Do me a favor, please. Before you start reading this column write down your definition of race. I'm aware that we all know what it is, but humor me. If you don't write it down, at least figure it out in your head. In words, that is.
In a few months, the Census Bureau is going to ask you to choose one or more "races" from a number of options. If past surveys are any example, our government is as confused about race as most of the rest of us, and for many decades has been puzzled over how to ask the "What race are you?" question. And if it's any indication that the wording of the question changes almost every census year, they are still confused.
Here were the six race categories listed on the 2000 census:
White
Black or African American
American Indian or Alaska Native
Asian
Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander
Some other race
Each respondent is asked to check one to six options, resulting in 63 possibilities. You can also be Hispanic. Which means that one can be any or all of the initial choices plus Hispanic, which doubles the possibilities to 126. Is that confusing enough for you? My sister Susan, the family genealogist, says that our family can only check three categories.
The biggest problem with race, however, is that it interests us only in its purity, or in its pretense of purity. President Obama, for example, could legitimately check off two categories: white and black, but as far as America is concerned, he will always be known by only one of them. For some reason African (or Black) seems to have more weight than any other so-called racial category.
The further one digs into the "Race" question on the census, the curiouser it gets until it resembles one of the questions the Mad Hatter asked Alice in Wonderland. This reflects our national obsession with something we haven't yet learned to define. Did you write down a definition? I'll bet you didn't. Neither did I.
Some might argue that "race" is a cultural construct and is an attempt to tally the various cultures that comprise our population. The problem with that leap of logic is that there are no single white, black, Asian, Native American, Hispanic, etc. cultures to tabulate. Whites proudly celebrate their French, Irish, Amish, Greek, German and other European roots. African Caribbean Americans are as proud of their heritages as are African Americans of theirs, and each island in the Caribbean has its own distinct cultural identity. And so on.
Using the word "Asian" as a race is also confusing. Technically, it means someone whose ancestors came from the continent of Asia. But the planet's largest continent is also its most diverse, and includes Israel, Saudi Arabia, and Siberia in addition to the nations commonly known as "Asian." To most people, the word refers to the nations of Southeast Asia and not the rest of the continent.
"Race" is also enlisted for studies that often compare oranges to cucumbers. Somehow, it makes sense to the studiers to compare people selected because of skin color (white), to people who are mainly of mixed ethnicity and self-select their group (African American), to people who have a Spanish heritage (but can also be members of either or both of the other two groups). That is like comparing blue-eyed people to people who have tattoos — it just doesn't make sense.
But, despite our national confusion about race, Americans are getting along much better these days even though discrimination lingers in various parts of the nation. In fact, middle- and upper-class folks of all colors seem to get along reasonably well when left alone. In most large population centers, they live in the same neighborhoods, shop in the same supermarkets, go to the same schools and generally have the same set of values. Brown, yellow, red or white, we celebrate education, manners, life, and upward mobility together. We just haven't got around to integrating our houses of worship.
In many ways, previous battles over race have been transcended by a more debilitating struggle over dollars. The disparity between upper and lower incomes has increased, and our nation has done little to erase poverty, hunger and homelessness. Our poorest and least educated citizens are more likely to live in segregated neighborhoods and continue to be the most visible source of race and gender bias and gang activity. This is where we have a lot of work left to do.
So if the census takers can't figure out what they mean by race, what can they expect from the rest of us? Expect them to continue their attempts at problem-solving until someone comes up with a new bad idea.
Ken Wibecan is a retired journalist. Once an op-ed and jazz columnist, later an editor of Modern Maturity magazine, these days he and his two dogs enjoy the country life in Peru.
Opinion
November 3, 2009
Race, as seen in the 2010 census
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