“I am comprised of many hues from across the vast spectrum of human existence, and am a critical part of the genetic diversity that will eventually save our species after the space insects invade.”
(Or does that sound a little trite nowadays?)
Bust out in song…
My mother was a tailor…she sewed my new blue jeans.
My father was a gambling man, down in New Orleans…
What’s wrong with saying “no idea, I’m adopted”?
That would be my advice as well. It’s kind of a personal question for strangers or acquaintances to ask, and if you’d prefer to say “That’s none of your business” or make a joke out of it then that’s your right, but I don’t see any reason not to simply tell the truth.
Really? Asking a stranger about their ethnic background is kind of personal? Maybe it’s just me, but I have yet to meet someone who isn’t open to talking about their ethnicity. And, if someone answered with “that’s none of your business,” all I would be thinking is, “Wow, sorry I asked! Please accept my apologies for taking in interest in getting to know you!”
Any question about another person’s family is, by definition, personal.
*I guess it’s nice that you’re unfamiliar with this kind of thing, but there are plenty of people out there who only ask such questions because they want to find out if the other person has the “right” ethnic background. I wouldn’t blame anyone with an ambiguous ethnic appearance if they got tired of essentially being asked “Are you someone I’d want to discriminate against?”
FWIW, my own ethnic appearance is pretty obvious, so the closest question I get from strangers and acquaintances is probably “What does your father do?” Sometimes this comes after I’ve mentioned my mother’s profession, sometimes it’s out of the blue. I suspect this is largely a class issue, as this rarely happened to me before I moved to the particular area where I now live. I am pretty sure many people who ask this are trying to find out if I come from the “right” sort of family. Others are probably just trying to make conversation, but either way I find it mildly annoying.
First, I’m a grown woman, it shouldn’t matter what my father does. Second, my father has been a full-time pusher-up of daisies for many years now, and I don’t really enjoy dropping “Well, he’s dead” into a casual conversation with someone I’ve never met before. But as tempting as it sometimes is to make a sarcastic response, an honest “Well, he’s dead” (or “He’s passed away” if I’m trying to be really tasteful) is really the only good answer to the question.
Sure, there are always going to be those with an ulterior motive for asking about one’s ethnicity. But do you honestly believe that this is the norm in most social situations? I think that when people ask, it’s not out of ruse, but rather, just normal innocuous curiosity, and as such, I don’t see the harm in answering.
I get “Where are you from?” a lot–which is often just another way to ask about ethnicity. I know this because the real answer is never satisfactory. "No, where are you from?"? Then I’ll say I’m a black American and that shuts them up good (unless they’re real nosy and they’ll ask if I’m biracial).
I can understand idle curiosity, but I don’t understand asking a person with an ambiguous racial appearance about their heritage right off the bat. If you get to know a person long enough, chances are the truth will emerge all on its own.
It depends on what the situation is and what kind of people you’re dealing with.
*I don’t see any harm in answering either, which is why I specifically said that the simple truth was the best way to go. But if the asker is a stranger or near-stranger then it’s really none of their business. I would not blame the askee for either pointing this out or for giving some sort of joke answer. Even if the asker is only trying to make smalltalk, it would be nice if they’d stop and think about whether they’re about to ask something that the other person gets asked ALL THE TIME. It’s not like this line of questioning is likely to lead to a very interesting conversation anyway, not unless the asker intends to get really personal with their follow-up questions.
Well, yeah, of course it depends. If you’re asked this question during a job interview by a white supremacist, and you’re not white, well then, this scenario is obviously not the norm and it’s not what constitutes most social situations.
So how do strangers become friendly with one another without ever revealing anything about themselves? How do I determine if a woman I just met can be a potential girlfriend if she thinks her ethnicity is none of my business? How do I make friends if I’m uncomfortable telling others what my ethnicity is?
I’m Chinese and German. Because of this, I have a certain “look” about me. And, naturally, I get asked the, “what’s your background?” question quite often. I don’t mind it. In fact, I welcome it and would rather get asked, as opposed to someone not asking, and only having a “guess” of what I am. Furthermore, when people ask, it makes me feel good. It makes me think people are interested in me and want to get to know me. Whether that’s true or not, I don’t have the slightest, but it’s worked out so far.
It does for me. I’ve shared stories with total strangers about traveling to various places throughout the world, I’ve talked about Chinese food, German food, which of course then leads to just food talk in general, which then leads to many other tangents. And, I realize this is all purely anecdotal, and that you may have had totally different experiences with this matter. Maybe I’ve just lived a jaded life. Who knows? But so far, I haven’t had any bad or negative experiences revealing my ethnicity.
Somehow I’ve managed to make friends without telling everyone I meet all about my family background. It’s not as difficult as you might think. Since few friendships are based on ethnicity, father’s occupation, birth order, etc., I wouldn’t consider them essential information that needed to be disclosed upon first meeting. If someone wants to get to know me they might start with something like “What do you do?”, “What kind of music do you like?”, “What was your major in college?” or other questions that actually have to do with my personality and interests rather than things over which I had no control.
*That’s delightful for you, but you’ll have to take my word for it that I know several people who have been asked “What are you?” because the asker wants to establish whether the askee is of an “acceptable” ethnic background.
*Your apparent positive attitude probably helps, but the fact that your ethnic background is unlikely to be considered unacceptable by many people (in the US at least, maybe you’re from somewhere with a different set of prejudices) is probably a major factor as well. One of my best friends in college was a very good-looking girl of ambiguous ethnic appearance who had learned the hard way that plenty of guys who found her attractive when they assumed she was Native American, Indian, Filipina, or Puerto Rican suddenly lost interest when they found out she was half black. (The other half was white, but this wasn’t typically what turned people off.) She’d actually had a guy break up with her when he saw a photo of her parents. Her solution to this was to basically say “Well, I’m black” quite early on so she wouldn’t waste her time with a guy for whom this was a dealbreaker. Plenty of guys didn’t care, but it was indeed a dealbreaker for more than you might guess.
Sometimes when people ask me, “So where are you from?” I worry if they’re really wondering if I fall into a ‘good’ group or a ‘bad’ group. Being biracial, black and white, might be a good thing to someone. But telling someone that no, you’re just a light-skinned black person, might make you less interesting.
When I lived in Miami, people would often assume I was Hispanic, and again, there was that worry with the “WHAT ARE YOU?!” question. Would people assume I was the bad “kind” of Hispanic (which would be Mexican, in the Cuban-denominated world down there)? And how would they react when I told them that I was black, since there’s no shortage of racist people even in Miami?
Sometimes it’s not fun being ambiguous-looking, even if people do equate it with being exotic and thus being absolutely gorgous. 
I don’t think that’s usually meant to be an intrusive question, but I understand if you don’t want to go into the whole thing about being adopted, etc. You know, it doesn’t cost that much to do a DNA test that will tell you what part of the world your ancestors came from. I did it because I like that kind of thing. They send you a Q-tip kind of thing to swab your cheek and send it back, then they send you ancestry info. I thought it was pretty interesting.
I did not know that! This is very interesting. Can you provide any kind of info such as what company you went through and how much it costs?
It’s a tough question because
a) in much of American society, it’s a perfectly acceptable small-talk/icebreaker question to ask where one’s ancestors/family are from; it’s considered not too personal and can lead to interesting conversations as vandal says.
b) it can also be about “are you someone I can discriminate against” question if the questionee has dark skin. And finally
c) it’s very personal for WOOKINPANUB in a way that the questioner wouldn’t know.
Easiest truthful answer is “I’m a mutt/mongrel/stew/hash; we’re not sure.” and then change the subject. If you wanted you could toss out “There were adoptions in the family” (which satisfies some curiousity without being specific about your situation) and change the subject.
If they persist in asking about your background, just keep repeating the change of subject until they get the hint.
It seems to me that there are times when you would want to used “Irish American” and times when you would want to use “American Irish”. If you were talking about the national backgrounds of Americans, it would be appropriate to use “Irish Americans”. On the other hand, if you were talking about the Irish diaspora, it would be appropriate to use “American Irish”.
A long time ago (1964 to be exact), I read a book entitled A Profile of the Negro American in which the author began by making what he thought was a very important point: throughout the book he used the term “Negro American” rather than the more usually used “American Negro” because he was talking about Americans who happened to be Negroes, not Negroes who happened to be Americans, i.e. the adjective was “Negro”, not “American”. So, too, today, we refer to “African Americans”, not “American Africans”, or “Black Americans”, not “American Blacks”.
“Where are you from?” “Betelguise.”
Prices vary, depending on how specific you want to get. If you’re female, they test mitochondria, males have YDNA tested. My maiden name is Magruder and lots of Magruders in the US want to believe they are descended from McGregors… the whole “Braveheart” thing, etc. They’ve been debating about this forever. So a bunch of male Magruders got tested and we found out our (namesake) line is descended from MacGruthers in Scotland; not McGregor. I also found out, as a female, that my female ancestors originally came up from Africa and went to northern Europe, then moved back down to Iberia to hang out during the Ice Age. Which I suppose would allow me to mark “Hispanic” on census and other forms, right?
Check out that website and other related ones (do a search on Ancestry DNA) and you’ll find lots of interesting stories.
Thanks, JillGat, that is fascinating!