Fermanagh
(?)Community Member
- Posted: Fri, 11 Jan 2013 22:02:29 +0000
Many people almost always seem to identify someone's ethnicity based on their looks, which usually is an accurate way to do so, but sometimes it's only semi-accurate, if you grant it that there is such a thing when it comes to ethnicity.
In the U.S. for example (even here in Wisconsin, pfft) when many people see another person who has darker skin and who looks like they could very well be of Mexican descent, why do those people usually refer to that person as being Mexican? "He's Mexican", "She's Mexican", "They're Mexican".
First of all, even if that person is indeed of Mexican descent, that doesn't necessarily mean that that person is a Mexican National, which is what the word "Mexican" implies, just as the words "American", "Russian", "Irish", "Canadian", "British", and "Australian" and so forth do. Even if someone says "Mexican" with the intention of refering to a person as being of Mexican descent, and not necessarily being a Mexican National, why don't they just say "Mexican-American"?
Second of all - these identifications being based on looks alone - said person may not even be Mexican; they could be Brazilian, or Puerto Rican, or Cuban, or Ecuadorian, or Columbian, or of some other similar ethnic background. Most likely to be Mexican, you say? Not necessarily. I've met more people from Ecquador and Brazil than I've met people from Mexico, even though I do live in the upper mid-west. Why not use "Hispanic", if you are unsure? Yes the criteria may be vague, but its connotations serve brevity well, don't they?
Also, what about surnames? Can people even recognize the respective ethnic origins of surnames anymore? To some extent, most likely, but do people know how to recognize a Jewish person, or an English person, etc.? Can people tell the difference between a Scottish surname and an Irish surname (even though a few are shared with origins too deep for common knowledge)? Etc. Etc.
Im droning on. There is alot I've left out here, and this is complicated stuff so the OP certainly isn't full-proof, so to speak, but I hope you take my meaning.
Discuss.
In the U.S. for example (even here in Wisconsin, pfft) when many people see another person who has darker skin and who looks like they could very well be of Mexican descent, why do those people usually refer to that person as being Mexican? "He's Mexican", "She's Mexican", "They're Mexican".
First of all, even if that person is indeed of Mexican descent, that doesn't necessarily mean that that person is a Mexican National, which is what the word "Mexican" implies, just as the words "American", "Russian", "Irish", "Canadian", "British", and "Australian" and so forth do. Even if someone says "Mexican" with the intention of refering to a person as being of Mexican descent, and not necessarily being a Mexican National, why don't they just say "Mexican-American"?
Second of all - these identifications being based on looks alone - said person may not even be Mexican; they could be Brazilian, or Puerto Rican, or Cuban, or Ecuadorian, or Columbian, or of some other similar ethnic background. Most likely to be Mexican, you say? Not necessarily. I've met more people from Ecquador and Brazil than I've met people from Mexico, even though I do live in the upper mid-west. Why not use "Hispanic", if you are unsure? Yes the criteria may be vague, but its connotations serve brevity well, don't they?
Also, what about surnames? Can people even recognize the respective ethnic origins of surnames anymore? To some extent, most likely, but do people know how to recognize a Jewish person, or an English person, etc.? Can people tell the difference between a Scottish surname and an Irish surname (even though a few are shared with origins too deep for common knowledge)? Etc. Etc.
Im droning on. There is alot I've left out here, and this is complicated stuff so the OP certainly isn't full-proof, so to speak, but I hope you take my meaning.
Discuss.