no Viking in us between then and 300 AD. No I1 in the DNA, either. ---
**Author:** ![davekhps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a5b964/32.png) [@davekhps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davekhps)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2009, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/58 "2009-03-03T19:18:18Z")
Interesting thread here. I guess I tend to lazily fall into the OP’s description of bias, insofar as I refer to white people as Americans first, then go down into their geneology if necessary, while with blacks I’ll resort to “African-American” while in PC-threatened territory, or likewise, Mexicans and other southern immigrants/descendants as Hispanic or Latino, Indians as Native-Americans (or India Indians as Indian-Americans. . . sheesh, this stuff is confusing, eh?). Personally, my ideal world is one where we’re all referred to as American, period. Then if we want to talk geneology, we can do that-- Americans of all stripes are proud of their immigration heritage, I would never want to lose that element of our character. But the problem is that white “Americans” are seen as homogenous by everyone looking to score favorable points for their own discrete ethnic group, and that’s just unfair. My family is Polish, Russian & Lithuanian-- they came over “on the boat” around the beginning of the 20th century, landed in Chicago, made good money, lost good money in the Depression, and basically lived a normal, average life. The only ethnic connections I have to my past is the knowledge that my great-grandparents were immigrants, a few Polish swear words passed down over the years, and an unnatural preference for pierogi and kolache. My family never owned slaves. They weren’t around at the time of the Mayflower, or the Founding, or the Civil War. If anything, I’m _less_ of an American than the vast majority of American blacks who could, if records had survived, traced their origins in this country back far further than my own. Thankfully, America is still primarily a creed, and less a nationality. As long as you sign up to be an American, we welcome all the world’s mutts. ---
**Author:** ![devilsknew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4da419/32.png) [@devilsknew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/devilsknew)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2009, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766/59 "2009-03-04T01:14:41Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > Where’s your evidence for that claim? There was at least as much American settlement from southern England and below the old Danelaw as there was from above it. The Viking age is evidence of my claim and its widespread cultural, linguistic, and genetic influence among Northern Europeans (Caucasians). Yes, there was a major number from Southern and Northern England… that speaks for nothing of 500 years of travel and intermarriage. Using the old No True Scotsman, er… Viking defense there, **Captain**? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-white/487766.md?page=2)