Ethnicity. What a word. It would be an interesting study to take a camcorder to the streets and ask people what it means. The answers would abound, and I do not doubt that most would include the words, "culture," "nationality," or "race." Yet ethnicity is neither of those things exclusively. According to "The Construction of Social Identity: Ethnicity" by Edward R. Kantowicz, ethnicity is "a collective, inherited, cultural identity, buttressed by social structures and social networks, and often formulated in opposition to competing social groups"(454). The sense I gather from this is that ethnicity is multifaceted, unique to each person (though similar, of course to those in their ethnic group), and is not the same for all Americans. Indeed, much of the article focused on highlighting the difficulty of assigning a national ethnicity. We have not reached any consensus on what that should be. Early colonials may have pushed for anglo-saxon domination, and immigrants may have formed their own ethnic ghettos, but the fact remains that to this day, Americans share many aspects of their ethnicity in common due to a common nationality, but also remain vastly diverse. Is this diversity good if it creates separation? Does it fracture the national identity as a whole? These questions are huge, and not the sort to be answered in a blog post. I think, personally, the melting-pot,described in this article as a give and take of culture and customs amongst all groups, comes across as a beautiful idea. If that is possible, or ideal in reality, are things I cannot say.
What I would like to ruminate on a bit further is the idea of personal ethnicity. This is something that the article brought up for me which I had never really considered. I consider myself an American. I am Caucasian. I have mainly Scottish and Norwegian roots, with English and Irish mixed in as well. What is my ethnicity? What is my ethnic group? I would say American, but that isn't quite right. There are many Americans whom I don't feel share an ethnicity with me, in the sense of a common identity and social networks that the article discusses. I suppose there is no name for it, except to provide adjective upon adjective to describe myself. But I find this to be an interesting concept on which to ruminate.
Alright, it is 12:42. My night owl capacities are reaching their weekday maximum. Until another day and another time.
Hi Katie--I like what you have to say about ethnicity and it brought back a memory for me. Many years ago, when academia in general was struggling with the meaning of multi-cultural identity--how to create a diverse community--there was a brief period of enthusiasm for the argument that each individual on a campus should embrace his or her ethnicity--should find (create?) an ethnic identity. The assumption was that each American carries an ethnic home--just some of us have lost the map to it. The hope under this argument was that each American would then feel part of a diversity and would see others the same way. I can recall attending a very large conference where this argument was enthusiastically and even movingly promoted by the keynote speaker. What happened, though,w as that when the attendees broke into small groups to talk, a huge wave of confusion and grief rose out of the majority of the white people: I don't have an ethnicity some cried, I'm just American others cried, I feel like a wannabee some confessed. In retrospect it now seems comic. In Poland, Poles are not ethnic. In Thailand, Thais are not ethnic--so what then creates an ethnicity? Are Americans living in Poland or Thailand ethnic? Hmmm? Is there an American ethnicity?
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