For Many Latinos, Race Is More Culture Than Color

*This is an old issue, but this article focuses, in part, on the political consequences of the answer. Political representation (voting districts) is divided by racial identification with the idea of equal representation in mind. But Latinos self-identify and don’t fit the government’s pre-set definitions, so how does that affect politics beyond the ballot box? VL


the-new-york-timesBy Mireya Navarro, The New York Times

Every decade, the Census Bureau spends billions of dollars and deploys hundreds of thousands of workers to get an accurate portrait of the American population. Among the questions on the census form is one about race, with 15 choices, including “some other race.”

More than 18 million Latinos checked this “other” box in the 2010 census, up from 14.9 million in 2000. It was an indicator of the sharp disconnect between how Latinos view themselves and how the government wants to count them. Many Latinos argue that the country’s race categories — indeed, the government’s very conception of identity — do not fit them.

The main reason for the split is that the census categorizes people by race, which typically refers to a set of common physical traits. But Latinos, as a group in this country, tend to identify themselves more by their ethnicity, meaning a shared set of cultural traits, like language or customs.

Click HERE to read the full story.


[Photo by longislandwins/Flicikr]

Subscribe today!

  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Must Read