5 ms·

I chose my words carefully - better, not sole, determinant. But I notice you did not give an example of the opposite: a unified ethnic group composed of genetic

I chose my words carefully - better, not sole, determinant. But I notice you did not give an example of the opposite: a unified ethnic group composed of genetically distant sub-groups. More distant than different flavors of European melding into 'white' after crossing the Atlantic. Because that is what the article is selling. Such a group may well exist, but is the exception rather than the rule.

barry-cotter 5y ago
American is absolutely an ethnic group. It’s not high salience in the US but it’s very obvious if you go abroad. Black Americans hang out with White Americans, not Africans. If you’re in a place where there are relatively few English speakers they all hang out together and the first split will be North Americans versus British + Irish + Aussies + Kiwis + South Africans.
- car_analogy 5y ago
  > American is absolutely an ethnic group. Keyword "unified". There was a series of recent protests complaining some groups were not treated as well as others - if they're all merely "Americans", what did they form groups based on? Edit: On further reflection, no, even if you drop "unified", I don't see how you could consider Americans being a single ethnic group. Ethnicity is not assigned based on hanging out together when abroad. By that criterion, ex-Yugoslavians would become a single ethnicity.
  - barry-cotter 5y ago
    Unified by whose criteria? It’s a rare Irish person who identifies in any emotional way with being of Gaelic, Viking, Anglo-Norman or English ancestry but they are not evenly distributed by class, profession or political loyalty. It’s been almost a thousand years since the Normans conquered the English and Norman surnames are still wildly over represented among the professions and British ruling class. > By that criterion, ex-Yugoslavians would become a single ethnicity. Yes. In China they’re a single ethnic group in Shanghai in my experience. The salience of different ethnic identities varies by context. That’s what social construction of identities is about. Shared ancestry is not the only determinant of ethnicity. Mormons are an ethnic group. There are old stock Mormons all over the American Wear. Mormonism is also a universalist religion. Things are complicated.
- watwut 5y ago
  Imo, African American is ethnicity too. It is complicated in US. But, a lot of issues related to race in US was difficult to me to understand, until it clicked that if I think about African Americans as about ethnicity too, some stuff starts to make sense.
  - barry-cotter 5y ago
    Yes. Nigerian-Americans aren’t African-American. Somali-Americans aren’t African-American. The descendants of Southerners who were held as slaves are African-Americans and over time some people of predominantly sub-Saharan ancestry acculturate to that identity, most obviously and quickly West Indians, but they’re not African-American either.
    - zozbot234 5y ago
      West-Indian blacks were also held as slaves in the Americas (and in especially brutal conditions), so they're just as African-American as anyone else.
      - barry-cotter 5y ago
        That’s about as accurate as calling Canadians Americans. African-American culture is Southern white culture. West Indian culture is English. Religion, speech, a lot of the food ways came from the white population and just as English people are not American West Indians are not African-American. They’re closer than Nigerians. They assimilate faster but they’re not the same.
        x86_64Ubuntu 5y ago
        >...African-American culture is Southern white culture. If anything, Southern white culture co-opts African-American culture. We have our own dialects (AAVE), our own foods, and our own music (pretty much any popular form of music from blues to rock-and-roll), and our own religious practices. Southern white culture may take in the some of the above, but it's pretty much a one-way transfer.
watwut 5y ago
> a unified ethnic group composed of genetically distant sub-groups African-Americans are such group. In Africa, they have many different ethnicities. Their descendants in America are all African-Americans, they dont differ at all between those who are from Nigeria 200 years ago and those who are from Angola. Within Africa, there are Nigelians and Angolans and they are distinct ethnicities. White people in America are such group. The descendants from Germans and French and Poland are all white Americans. In Europe, they are all different ethnicities.

barry-cotter 5y ago

American is absolutely an ethnic group. It’s not high salience in the US but it’s very obvious if you go abroad. Black Americans hang out with White Americans, not Africans. If you’re in a place where there are relatively few English speakers they all hang out together and the first split will be North Americans versus British + Irish + Aussies + Kiwis + South Africans.

car_analogy 5y ago
> American is absolutely an ethnic group. Keyword "unified". There was a series of recent protests complaining some groups were not treated as well as others - if they're all merely "Americans", what did they form groups based on? Edit: On further reflection, no, even if you drop "unified", I don't see how you could consider Americans being a single ethnic group. Ethnicity is not assigned based on hanging out together when abroad. By that criterion, ex-Yugoslavians would become a single ethnicity.
- barry-cotter 5y ago
  Unified by whose criteria? It’s a rare Irish person who identifies in any emotional way with being of Gaelic, Viking, Anglo-Norman or English ancestry but they are not evenly distributed by class, profession or political loyalty. It’s been almost a thousand years since the Normans conquered the English and Norman surnames are still wildly over represented among the professions and British ruling class. > By that criterion, ex-Yugoslavians would become a single ethnicity. Yes. In China they’re a single ethnic group in Shanghai in my experience. The salience of different ethnic identities varies by context. That’s what social construction of identities is about. Shared ancestry is not the only determinant of ethnicity. Mormons are an ethnic group. There are old stock Mormons all over the American Wear. Mormonism is also a universalist religion. Things are complicated.
watwut 5y ago
Imo, African American is ethnicity too. It is complicated in US. But, a lot of issues related to race in US was difficult to me to understand, until it clicked that if I think about African Americans as about ethnicity too, some stuff starts to make sense.
- barry-cotter 5y ago
  Yes. Nigerian-Americans aren’t African-American. Somali-Americans aren’t African-American. The descendants of Southerners who were held as slaves are African-Americans and over time some people of predominantly sub-Saharan ancestry acculturate to that identity, most obviously and quickly West Indians, but they’re not African-American either.
  - zozbot234 5y ago
    West-Indian blacks were also held as slaves in the Americas (and in especially brutal conditions), so they're just as African-American as anyone else.
    - barry-cotter 5y ago
      That’s about as accurate as calling Canadians Americans. African-American culture is Southern white culture. West Indian culture is English. Religion, speech, a lot of the food ways came from the white population and just as English people are not American West Indians are not African-American. They’re closer than Nigerians. They assimilate faster but they’re not the same.
      - x86_64Ubuntu 5y ago
        >...African-American culture is Southern white culture. If anything, Southern white culture co-opts African-American culture. We have our own dialects (AAVE), our own foods, and our own music (pretty much any popular form of music from blues to rock-and-roll), and our own religious practices. Southern white culture may take in the some of the above, but it's pretty much a one-way transfer.

watwut 5y ago

> a unified ethnic group composed of genetically distant sub-groups African-Americans are such group. In Africa, they have many different ethnicities. Their descendants in America are all African-Americans, they dont differ at all between those who are from Nigeria 200 years ago and those who are from Angola. Within Africa, there are Nigelians and Angolans and they are distinct ethnicities. White people in America are such group. The descendants from Germans and French and Poland are all white Americans. In Europe, they are all different ethnicities.