We have to be careful with ethnic and racial terminology. They don’t always match those of other cultures. Allow me to share some examples. As I have said many times, I studied in Europe, have lived in many parts of the USA and served as a missionary in South America.
In South America the term for the native people is Indigenous People. Terms such as Indian and Native Americans are considered incorrect. They are not from India. Most of the native people of the Americas came from the Far East, not the Sub-Continent, which is where India is located. They also consider Native American incorrect. To them, American the entire hemisphere from Greenland to the Falkland Islands. In their mind, most people who live in the Americas are native by virtue of being born in the Americas.
They don’t speak as Canadians and Americans do. “I’m Italian, German, Irish, etc.” They too are decendants of immigrants, but they do not hang on to the European roots. In their mind, there are only two kinds of people in this hemisphere, Americans and other. They refer to the people of the United States as Estadounidense (Es-ta-doe-oo-knee-den-say), which literally translated means United Statan. They do not refer to the USA as America, but as USA or simply US (Estados Unidos).
I found something similar while in school in Italy. Well educated Italians have a disdain for Americans and Canadians who insist that they are Italian. They look at them as wannabes. They teach their students that such people have no sense of identity or culture of their own. I found it interesting, because even the food is different. Italians and Italian Americans do not cook the same way. In fact, I hated their sauce and their pizza.
Most Italian Americans can’t speak Italian.
Language is a very strong cultural bond. Once you lose it, your link is broken. For this reason the Hispanics in the USA, both the immigrants and those who have been here for many generations insist on preserving the Spanish language. It’s a link to the culture of origin. Anthropology has proven that language does influence behavior, worldview and customs.
We have the same issues in the USA. I’m from VA. We always referred to ourselves as Southerners. A northerner is a Yankee. When I was sent to FL for a while. When people found out that I was from VA, they kept referring to me as a Northerner, which I found very annoying. However, they couldn’t understand why that would be annoying. One day I asked someone, “Did you know that Lee and Jackson were on the same side?”, because they have Jacksonville, FL. The person stopped, thought about it and then smiled.
My experience has been that Americans and Canadians are not well educated in geography and social studies. As a result, we tend to make blunders when using ethnic and racial terminology. Let’s face it. We classify Hispanics as a race rather than a language group. The truth is that most Hispanics are a mix of Indigenous and Spanish blood. Others are Black and Spanish. Then you have another third that is Spanish, German, Italian and French. One third of the southern cone of South America is Italian and German. These were people who came over right after WW II.
Having a father who was a diplomat I learned that the best way to avoid a conflict is to state up front where you’re coming from. When I use the ethnic and racial terms as we use them in the USA, such as Native American or Hispanic American, I always add that I’m from the USA. People are more forgiving. Even though they do not understand how we classify people or understand and disagree, they understand that this is our system.
I found this out very quickly while living in South America. I used the term Hispanic American. Someone quickly asked me if I was speaking about American Hispanics or Hispanic Americans. In their countries, American Hispanics are Hispanics that are citizens of the USA. Hispanic American is any Spanish speaking person of any country in the Americas.
Didn’t mean to derail the thread, but to shed some light as to what confuses people and how some people react negatively, because they don’t understand how you’re using language or labels. Therefore, they tend to interpret them from according to their experience. If you use the word negro in the USA, it has a very different meaning than negro in South America. In South America, it’s a term of endearment and a racial group. Olive skin children are called negro and they love it. It shows that people notice them. Experience colors our understanding of words.
When you’re speaking to a group that of a culture not your own, it is wise to say that you’re [insert nationality]. This way people know that you’re not using language the same way.
Fraternally,
Br. JR, OSF
