No one ever says “white European”. Just “European”.
No one ever says “yellow Asian”. They just say “Asian”.
Same for Middle Easterners and Indians. When was the last time you heard someone refer to these folks by color?
But when someone says “African”, there’s hand-wringing about black
Africans and white Africans and everything-else Africans, who’s Subsaharan and who’s not really “African”. I think Jared Diamond used “Black African” about eleventy-million times in Guns, Germs, and Steel, while staying mum about the skin coloring of Europeans and Asians. The race of ancient Egyptians gets dissected whenever the topic is mentioned; while other ancient peoples and their descendants can relax comfortably in their non-important racial identities. Every race seems to have its own continental landmass except for black people. If hordes of Asians were attacking us, we would know exactly who to scurry from. But say the same thing about Africans and we’d be looking for the veritable rainbow coalition to show up. We’d be looking for Charleze Therons and Boutrous Boutrous-Ghalis along with Yaphet Kottos and Thandi Newtons.
I’m not complaining, mind you. I just think it’s funny, especially since the descendants of Africans living in America–the ones we call Black–really are a rainbow coalition.
Someone who was ignorant and racist might also think such a person was “African-American” but that would not make it so.
Harold Ford looks white but he is not white. If he became president in 2008, that would make him the first black president in the history of the country. Not because of what he looks like, but because of his ancestry.
Right. He’d be catching the same kind of flak that goes to Blacks because that’s what folks would assume him to be. It’s a case of mistaken identity.
I didn’t see his usage of “black” and “white” as refering to actual skin color, which is why I didn’t walk away with the same impression that you did. I read “black” more like “Black” and “white” as “White”. Meaning, I didn’t think he was describing how these people looked so much as how these people are defined racially based on today’s rules.
I think the main reason he did this was to make it easier to see how “white Africans” ended up in a different place technologically than “black Africans”, but you’re right, to put Africans in boxes like that is obnoxious.
I’m talking about his discussion about Africa prior to its colonization by Europeans, when he talked about the indigenous races of the continent.
I can understand using ethnic labels like Bantu or Khoi, just like I have no problem with the use of “Anglo-Saxons” and “Turks”. However, no one ever says “White Europeans” to separate, say, Western Europeans from Eastern Europeans. No serious historian ever says “Black Asians” to distinguish southwest Asians from eastern Asians. Yet, there’s no more reason to lump a fellow from Malta with one from Iceland than it is to separate a Kenyan from an Egyptian. But the Maltese and Icelanders are both equally European. Their race and kinship is implied when you call them “European”. A Kenyan and a Egyptian might as well belong to separate continents, in some people eye’s. Doesn’t matter that the Kenyan and Egyptian can have the same skin complexion and hair texture and can speak the same language. No, they aren’t kin and you’ll be laughed off the stage for claiming so. The blackness of the former and the whiteness of the latter will be drummed into your head until you start to believe the distinction is important. I don’t think we’ll ever stop separating Africans by race.
Only if you assume that “black” means what you think it means to begin with. I would say (and, really, this is just a “how common perception and opinions and usage seem to me” thing, not something I can prove) that if someone looks sufficiently black, they are black, somewhat tautologically.
I knew a guy in college who was the son of Indian immigrants. He was pretty dark, darker than most African American folks. He once said he thought it was weird when people asked him if he was Black. He was like, “No, I’m just a dark-as-hell Indian… either that or I’m a flashback of a 50’s-style doo-wop singer.”
If someone referred to a dark-skinned Indian or Arab person as Black, I’d think they were completely unaware of the world around them. Now, if said person was running across the street and tips over a rickshaw, I wouldn’t have a problem with someone saying he was black as a descriptor. However, if he’s wearing a nametag that says “VIKRAM PATEL” and you call him Black… I don’t get it.
(Unless he is rocking a 'fro or something. Indian people tend to have that nice straight hair.)
However, if somebody is wearing a nametag that says VIKRAM PATEL, I am going to call them Vikram, not black. If a person is a visitor from some African country, they are black. If I know that country to be specifically Kenya, I am going to refer to them as Kenyan, that doesn’t stop them from being black (or not if they don’t want to). Besides, I’ve met indian people who identified with the Black Culture in the US and called themselves black. I fail to see your point.
Well, first of all, very few of us are “pure breeds” and thus, if one is half this and half that, what’s one to call themself? You self-identify. Same if you are a mix of half a dozen “races”, or even are 1/4 this and 3/4 that.
Next, the classifications there don’t cover what used to be call “Melanesian”, which leaves the subject of the very dark colored dude with a big 'fro from New Guinea up in the air.
And when you lump all dark-colored dudes from Africa together as one “race” you are commiting nearly the same “sin” as those that lump *all *the dark skinned races together. The Mbuti (used to be called Pygmies) are a considerable different population than say the Zulu. Lumping them together becuase they are both dark skinned and come from Africa is like calling Egyptians “black”.
If a dark-skinned dude from New Guinea wanted to call himself Black, fine by me.
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