format_quote Originally Posted by
Thinker
Why do black people in America prefer to be labelled as ‘African Americans?’
Some years back when I was living and working in Zambia I was talking, over beer, to a South African guy who was explaining to me how the apartheid system had operated in South Africa. As the beer flowed his bitterness grew. Although I had known this chap (socially) for sometime this was the first time he’d shared his story and the resentment he felt. What was surprising was that he was white. Well when I say white, I mean I hadn’t consciously thought about what ethnic group he came from but he looked just like any other ‘white’ guy. He went on to tell me that he had been classified as ‘coloured’ because he was from an Iranian background. And, he explained how the apartheid system discriminated against him because his ID card classified him as coloured. This was the late 90’s and long after the end of apartheid and the classification of citizens according to race.
Later whilst watching TV one night I saw this African American going on about the treatment of African Americans and I wondered why black Americans wanted to be classified as an ethnic group with the title African American. It seemed to be that black Americans were asking to be classified in exactly way my friend had resented so much. The next question that followed was, if the black guy in America is an African American what are all the white guys living in Africa called? And then the question – is every black man in America from Africa and what do the black people who are not from Africa feel about the title?
I got onto internet and found an African American organisation in American and emailed them; a guy responded and I asked him these questions, he never replied.
As this is Ramadan and I am steering away from forbidden topics and as there are Americans and possibly some black American members on this forum I thought I’d ask the question here.
Interesting thoughts.
However, I disagree that self-identifying as a particular ethnic group is the same as marginalising oneself - I don't think the terms 'African American' and 'Coloured' are equivalent. Just from a semantic point of view, the terms 'black' and 'coloured' are more similar.
The term 'African American' may be analogous to British terms for people of non-white ethnic origins. There's 'Afro Carribbean' and 'Asian or Asian British', for instance. But in the UK those kinds of terms tend to be for official purposes - equal opportunities stuff on various forms. It doesn't necessarily mean the person in question is literally an African or Asian immigrant. It's just a PC way to describe the colour of their skin. :)
Usually, like most other British people, when referring to a person's race, I would just say they are 'white', or 'black' or 'Asian' (i.e. brown). Interesting that us Brits tend to group together Asians of Far Eastern descent as 'Chinese'.
As for white people in Africa... maybe there's some Dutch word, I don't know.
As you may be aware, there's a lot of academic literature arguing that notions of race and ethnicity are purely artificial anyway.