Ethnicity in the United States

[Crumpets]

This is intentionally a very vague and subjective set of questions, but I'm curious how people would answer them:

In the US, we tend to divide people's ethnic identities predominantly along racial lines. But ethnicity and race are not the same thing, nor is ethnicity the same as one's national background (German-American, Italian-American, etc.) Going by the main characteristics that can define an ethnic group (quoting from Wikipedia here):

- cultural heritage
- ancestry
- origin myth
- history
- homeland
- language
- dialect
- religion
- mythology
- folklore
- ritual
- cuisine
- dressing style
- art
- physical appearance

...you could easily make the case that Americans as a whole are a single ethnic group. You could also make the case that America has hundreds and hundreds of ethnic groups, if you wanted to break it down to only those groups that share all of these characteristics.

Ethnicity is also not a constant characteristic of any population, and ethnicities may arise and die out, either suddenly or gradually.

So, my questions are: what ethnic groups do you see in the United States? Roughly how many are there in total? What categories/characteristics do you think are becoming more important identifiers that were less prominent in the past? What defining characteristics of ethnic identity are becoming less important overtime? What is your ethnic identity?

[Kamala's side hoe]

I would say 1) each major racial category in the US can be further subdivided into multiple ethnicities, 2) different combinations of ethnicities can be considered their own ethnicities (e.g. Mexican + Iranian is different from ADOS + Japanese), and that 3) mixed-race people effectively constitute a separate ancestry group from the major racial categories.

Points 1 and 2 are more relevant for groups that are of relatively recent immigrant origin and are thought of as more culturally distinct. Italians, Polish, and Jews are more widely thought of as distinct Non-Hispanic White ethnicities than say Irish, Germans, or Dutch.

Points 2 and 3 imply that integration/assimilation of immigrants and their children results in ethnic identity becoming replaced with a more racialized identity that corresponds to long-standing US Census racial categories. Within my predominantly nonwhite RL social network, and I've seen this happen as many people end up partnered with members of the same race but not necessarily of the same ethnicity. The Puerto Rican chick born and raised on the island marries a Chicano guy from Washington state. The children of Indian immigrants who end up with other Subcontinentals don't particularly care about caste or heritage language unless they're Punjabi Sikh. The children of the East and Southeast Asian diasporas intermingle amidst an evolving pan-diasporic subculture of weeaboo-ism, koreaboo-ism, and 88rising. African immigrants and their children own their blackness and identify with it on uniquely American terms. Et cetera.

My ethnic identity is Chinese. My racial identity is East/Southeast Asian. I don't think of myself as "different" from other Chinese Americans whose families are from different parts of China as mine (or from Taiwanese or Hong Kong diasporans in the US) because we are all seen as Chinese and as East/Southeast Asian by the broader American public. These are two of many aspects of my personal identity, and they are unlikely to change because I have a fairly fixed concept of what "ethnicity" and "race" mean.

[Del Tachi]

All I know is that Southerners are a distinct ethnic group. 

[It’s so Joever]

I would say 1) each major racial category in the US can be further subdivided into multiple ethnicities, 2) different combinations of ethnicities can be considered their own ethnicities (e.g. Mexican + Iranian is different from ADOS + Japanese), and that 3) mixed-race people effectively constitute a separate ancestry group from the major racial categories.

Points 1 and 2 are more relevant for groups that are of relatively recent immigrant origin and are thought of as more culturally distinct. Italians, Polish, and Jews are more widely thought of as distinct Non-Hispanic White ethnicities than say Irish, Germans, or Dutch.

Points 2 and 3 imply that integration/assimilation of immigrants and their children results in ethnic identity becoming replaced with a more racialized identity that corresponds to long-standing US Census racial categories. Within my predominantly nonwhite RL social network, and I've seen this happen as many people end up partnered with members of the same race but not necessarily of the same ethnicity. The Puerto Rican chick born and raised on the island marries a Chicano guy from Washington state. The children of Indian immigrants who end up with other Subcontinentals don't particularly care about caste or heritage language unless they're Punjabi Sikh. The children of the East and Southeast Asian diasporas intermingle amidst an evolving pan-diasporic subculture of weeaboo-ism, koreaboo-ism, and 88rising. African immigrants and their children own their blackness and identify with it on uniquely American terms. Et cetera.

My ethnic identity is Chinese. My racial identity is East/Southeast Asian. I don't think of myself as "different" from other Chinese Americans whose families are from different parts of China as mine (or from Taiwanese or Hong Kong diasporans in the US) because we are all seen as Chinese and as East/Southeast Asian by the broader American public. These are two of many aspects of my personal identity, and they are unlikely to change because I have a fairly fixed concept of what "ethnicity" and "race" mean.

I’ve seen this blending of Asian American culture myself. Things such as ramen/pho, k pop, etc are all very popular amongst my largely Chinese American friend group right now. I was worried actually bcuz I have some Japanese scrolls with the rising Sun in my apartment (my mother is a closet weeb and I gave her full control of my apartment decorating bcuz she is paying the rent) but they all thought it was wonderful and complimented it.
Otoh my old Chinese roomate always said “F**K Japan” unironically. But he did like Korea. Moral of the story, be like Korea ig.