I never heard the term “African American” until I was in high school, before that it was just Black, a term which had no negative association to it in any way so far as I had ever been aware (nor have I ever yet heard of anything particularly wrong with it beyond that African American was preferred). But while, in general, I’d rather call someone by what he wants to be called, African American is just too lengthy and cumbersome. It’s a sentence in itself. It’d be like someone saying that you can only call animals by their latin name. That just seems excessive when there’s perfectly decent standard English names that are well recognized and mean the same thing for nearly all purposes.
I think you’re being a little pedantic here. I know people from Canada, Mexico, and Argentina, and they don’t use the term “American” to refer to themselves (unless they are naturalized citizens of the United States of America). Those descriptors are Canadian, Mexican, and Argentinean.
I’d love to hear if there are sizable numbers of folks from the countries you mention that call themselves Americans.
Are you sure? If she called herself white, why would not dudes of today beleive her? Ihave a freind who is 1/4 black, and he looks as white as I do, unless I hadn’t seen his mother (and he hadn;t said he was 1/4 black) I would have no idea. I think we have got beyond the old “one drop” idea and if you look somewhat mixed, then you can pretty well self-identify as you prefer.
I have had at least one black dudette go off on being called “black”: “Does my skin look black to you? No, I am not black, I am a lovely mocha brown.” She was serious.
Personally, I’m “flesh colored”. (At least back when there was only one in a crayon box.)
The question of importance is not how people self-identify. It’s how they are identified by the majority of outsiders. The “one drop” rule is still in practice because by default if you look like you have African ancestry, even if you have light skin, you are more apt to be called black than anything else.
Throw me in the bunch who don’t mind A-A or black, and find it hilarious that white people care so much about this topic. To me they are not synonymous terms, so I don’t see what the problem is. Black denotes race; A-A refers to ethnicity. Capitalizing “black” makes sense to me, but I leave it lowercase because of social convention. Nigerian immigrants are not A-A and were never meant to be called A-A. Neither is Charlize Theron or Dave Matthews. Parse any ethnic label down to its literal components and you’ll get confusion. After all, everyone born in the US is a “Native American” but somehow when we use this term we understand what is being communicated. And Obama’s skin is not literally black, and yet few get hung up on that when he is refered to as a black man.
The above represents of rough synopsis of everything I’ve ever said on this topic in the last 5 years.
If you have only one drop of black blood you probably don’t look like you have any. Now, if you’re half-black, people will probably call you black (see Obama, etc.), but that’s different.
“One drop” is in quotes for a reason. It’s not meant to indicate a literal drop of blood*. My point is that if you look white, then odds are you will be seen as white. But if you look like you have an African ancestor, then odds are you will be perceived as black…or at least not-white.
*Ack, getting flashbacks to a bad time…some of yall know what I talking about.
Well, yes, but based on the mixed folk I know, I don’t think Sally Hemings would have looked “black” to most people today. I could be wrong.
ETA: And back in the day, the “one drop” rule certainly was literally that- if you were known to have a black ancestor, in the eyes of the law you were black, even if you looked like… ponders who the whitest person in the world is… Anne Hathaway?
It’s hard to compare those days to now, since the non-black people back then were probably a lot whiter, on average, than today. Since that time there’s been a lot of immigration by other nationalities with swarthier complexions, so someone with a swarthy complexion doesn’t stand out as much as he might have back then.
Okay, but “known to have a black ancestor” is different than looking like you have a black ancestor. I have little doubt Sally would have been able to pass as a white woman, but only by keeping her ancestry a secret. Pedigree was a bigger deal back in the day, particularly in the race-obsessed south, where “passers” were a threat to the white purity ideal. Everyone kept track of everyone’s parents and grandparents and great grandparents; your heritage moreso than your phenotype determined what your race and social position your were. That’s why the passing phenomenon even existed. You “passed” as a white person by keeping your family tree a secret from others.
Nowadays, we don’t know most people’s geneaology unless they tell us. So all we have to go by is phenotype. If that black ancestor shows in your appearance, that marks you as black (just as it did in Sally’s day), even if most of your ancestors are white. This is still the “one drop” rule in practice. It’s just not as deep as it was in the 19th century because few people know or care what race someone else’s grandparents were.
Um, I didn’t take issue with any of it. I think it’s silly that we’d invent a term to specifically reference black people from America, then decide to use it interchangeably with the term “black” in general.
I was joking about the second part. Perhaps I should begin punctuating my posts with emoticons. 
If I were to guess (and I can only guess; haven’t read any polls or anything) I would guess that most black people don’t care that much. I, on the otherhand, really love the word black. For lots of reasons, starting with the actual sound of the word. I won’t care much if others use the term African American. I mean I hate it, but I’m not offended or anything.
Yeah. I live in Maryland. The term"African American" seems to be used primarily by self-conscious Baby Boomers. Most of the people I know just say black or white.
People who refer to black people who aren’t from the U.S. as “African-American” are just on auto-pilot and not thinking about what they’re saying. They’re not trying to claim that all black people are American or anything; they’ve just trained themselves not to say “black,” so “African-American” spills out instead. I can’t see that there’s anything offensively “US-centric” in the term, any more so than in someone calling themself “Irish-American.”
It’s funny, because multiple times I’ve heard Canadians (and sometimes Europeans, but never, strangely, anyone from South or Central America) use the fact that Americans call themselves…Americans…as an example of the horrible arrogance and presumptuousness of people from the U.S.A. :rolleyes: Yet somehow I suspect that those same Canadians would be horrified if anyone casually referred to them as Americans!
Fading or not, African-American is a useful term alongside black, because the latter refers to people in the U.S., the U.K., Ghana, South Africa, Peru, Jamaica, Cuba, France, Sudan, etc. etc., while the former designates black Americans. Still, though, we have no way to distinguish the very different heritages of people like Michelle Obama, who are descended from slaves and have been in the U.S. for a very long time, and people like Barack Obama, who are descended from recent immigrants.
Sure we do. You just did.
Whew! Sorry about that, I was wondering if something I’d said came off as saying “we shouldn’t try to differentiate the dark people.”
I think that’s a bit pedantic. Anything can be explained in so many words, but for useful distinctions that are otherwise lengthy to describe, concise terms can be helpful.
You’re skeptical that people from America are Americans? 
I assure you that if you knew enough people from Latin America, or took a college course in North American, South American, Latin American, or Western Hemisphere studies, you would be thoroughly disabused of this notion. It’s commonly cited as a point of arrogance that we think we’re the only Americans.
Florida here. The only time I have ever heard the term used is in a sarcastic manner or in a formal business/social setting where someone wants to seem like they are using the proper terms. I have absolutely never heard a person use the term in a casual, normal conversation. It is always black…