Census & Racial identity.

[verytwistedmind.livejournal.com]

Question #9 on the this year's census asks about your race. One of the boxes you can choose is "black," "African American," or "negro," all placed next to the same box.  

The word 'negro' has offended several people as the referenced article shows.

http://wcbstv.com/national/negro.census.form.2.1409469.html

Should the term Negro be phased out of the census? if so, shouldn't Caucasian be phased out as well since they are from Typology?

I dislike 'multi-racial' in the census. It's too inclusive. It means little, especially in America. I know people who have multi-European backgrounds who classify themselves as multi-racial.

Comments

[rev-proffessor.livejournal.com]

A Rose by any other name... I don't know. It's an antiquated term but, at least they didn't list 'colored'. Is that bad? My Dad uses that term sometimes and I always tease him about it.

I don't understand why someone with a "multi-European" despondency would identify as multi-racial. What, if you're Celtic and Slavic that's multi-racial? Really? I know my wife like to play with people by marking Asian, just because her Grandfather was a Siberian Jew. Given that people self report and self identify, how useful is the racial data, I wonder..?

us vs them

[the-rukh.livejournal.com]

Yes, the binary 'white' vs 'colored' is slightly worse than 'white' vs 'black', because in the second one at least there's an implicit acknowledgment that those might not be the only two possibilities, even if both of them in themselves are misleading labels.

By traditional standards...

[sophia-sadek.livejournal.com]

... there is a Saxon race, an English race, a Norman race. Back in the day, the race designated the tribe, not the skin color.

[htpcl.livejournal.com]

Which day? 5 centuries ago? 6 maybe?

Time is relative...

[sophia-sadek.livejournal.com]

... some people still live in the Dark Ages.

Re: Time is relative...

[htpcl.livejournal.com]

Apparently.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

At one time, surprisingly, it was. That was the high tide of Nordicism, the belief that Northern Europeans (i.e. Germanics) were the top of the European hierarchy, followed by the Latins, then the Celts, then the Slavs, and then the Jews, and the Turks and other such infidels weren't even human, simply ogres who existed under the Dark Lord-I mean Sultan and Huangdi....

[rev-proffessor.livejournal.com]

meh, like I said, antiquated...