# Ethnicity or not? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 21, 2017, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ethnicity-or-not/789494 "2017-06-21T01:44:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2017, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ethnicity-or-not/789494/41 "2017-07-16T16:46:36Z")
> [@elfkin477](#): > > American, Canadian, Australian and New Zealand are nationalities, but I’ve met very few people who consider them ethnicities for anyone who is not a part of the native American/First Nation/Aboriginal/Māori cultures. Ethnically the rest of people born in those four counties are mostly of European, African, and Asian origin. Do you think it’s possible for someone to not have an ethnicity? ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2017, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ethnicity-or-not/789494/42 "2017-07-16T18:03:12Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > Do you think it’s possible for someone to not have an ethnicity? Why are you asking me that when you quoted where I said that people from those countries are ethnically European, Asian, and African? ---
**Author:** ![Okrahoma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90db22/32.png) [@Okrahoma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Okrahoma)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2017, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ethnicity-or-not/789494/43 "2017-07-16T18:18:50Z")
> [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > Yes, “Rossiyane” vs. “Russki”, right? > > On that topic, there are apparently still some people in former Soviet countries who list their nationality as “Soviet”. (I knew a Russian-Moldovan guy once who described his national identity as “Soviet”, neither Moldovan or Russian, and polling data suggests that’s especially common self-identifier in the frozen conflict statelet of Transnistria, although I’m not sure that was where he was from). Cite? “Soviet” was never an option in Russian or USSR internal documents’ “nationality” designation. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2017, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ethnicity-or-not/789494/44 "2017-07-16T18:19:17Z")
> [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > On that topic, there are apparently still some people in former Soviet countries who list their nationality as “Soviet”. (I knew a Russian-Moldovan guy once who described his national identity as “Soviet”, neither Moldovan or Russian, and polling data suggests that’s especially common self-identifier in the frozen conflict statelet of Transnistria, although I’m not sure that was where he was from). Reminds me of what’s-his-name in Kusturica’s film _Underground._ Near the end, someone asks him his ethnicity, and he proudly replies, “Yugoslav!” ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2017, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ethnicity-or-not/789494/45 "2017-07-16T18:23:23Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Question: is it possible to be more than one ethnicity simultaneously? Well, considering a good many Americans are descendents of immigrants, I’d say so. Like on my dad’s side I have Irish and German ancestry, and on my mom’s, Polish, Slovak and Hungarian. I would consider American my _nationality_, but since I’m not a Native American, I don’t feel comfortable calling it my ethnicity. Does that count? ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2017, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ethnicity-or-not/789494/46 "2017-07-16T19:57:28Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > Do you think it’s possible for someone to not have an ethnicity? In what sense? I mean if someone asks what my ethnicity is( which occasionally happens, as I have a non-standard-American name ), I will usually say “half-Serb, with the rest some mix of mostly Welsh, English and ‘Black Dutch’/German with god knows what else.” I won’t say “American” because in my head that’s a nationality. If you asked what ethnicity I _identify_ with, the answer would be “none.” But contrarily I do identify as an American ;). So I have an ancestral ethnic heritage I can point to which I don’t self-identify with and a nationality which for whatever logical or illogical reason I separate in my mind but would self-identify with culturally. I’m very much one with **John Mace** in this, except I’m even more wishy-washy - I have no regional or state geographic self-identification at all, as a Californian or anything else. I think it would be entirely fair for someone to label me as ethnically American - it is no less outré than labeling ethnicity by language( Arabs ) or religion( Serbs vs. Croats vs. Bosniaks ). But it’s not how I personally think of the word in relation to myself. ---
**Author:** ![Corry\_El](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecae2f/32.png) [@Corry\_El](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Corry_El)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2017, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ethnicity-or-not/789494/47 "2017-07-16T20:24:16Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > I dunno about “American” not being an ethnicity. Why do you believe this, \*\*John Mace \*\*? > > IIRC, you live on the west coast. Would this not be a good starting point for describing yourself? In the US Census special tabulation of ‘ancestry’ in 2000 ‘American’ was the 5th most common answer nationally behind German, Irish, African American and English. And it was the most common answer in the counties shown on the map in the second link, basically Appalachia and the South, and in many of the Southern counties where ‘African-American’ was first, ‘American’ was probably second. There’s ambiguity in the title of the survey, ‘ancestry’ vice ‘ethnicity’, but the actual question is ‘What is this person’s ancestry or ethnic origin?’ which tends to equate the two. And AFAIK most of the people who answer ‘American’, typically multi-generation white Protestants of mixed national ancestry but often with Scotch-Irish\* names (a smaller % of whom give that as their ancestry/ethnicity), in those parts of the country, do in fact consider ‘American’ to be their ethnicity. ‘WASP’ wasn’t offered as answer, but AFAIK most people of that background and region would not call themselves that. So sticking to the idea that people get to name their own ethnicity rather than being told what it is, ‘American’ is a pretty common one. It’s not common though AFAIK outside that region so no surprise if Americans from other parts of the country haven’t heard it. One’s region in the US is not an ethnicity, but the view of ethnicity varies by region, besides other things. And obviously not all ethnicities are equally well acknowledged and defined. One could still make an argument there’s no such thing as ‘American’ ethnicity (and what people call themselves be damned). But to note another ambiguity, ‘African American’ is often used as a synonym for ‘black’ (race), which isn’t how you’ve used it, and also apparently not how all respondents in that survey used it since the % of ‘ancestry or ethnic origin’ African American came out several % points lower than the ‘black’ % in the main census that year. \*as the Census Bureau writes it, some insist only ‘Scots Irish’ is correct. [https://www.census.gov/prod/2004pubs/c2kbr-35.pdf](https://www.census.gov/prod/2004pubs/c2kbr-35.pdf) > **[The map that shows where America came from: Fascinating illustration shows...](https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2408591/American-ethnicity-map-shows-melting-pot-ethnicities-make-USA-today.html)** > > For decades, Lady Liberty, mother of exiles, stood watch as millions of immigrants arrived in the U.S. in hope of a better life. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2017, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ethnicity-or-not/789494/48 "2017-07-16T22:38:36Z")
> [@elfkin477](#): > > Why are you asking me that when you quoted where I said that people from those countries are ethnically European, Asian, and African? I’m asking you probably for the same reason that you chose to address me, but not the poster who claims to not have an ethnicity, which is a statement that begs more questioning than simply wondering why someone would be wrong to claim an “American” ethnicity. To address your initial post, my ethnicity isn’t “African”. Even though the majority of my distant ancestors were African, that’s not me. I don’t practice any African cultural traditions or speak any African languages. There is nothing about me that is particularly African except for the genetic markers I possess. I do, however, belong to the ethnic group called “African American.” I suppose it is new fangled as far as ethnicities go (if we want to say 300 years is “new fangled”), but it is still just as real as any other ethnic group. So I’m wondering why shouldn’t someone who doesn’t feel kinship to anyone living in Europe, Asia, or African _shouldn’t_ consider himself an ethnic American? Where is the rule that says such a label only has meaning as a nationality? The definition of ethnicity certainly doesn’t preclude it from also counting as an ethnicity. Unless we want to say there is no such thing as American culture, which I hope no one seriously believes… BTW, I don’t know any Native American who would identify his or her ethnic group as “American”. Native Americans identify culturally with tribes/nations–and I’m thinking these groups would be the first thing to come to mind when the question turns to ethnicity. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ethnicity-or-not/789494.md?page=2)