Race and Ethnic Relations(个人整理).doc

Race and Ethnic Relations1. BlacksAfrican Americans make up the second largest racial and ethnic minority in the United States.5 Most African Americans are of West and Central African descent and are descendants of enslaved blacks within the boundaries of the present United States. However, some immigrants from African, Caribbean, Central American, and South American nations, and their descendants, may be identified or self-identify with the term.African-American history starts in the 16th century with black Africans forcibly taken to Spanish and English colonies in America as slaves. After the United States came into being, black people continued to be enslaved and treated as inferiors. These circumstances were changed by Reconstruction, development of the black community, participation in the great military conflicts of the United States, the elimination of racial segregation, and the Civil Rights Movement. In 2008, Barack Obama was the first African American to be elected president of the United States. The geographical-origin-based term African American is commonly used interchangeably with black American, although skin-color-based terms are sometimes considered disparaging.Famous people: Barack Obama, Martin Luther King, Michael Jordan, Frederick Douglass, Michael Jackson2. IndiansIndian Americansare citizens of theUnited StatesofIndian ancestryand comprise about 3.18 million people, or 1.0% of the U.S. population, the countrysthird largestself-reportedAsian ancestral groupafterChinese AmericansandFilipino Americansaccording toAmerican Community Surveyof 2010 data.TheU.S. Census Bureauuses the termAsian Indianto avoid confusion with theindigenous peoples of the Americascommonly referred to asAmerican Indians.Brief History: In North America, the termIndianhas an ambiguous meaning. In the western hemisphere (mainlyNorthandSouth America), historically and currently,Indianhas been commonly used to refer to theindigenous peoples of the Americas. Qualifying terms such asAmerican IndianandEast Indianwere and are commonly used to avoid ambiguity.WhileEast Indianremains in use,South Asianis often chosen instead. The U.S. government coinedNative Americanto refer to the indigenous peoples of the United States, butAmerican Indianremains popular among the indigenous and general populations.People of Indian origin often prefer the termDesito refer to thediasporicsubcultureof South Asians. Indian Americans are categorized asAsian Indian(and more broadly,Asian American) by theUnited States Census Bureau.It was after theLuceCeller Act of 1946that Indian Americans were restored naturalization rights in the United States.A number of Indian Americans came to the U.S. viaIndian communities in other countriesincluding theUnited Kingdom,Canada,South Africa,Mauritius,Malaysia,Singapore,Suriname,Guyana,Fiji,Kenya,Tanzania,Uganda,Trinidad & Tobago, andJamaica.3. HispanicsHispanic and Latino Americans(Spanish:Latino-estadounidenses) refers to anethnolinguisticgroupin theUnited Stateswithoriginsin the countries ofLatin Americaor theIberian peninsula. More generally it includes all persons in the United States who self-identify as Hispanic or Latino.Reflecting especially the Latin American population, which has origins in all the continents and many ancestries,Hispanic/Latino Americans are very racially diverse, and as a result form anethnic category, rather than arace. While the two terms are sometimes used interchangeably,Hispanicis a narrower term which only refers to persons of Spanish-speaking origin or ancestry, whileLatinois more frequently used to refer more generally to anyone of Latin American origin or ancestry, including Brazilians.Hispanicthus includes persons from Spain and Spanish-speaking Latin Americans excluding Brazilians (who speak Portuguese) whileLatinoexcludes persons from Spain but includes both Spanish-speaking and Portuguese-speaking Latin Americans. BecauseBrazils populationof 191,000,000is several times larger thanSpains populationof 47,000,000and also because there are moreBrazilian Americans(between 360,000 and 1,100,000as of 2010) thanSpanish Americans(about 85,000 as of 2010)in the United States, Latino is a broader term encompassing more people. The choice between the termsLatinoandHispanicamong those of Spanish-speaking origin is also associated with location: persons of Spanish-speaking origins residing in the eastern United States tend to prefer the termHispanic, whereas those in the west tend to preferLatino. Hispanics or Latinos constitute 16.7% of the total United States population, or 52 million people,forming the second largest ethnic group, afternon-Hispanic White Americans(a group composed of dozens of sub-groups, as is Hispanic and Latino Americans).Hispanic and Latino Americans are the largest of all the minority groups, butBlack Americansare the largest minority among theraces, afterWhite Americansin general (non-Hispanic and Hispanic).Mexican Americans,Cuban Americans,Colombian Americans,Dominican Americans,Puerto Ricans,Spanish Americans, andSalvadoran Americansare some of the Hispanic and Latino American national origin groups. There have been people of Hispanic or Latino heritage in the territory of the present-day United States continuouslysince the 1565 founding ofSt. Augustine, Florida, by the Spanish, the longest among European Americanethnic groups and second-longest of allU.S. ethnic groups, afterNative Americans. Hispanics have also lived continuously in theSouthwestsince near the end of the 16th century, withsettlements in New Mexicothat began in 1598, and which were transferred to the area ofEl Paso, Texas, in 1680.Spanish settlement of New Mexico resumed in 1692, and new ones were established inArizonaandCaliforniain the 18th century. The Hispanic presence can even be said to date from half a century earlier than St. Augustine, ifSan Juan, Puerto Ricois considered to be the oldest Spanish settlement, and the oldest city, in the U.S. 4. Asian AmericansHistory: As Asian Americans originate from many different countries, each population has its own unique history. In 1635, an East Indian is listed inJamestown, VirginiaThis proceededIndianimmigrants settling on theEast Coast of the United Statesbeginning in the 1790s. In 1763,Filipinosestablished the small settlement ofSaint Malo, Louisiana, after fleeing mistreatment aboardSpanishships.Since there were no Filipino women with them, the Manilamen, as they were known, marriedCajunandNative Americanwomen. Chinese sailors first came to Hawaii in 1778,the same year that Captain James Cook came upon the island. Many settled and marriedHawaiianwomen. Some Island-born Chinese can claim to be 7th generation. Most Chinese,Koreanand Japanese immigrants in Hawaii arrived in the 19th century as laborers to work on sugar plantations. Later, Filipinos also came to work as laborers, attracted by the job opportunities, although they were limited. Numerous Chinese and Japanese began immigrating to the U.S. in the mid-19th century for work, because of poor economic conditions in their home nations. Many of the immigrants worked as laborers on thetranscontinental railroad. Although the absolute numbers of Asian immigrants in the late 19th century were small compared to that of immigrants from other regions, much of it was concentrated in the West, and the increase caused some Americans to fear the change represented by the growing number of Asians. This fear was referred to as the yellow peril. The United States passed laws such asAsian Exclusion ActandChinese Exclusion Actto sharply restrict Asian immigration.Immigration trends:Filipinos have been in the territories that would become the United States since the 16th century. There were thousands of Asians in Hawaii when it was annexed to the United States in 1898, and they all gained full US citizenship at that time.The United States Supreme Court inUnited States v. Wong Kim Ark(1898) interpreted the 14th amendment to mean that every person born in the United States, regardless of race or ancestry is a citizen of the United States. Congress passed restrictive legislation to nearly all Chinese immigration in the 1880s, which was in effect until the 1940s.Japanese immigration was sharply curtailed by a gentlemans agreement brokered by President Theodore Roosevelt. The immigration restriction laws of the 1920s produced quotas for all countries, with Asian countries getting a zero quota. After World War II legislation was passed, and judicial rulings gradually increased the ability of Asian Americans to immigrate and becomenaturalizedcitizens. Immigration rapidly increased following the enactment of theImmigration and Nationality Act Amendments of 1965as well as naturalization ofrefugeesfrom conflicts that occurred in the late 20th century in Southeast Asia. Asian American immigrants have a significant percentage of individuals who have already achieved professional status, a first among immigration groups.In 2009, Asian Americans surpassedHispanic Americansas the largest plurality of immigrants to the United States.49Additionally, from 2000 to 2010, the Asian American population was the fastest growing group according to the2010 U.S. Census.In the years immediately preceding 2012, 61% of Asian American adult immigrants have a bachelor or higher level college education.5. White EthnicsThe term White refers to people having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa. It includes people who reported White or wrote in entries such as Irish, German, Italian, Lebanese, Near Easterner, Arab, or Polish. In the United States, essentially anyone of European descent is considered white. Although both Jewish Americansand Arab-Americans are included in the white category in the census, some might not consider themselves white, and might not be considered white by others. The cultural boundaries separating white Americans from other racial or ethnic categories have changed significantly over the course of American history. Even among Europeans, those not considered white at some time in American history includeSouthern Europeans(Spaniards,Greeks,Italiansetc.),IrishCatholics,Eastern EuropeansandGermans.Early on in the United States, white generally referred to those of British Isles or northwestern European descent. David R. Roediger argues that the construction of the white race in the United States was an effort to mentally distance slave owners from slaves.The process of officially being defined aswhiteby law often came about in court disputes over pursuit ofcitizenship.Many whites have varying amounts of Native American and African ancestry. In a recent study, Gonalves et al. 2007 reportedSub-SaharanandAmerindianmtDnalineages at a frequency of 3.1% (respectively 0.90% and 2.2%) in White Americans of European descent.In another study, about 30% of all White Americans, approximately 66 million people, have a median of 2.3% ofBlack Africanadmixture.6. The Relation among themThe immigrants to theAmericascame from every region of Europe, Africa, and Asia. Theymixedamong themselves and with theindigenous inhabitants of the continent. In theUnited Statesmost people who self-identify asAfricanAmericanhave someEuropean ancestors, while many people who identify asEuropean Americanhave some African or Amerindian ancestors.Since the early history of the United States, Amerindians, AfricanAmericans, and European Americans have been classified as belonging to different races. Efforts to track mixing between groups led to a proliferation of categories, such asmulattoandoctoroon. The criteria for membership in these races diverged in the late 19th century. DuringReconstruction, increasing numbers of Americans began to consider anyone with one drop of known Black blood to be Black, regardless of appearance.By the early 20th century, this notion was made statutory in many states.4Amerindianscontinue to be defined by a certain percentage of Indian blood (calledblood quantum). To be White one had to have perceived pure White ances