Question on ethnicity

My former college roommate, who is now a history professor, recently expressed concern that his university was considering making "Jewish" a choice for ethnicity. He felt this was wrong because Judaism is only a religion that anyone can convert to.

I explained to him that while Judaism is a religion, the Jewish people are a distinct group that has a religion. While conversion is possible, it's not a major component the way it is in Christianity or Islam. Jewish people all over the world share a common origin and while they have a common religion, someone doesn't cease to be Jewish if they stop practicing the religion.

I then asked him why "Latino" is an ethnicity (he's of Mexican background). Every survey question asks about this. But "Latino" or "Hispanic" could include:

Spaniards
Basques from Spain (but not France despite being the same group)
Spanish-speaking Roma from Perpignan in France
Native Americans from Guatemala who only speak indigenous languages
Argentinians or Chileans of Italian or German descent
People of Mexican background in the Southwest US whose families have been here for centuries and are fully assimilated Americans, and are Protestant (not Catholic like many Mexicans)
One of my childhood friends whose father is Cuban (born in the US) and mother is of Northern European background

Why are all of these people considered to be members of the same ethnic group when they are clearly not, and have nothing in common, not ancestry, or religion, or even the Spanish language?

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BohoBabe · M

Ethnicity is a social construct, of course there are inconsistencies.

Latinos are considered an ethnic group because for a long time, they were considered a race. The census used to include "Latino" as a racial group along with white and black. But Latinos argued that they're defined by language, not skin-color, so they're not a race. So then they became an ethnic group. This is very different from how the term is used in Latin America.
As for why they were considered a race, probably because most of the Hispanics that came to America were brown. So they were seen as a distinct race, neither black nor white. But it is true that there are tons of Latinos who are any one of these colors, so the label as a race was never consistent.

Adstar · 56-60, M

Jews are genetic descendants of - Jacob who was renamed Israel..

BohoBabe · M

@Adstar So are Palestinians. Irony!

jademonkey19 · 41-45, T

I'm not sure I even believe in ethnicity at this point. I'm ostensibly "white" - but I tend to think that 'whiteness' is sort of made up; culturally my family background is Irish; my mother and grandmothers in particular preserved family folklore, traditions, and beliefs--and the older I get the more I tend to view those older traditions as key to our family identity, and Catholicism (for example) as an intrusion into our family's history, rather than a part of it.

I never really considered any of this until I saw Sinners--but the more I thought about it, the more ridiculous the idea of being 'white' started to seem to me.

The definition of what is or isn't "white" has changed over the years and continues to change--once upon a time in the US, Irish people and Italian peopole weren't considered white; Greeks weren't considered white, nor Polish people... but the definition of who is white seems to fluctuate with whatever is most convenient, and depends on who you ask... And it seems to require... giving up and separating from your *actual* culture and background in favor of this thing that divides the world into these bizarre ethnic, rather than cultural, lines.

And each of these cultures gets sort of subsumed when they are eventually claimed as white--their achievements are all reframed from this perspective of 'whiteness' that I don't think really existed until the colonial period and the Antebellum South.

Anyway, that's my take.

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LeopoldBloom · M

@jademonkey19 What's confusing is the Jewish people came into existence well before the modern concepts of ethnicity, race, and even religion. The Bible contains no word for "religion" because the category didn't exist back then, even though what we would consider to be religions did.

jademonkey19 · 41-45, T

@LeopoldBloom as I said, I'm not really sure I believe that ethnicity as a concept makes much sense... I know people who are Jewish by heritage, but are effectively atheists at this point (which is reminiscent to me of my own family, which I used to describe as "ethnically Catholic") - people who consider themselves to be Jewish genealogically do not necessarily consider themselves to be Jewish in terms of religion.

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BlueGreenGrey · M

The Office of Management and Budget will never add a Jewish option to its Tier 1 statistical list for employment forms or federal statistical standards, because it (and the US Census) adheres to a rigid, constitutionally protective stance regarding the separation of church and state. The federal government explicitly chooses not to identify, track, or count religious populations or religiously affiliated ancestries on mandatory demographic data collections.

Jewish is well-known, for a long time now, to connote a combined ethnoreligious meaning, not just a religion, and not just, as the periodic commenters to the feds mention when advocating for its inclusion, an ethnicity. Moreover, it is not even ONE monolithic ethnicity at all, e.g., you have Mizrahi Jews, Sephardic Jews, Ethiopian Jews, et al. Thus, in the 2024 updated Tier 1 list, White, Black and MENA will typically cover Jewish; more than one option can be selected as well.

Now what certain states do may be another matter.

ninalanyon · 70-79, T

Why does everyone in the US seem to be obsessed with ethnicity?

LeopoldBloom · M

@ninalanyon Good point, I don't think it's meaningful in terms of shared experience. My point is why one but not the other?

BlueVeins · 26-30

I feel like there would be less confusion if we just used separate terms for the ethnicity vs the religion.

Not that it's terribly complicated. Ethnicity is obviously a social construct and like you're saying, there's no super clean way to do it.

ReptilianFromPlanetCrush · M

ethnicity, like race, has alot of grey areas. people like to be able to stick you in a nice neat box, when, in reality, its just not that clear cut.

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