A Pew survey released this week shows that Hispanics/Latinos don’t exactly like those federal government labels to describe their ethnicity.
Only 24 percent said they actually use those terms to describe themselves. If they have to choose between the two — and 51 percent said they have no preference — Hispanic is preferred 33 percent over Latino at just 14 percent.
More than half — 51 percent — use their family’s country of origin for self-identification, i.e. Mexican, Cuban, Puerto Rican, Salvadoran or Dominican. That percentage drops to 28 percent when you get into the third generation in this country.
On average, 21 percent describe themselves as American, with just 8 percent of the first generation doing so. That rises to nearly half — 48 percent — by the time you get to the third generation.
Eighty-seven percent said it’s important for immigrants to learn English in order to succeed in the United States. Three-quarters said most people can get ahead if they work hard, compared to 58 percent of the general population feeling the same.
Pew also found that most Hispanics don’t see themselves as fitting into the government’s race categories; half check a Census or similar box as “some other race” or offer “Hispanic/Latino,” 36 percent pick white and 3 percent choose black.
“Hispanic” and “Latino” only make sense if, people from, say, Peru feel they share a significant racial/cultural kinship with people from Puerto Rico or Guatemala. Something tells me they feel about as much kinship as you and I do with the English, the Australians or the Canadians. Same language, same general origins, but somewhat different history and culture. There are also differences between the recent South and Central American immigrants and the Mexican-Americans who have lived here for hundreds of years. Add to that the fact that many “Hispanic” people have varying degrees of Native American background – some currently or recently “Indian,” others only historically so, and still others never – and things get even more complicated. And consider the former president of Peru, Alberto Fujimori. If he emigrated to the U.S., would the census show him as Asian or Hispanic? What is it, race or culture? Or is it purely self-identification? If so, can I self-identify as Asian? If I signed up as a Native American, would anybody notice?
I guess it makes about as much sense as classifying Vietnamese, Japanese, Chinese, and Indians as “Asian.” For that matter, Egyptians and Israelis are both “of Middle Eastern origin.” What the hell is that supposed to signify?
When the jackass from the census came around and asked what race my wife and I were I told home him human. When he questioned me about it I told him I wasn’t a f’ing racist. He put down human and left.
Census people said that when they saw a form that had answers like that (i.e. human; American; Native American) they just changed it to caucasian.
My father is a (legal) Mexican immigrant and my mother is 2nd generation Irish. When I was born, Pops was serving in the US Army on a green card and Mom was a US citizen. Thus I had dual citizenship until I turned 18. Both Mom and Pop have brown eyes and black hair, but since nature has a wicked sense of humor, I was born with brown hair and blue eyes.
I recall a situation many years back when I filled out an employment application (for a large US corporation) and I marked the box indicating I was of “Hispanic” race. During the interview with the company human resources manager, who happened to be a white female, she questioned the fact that I was claiming to be of “Hispanic” race. Can you imagine a similar situation occurring today, where a corporate official questions your “race” or “ethnicity”?