Whatever-Americans?

[Raiders Army]

Question for you PC people: we have labels for each minority group in the United States...African-Americans, Chinese-Americans, Native Americans, etc. What if someone is visiting from a foreign country, like England and they're black? Would you call them an African-American? How would you know until they spoke like Austin Powers?

What do people in other countries call their minorities?

[hukarez]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

What if someone is visiting from a foreign country, like England and they're black? Would you call them an African-American? How would you know until they spoke like Austin Powers?

What do people in other countries call their minorities?

I've always wondered about this myself. Though, I've been lucky from figuring out if they're from England or not. Weird gut feeling, I guess.

[WSUCougar]

I'd just call him a limey bastard like the rest of 'em.




(just kidding)

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

Question for you PC people: we have labels for each minority group in the United States...African-Americans, Chinese-Americans, Native Americans, etc. What if someone is visiting from a foreign country, like England and they're black? Would you call them an African-American? How would you know until they spoke like Austin Powers?

What do people in other countries call their minorities?

While living in Europe I caught myself doing this at times. For example, we would be talking about certain soccer players and I would say "Oh, you mean the African-American guy." I would, of course, think about it and it was stupid. While clearly of African descent, he certainly wasn't American and it's possible neither he nor any of his ancestors had never stepped foot in America.

So, I guess the answer to the question is you could refer to him as "African" or "black" (which I don't think is really Un-PC, though some would argue it is). Or if you knew what country he/she was form, by their country: Congolese guy, Senegalese guy, etc. Similar with folks from Asia. You could say the "Asian guy" or the "Chinese guy", etc.

As for Native Americans, well, they sort of always will be Native Americans no matter where you happen to meet them, no?

[Raiders Army]

But Native Americans technically aren't native Americans. From what I remember, didn't they cross a land bridge a couple centuries before Columbus? They just got here before he did.

[NoMyths]

You're not actually looking for a reasonable answer here, are you?

[Raiders Army]

HB's answer was good enough for me. It just seems very US-centric that we deem to call minorities in this fashion. Personally, we're supposed to be a melting pot and I think we should drop labels and just call ourselves Americans.

[MrBug708]

I want to move north and be a Canadian
Or hang down low with the nice Australians
I don't want to be another 'I-don't-care-ican'
What are we gonna do Franco, Franco Un-American

[WSUCougar]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

But Native Americans technically aren't native Americans. From what I remember, didn't they cross a land bridge a couple centuries before Columbus? They just got here before he did.

Ideally I think you'd want to refer to them by their tribe.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

But Native Americans technically aren't native Americans. From what I remember, didn't they cross a land bridge a couple centuries before Columbus? They just got here before he did.

Native American - A member of any of the indigenous peoples of the Western Hemisphere. The ancestors of the Native Americans are generally considered by scientists to have entered the Americas from Asia by way of the Bering Strait sometime during the late glacial epoch.

[Wolfpack]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

But Native Americans technically aren't native Americans. From what I remember, didn't they cross a land bridge a couple centuries before Columbus? They just got here before he did.

Couple of centuries? Errumm...there hasn't been a land bridge connecting America and Asia for a few thousand years.

As to the topic at hand, I've wondered about it myself. When I worked in a customer service department of an online retailer, I remember reading an email from a person who talked about I think twin black authors and described them as "African-Americans from Britain". It was a little silly to read that. I'm also fairly certain that there's no "Afro-British" term, as well (or at least it isn't widely used). In short, we seem to be the only nation that's really made an effort to decide our base nationality (American) isn't distinct enough and we have to append to it to further describe ourselves.

[33sherman]

fwiw, it's not just the US. The term African-Canadian is used up north.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

HB's answer was good enough for me. It just seems very US-centric that we deem to call minorities in this fashion. Personally, we're supposed to be a melting pot and I think we should drop labels and just call ourselves Americans.

I think that's a right way to look at things, but it's all relative, no? When I was in Europe, describing someone as "that American guy" was usually enough to put into context who was I talking about, regardless of race.

But, for example, if I was talking about an American rock group, let's call them "The Band", that had four members, all male, three white, one black. And I said "You know that guy from 'The Band', the American one.' That doesn't really help anyone. Now if I said, the 'black guy' or the 'African-American guy', it would be pretty clear who I was talking about.

I don't think Chinese-American, African-American, or Whatever-American are words to describe people's nationality, but rather their ethnicity.

[WSUCougar]

This discussion brings to mind the point that often there is no need to differentiate. I'm not pointing fingers - I do it myself - but why are we differentiating the race of the person? Does it really have a bearing on anything?

This occurs to me most frequently when someone is telling a story and, innocently enough, says something like, "So we met Joe's friend Ray, who's black, and so on and so forth." What difference does that really make?

[Wolfpack]

I think it's just how we are as humans. We're descriptive in our language. If you've never met someone and someone else is describing him as just "Joe's friend Ray" but left out what he looks like, you would still make some attempt to create a picture of what Ray might look like. However, if we add the qualifier that Ray's black, then we start drawing a mental picture of a black person, which is a much more accurate picture than if his skin color wasn't mentioned, in which case we could go any number of directions in our mental picturing of Ray. Such absences of details invariably lead to, "He's not at all like I pictured him."

[Klinglerware]

Originally Posted by Honolulu_Blue

I don't think Chinese-American, African-American, or Whatever-American are words to describe people's nationality, but rather their ethnicity.

My opinion here is that hyphenation is a cultural thing unique to America: the US is more ethnically diverse than most countries, so it shouldn't be surprising that ethnicities are classified the way they are.

I would also say that this whole hyphenation thing was really meant to be inclusive rather than exclusive. Immigrants were always treated with suspicion. So when an Italian immigrant, for example, was referred to as to "that Italian guy", people were still suspicious of where his loyalties lay--and it usually takes awhile for immigrants to be fully integrated into society, so it takes awhile for society to consider them "real Americans". So, the term "Italian-American" (or any other hyphen) is a way to tell a distrustful society, "hey, I'm an American, too."

[WSUCougar]

Understood, Wolfpack, but usually it seems that we don't do so with our own race. "So we met Joe's friend Chris, who's a German-American with a mustache." Extreme example, I know, but we default to our own race.

[Anthony]

i always wondered what we'd look like if a thousand years from now there were no distinct ethnicities, like if a black person mated with an oriental person, whose offspring (half black, half chinese) mated with the offspring of a white person and a indian person, so and and so forth until all mixes and matches were done over time, until we all were just a complete mix of ethnicities.

it could happen, you know.

[WSUCougar]

We'd change the planet name from "Earth" to "Mutt."

[Klinglerware]

I think it's a natural urge: we describe ourselves in such a way to differentiate ourselves from others:

1. When we are in a foreign country, we describe ourselves as "American"
2. When we are in another state, we describe ourselves as being from whatever home state we're from
3. When we are speaking with people from the same state, we describe ourselves as being from whatever home town we live in
4. When we are speaking with people from our home town, we describe ourselves as being from whatever neighborhood of that home town we're from

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by WSUCougar

This discussion brings to mind the point that often there is no need to differentiate. I'm not pointing fingers - I do it myself - but why are we differentiating the race of the person? Does it really have a bearing on anything?

This occurs to me most frequently when someone is telling a story and, innocently enough, says something like, "So we met Joe's friend Ray, who's black, and so on and so forth." What difference does that really make?

Along with what Wolfpack said, I'd add that I believe the context of the discussion either encourages/discourages the use of these descriptives. There are situations where I'd say race definitely has bearings -- let's say, for example, the conversation is about the role of race in politics. If I'm quoting something said by a black Republican, race is likely to be an important factor in the context, since it reveals something about the perspective for their commentary.

By the same token, if I'm telling the story about SD's problems with campers & their sleeping bags, he becomes "this youth minister friend of mine", not "this black friend of mine", as race has no impact on the story or the context that it occurs in, etc.

[Wolfpack]

Originally Posted by Hell Atlantic

i always wondered what we'd look like if a thousand years from now there were no distinct ethnicities, like if a black person mated with an oriental person, whose offspring (half black, half chinese) mated with the offspring of a white person and a indian person, so and and so forth until all mixes and matches were done over time, until we all were just a complete mix of ethnicities.

it could happen, you know.

We'd all look like Tiger Woods?

[Mustang]

Originally Posted by Wolfpack

We'd all look like Tiger Woods?

And the Western U.S would be one big golf course..

"Looks like that par 5 from Vegas to Reno is a little tricky...."

[BigJohn&TheLions]

In Alabama they keep it simple. They'd just call him "niggra."

[BigJohn&TheLions]

I actually saw on the news one time where they said that Bobby Brown and Whitney Houston were visiting a villiage of "African-American Jews" in Israel. Considering that these people needed translators when interviewed I assume that they are not from America, but the PC newspeople apparently didn't feel comfortable with the term Black Hebrew.

I hate PC...

[Glengoyne]

Originally Posted by 33sherman

fwiw, it's not just the US. The term African-Canadian is used up north.

Well that's just silly, its almost like they've started to consider themselves a real country or something.


As for the topic. I'm guessing they say Black, Asian, and Indian(maybe American Indian). Then again that may just be how I'd answer the question. I've seen some reporters go OVER PC and describe the black populations of Africa as being African American. Or Nelson Mandella, a notable African American. It can be pretty silly.

[Klinglerware]

Originally Posted by Glengoyne

. I've seen some reporters go OVER PC and describe the black populations of Africa as being African American. Or Nelson Mandella, a notable African American. It can be pretty silly.

I've never seen this at all--are you sure this is happening?

[Glengoyne]

Originally Posted by Klinglerware

I've never seen this at all--are you sure this is happening?

I've seen the Black communities of Africa, possibly countries like Zimbabwe or South Africa where there is much black-white tension, referred to as African American in T.V. news reports. It struck me as funny as hell at the time. The Mandella thing was an example, not something I've seen. I probably should have made that clearer.

[Leonidas]

Anyone remember the story about that white kid from South Africa who was denied an award for African Americans in his school because he wasn't black, even though he was the only true African American in the school, and the award never said anything about skin color?

[fantastic flying froggies]

In France, strangely enough, the non-PC term 'noir' for a black person was replaced by its English translation 'black', ie we took the English word and somehow magically made it OK to use.

Also, sometimes, the term 'person of colour', close to the american very un-PC 'coloured' is used and perfectly acceptable.

[Ryan S]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

What do people in other countries call their minorities?

In the UK we call black people black, asian people asian etc. The term "african-american" is never used over here, but is understood.

If someone is from another country we might call them by their nationality. If I were to describe someone as Irish, he comes from Ireland, not New England.

[Dutch]

Originally Posted by BigJohn&TheLions

In Alabama they keep it simple. They'd just call him "niggra."

Just to be clear, my time in the military has brought me close to people from all over the states. And racists in Wisconsin say the same thing as racists in NY and Alabama.

I'd hate to promote the perception that only the south has racists and only those who are 'holier than thou' live in the north.

As for me, I generally tend to only suggest a race when a need to describe the person comes up.

"What does the guy look like?"

"He's the black guy."

When the population of blacks in less than 20% in the US, it's a great descriptive term.

[clintl]

The preferred terminology has evolved over time. At one time, it was "negro" (hence, the United Negro College Fund's name). Then, "black" became the preferred term, I think during the civil rights movement. It wasn't until the '80s that "African-American" replaced "black." However, in my opinion, African-American is a more accurate term. We don't call Asian-Americans "yellow" any more, nor Native Americans "red," even though both were once common. I fail to understand why the fact that many, if not most, African-Americans prefer to be called by that name, instead by skin color, incurs such resistance and hostility from certain people. It is as if certain people think they have an entitlement to be rude and not get called on it.

If African-Americans want to identify culturally with their historical origins and heritage, what's wrong with that? No one complains about Irish-Americans calling themselves Irish-Americans, and celebrating their heritage with St. Patrick's Day.

It's not PC. It's respecting others. The Golden Rule.

[MIJB#19]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

What do people in other countries call their minorities?

In the Netherlands usually minorites are named by their ancestors (main groups Surinamese, Moroccans, Turks, Antillians, Indonesians), but for the easy to sum up all minorities there's the official seperation between 'allochtoon' and 'autochtoon' (new and old Dutchmen).

I'd like to prefer call all people living in the Netherlands as Dutch.

With most groups that works, however teenagers and guys in their early twenties tend to be radical (especially in the Moroccan group, even morse since all the war-on-terror-talk heated up pro-islam sentiments) and want to be asociated with a country most of them never lived in, with a culture they hardkly know and a language they hardly speak.

[dawgfan]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

But Native Americans technically aren't native Americans. From what I remember, didn't they cross a land bridge a couple centuries before Columbus? They just got here before he did.

Dude. The migration of people over the land bridge across the Bering Sea was not just a couple centuries before Columbus, it was about 12,000 B.C. From Alaska they reached the southern end of South America by about 10,000 B.C. Native Americans were established for hundreds of centuries before Columbus arrived.

And considering all humans originated in Africa and migrated elsewhere, I don't see why the desire to discount Native Americans.

[dawgfan]

Originally Posted by clintl

The preferred terminology has evolved over time. At one time, it was "negro" (hence, the United Negro College Fund's name). Then, "black" became the preferred term, I think during the civil rights movement. It wasn't until the '80s that "African-American" replaced "black." However, in my opinion, African-American is a more accurate term. We don't call Asian-Americans "yellow" any more, nor Native Americans "red," even though both were once common. I fail to understand why the fact that many, if not most, African-Americans prefer to be called by that name, instead by skin color, incurs such resistance and hostility from certain people. It is as if certain people think they have an entitlement to be rude and not get called on it.

If African-Americans want to identify culturally with their historical origins and heritage, what's wrong with that? No one complains about Irish-Americans calling themselves Irish-Americans, and celebrating their heritage with St. Patrick's Day.

It's not PC. It's respecting others. The Golden Rule.

Very good points clint, but is it still the case that most in this country prefer to be called African-American and not black? I was under the impression that the hyphenated term was losing popularity.

[Dutch]

I was under the impression that being called 'black' wasn't derogatory. Being called 'yellow' or 'red' was.

[korme]

Black guy. White guy.

It's all gravy

[Tom E]

What if your WHITE, born in AFRICA and move to the USA. Are you African American...

[Glengoyne]

Originally Posted by Tom E

What if your WHITE, born in AFRICA and move to the USA. Are you African American...

The exact same argument was used by a white student(Migrated from Africa) in Georgia, I believe, when he essentially ran for the "Best African American Student" award at his highschool. I'm pretty sure he got suspended if not expelled.

[clintl]

Originally Posted by dawgfan

Very good points clint, but is it still the case that most in this country prefer to be called African-American and not black? I was under the impression that the hyphenated term was losing popularity.

It could be. I'm not sure where the terms stand in the way of preference. My main point is that they are the ones that should get to decide what they are called. White people who make such a big deal of objecting to the term "African-American" are being both disrespectful and hypocritical, because there are many white ethnic groups referred to by similarly hyphenated names without such objections.

[clintl]

Originally Posted by Tom E

What if your WHITE, born in AFRICA and move to the USA. Are you African American...

If you're born in Africa, you're not an American, are you?

[AlexB]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

What do people in other countries call their minorities?

The term 'UK national' is becoming more commonplace in news stories over here, but I don't recall any instance when it has been used for a caucasian English person.

Black and Asian are acceptable descriptions (the former, to me at least, seemingly only recently) but like one of the posts earlier, you would only use the terms to dexcribe somebody within a group, etc. (At the same time 'my mate Nilesh' gives all of the relevant information without having to explicitly say any more)

Between 11-28 I lived in the first UK city where the Asian population exceeded 50% of the city's inhabitants, and describing people from their family background has never been a problem: this isn;t to say this is fine everywhere though - Leicester has always been a slightly different city to the rest of UK (evidenced when there a number of race riots in the UK, the city with the higest majority of Asians had exactly zero problems over the riotous period) so maybe it's just the norm where I grew up...

[Blade6119]

My best friend is white and moved here from south africa a year ago...he calls himself an African American and all the black people look at him funny...never fails to amuse me when he resonds or gets mad about african american jokes(even from black guys) since he thinks they are talking about him.

[Raiders Army]

Originally Posted by Glengoyne

The exact same argument was used by a white student(Migrated from Africa) in Georgia, I believe, when he essentially ran for the "Best African American Student" award at his highschool. I'm pretty sure he got suspended if not expelled.

That's the best! Not the suspension or expulsion part, but the fact that he ran. LOL.

[finkenst]

Originally Posted by Raiders Army

What do people in other countries call their minorities?

"Citizens"?