I've lived in the United States for ten years, but for some reason people seem to have no knowledge that Africa is a diverse continent, with 53 countries, hundreds of languages, and various ethnic groups. I'm getting sick of hearing things like "African" proverb unbuntu, it's from South Africa from the zulu peoples, Doc. Questions: Are you from Africa (I don't remember asking someone from Mexico, are you from North America?) the concept of African Peoples as a singular entity devoid of diversity (Nigeria has more than 250 Ethnic Groups) and more ignorant comments completely devoid of any sense of geography or history.
It's like calling an Asian, an Asian, instead of Korean, Japanese, or whatever. I'm Korean American, I've been living in Houston since my birth. I don't expect people to call me Korean American. I do get offended when people assume I'm Chinese or Japanese (not because I hate them), and I rather be just called Asian. And you honestly expect people to remember the 53 countries in Africa? And like you said, there are so many ethnic groups in one country... Maybe they'd like to be called African instead of a wrong nationality?
A lot of the confusion comes from the fact that in America we loosely use the term "African American" to describe most black people. Working for an international bank, I work with a variety of people who cant stand that designation. Especially the Brits who are black, or the guys from the DR and Jamaica...they all get kinda jacked if you call them African American. If you havent figured it out in the past 10 years, we're sorta a complicated country with a lot of race issues and sensitivities. We're getting better at it, really....but there's a lot of work to be done.
I believe in a few years, we will start to see "african-american" becoming un-PC. I never understood how it even came about, as its completely ignorant. Calling someone "african-american" is a stereotype, and Im sure there are plenty of blacks abroad who would take great offense to that. Calling someone "black" is a general observation. Africa is a very complicated country and most people will do good to name a handful of countries. Its not like North America, where you only have 3 countries. It doesn't excuse the ignorance, but it is understandable. It only shows that nobody pays any attention to Africa.
It's difficult for most non-Asians to differentiate Chinese from Japanese from Korean, etc . . . It would be even harder to differentiate a Kenyan from an Ethiopian from a Nigerian, etc . . . That's why we use blanket terms. I lived in Singapore for a while and I wouldn't expect them to look at me and be able to tell if I were American, Australian, Canadian, English, German, or French.
This is about as important as someone from the United States getting angry because you didn't differentiate which state they were from originally.
Yea. I agree... I think you misunderstood me. I rather be called Asian than a different nationality. And, I'm pretty sure someone from Kenyan would rather be called African than Ethiopian.
I got your point. I was just expanding that people speak in broad terms regarding Asians and Africans because they know they can't tell what exact country they're from and it's less offensive to call somebody by their continent than by the wrong country. Identifying somebody by their continent (or other large geographic regions) doesn't happen too much with the Americas but it works for most other places. African, Asian, European, Eastern European, Middle Eastern. Not that it's ever happened, but I don't think I'd care or get offended if I were somewhere in Africa and somebody mistook me as British.
Three countries in North America? What about Belize? Guatemala, Honduras, San Salvador? Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama? Guess we can put aside the islands in the Caribbean. After all, the British didn't consider themselves part of Europe for ages. Some still don't.
On a similar note, it sorta bugs me that I have to put down "asian" on a survey for example. Why isn't there "Indo-Pak" or "South Asian" or "desi" even to distinguish someone from the indo-pak subcontinent (indian, pakistani, bangali, etc.)? Is someone from central Russia considered an Asian? I don't get it. Not saying I get upset but just find it weird that nobody takes this into account. A chinese and an indian have two very distinct cultures (not just food ). They don't even look alike!
A lot of people refer to me as Asian because of the way I look. Some have even asked what Asian country my ancestors are from. I enjoy it, because I have always been fascinated with Asian culture and people and I love any kind of Asian food - Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Indian, Vietnamese...all of it. However, I'm not Asian, just a smorgasbord of European countries and maybe a tiny fraction Native American. If my ancestors were from Vietnam, Thailand, or even Sweden or France, I would probably be upset if someone generalized and referred to me as "Chinese" or "British." Since I don't have a "home" country, I don't really care that much when people mistake my race. It would be a different story if I had a distinct place of origin. Many people, not just Americans, are ignorant about the differences between countries in close proximity even though their cultures are completely different. That's just the unfortunate truth.
Correct me if I am wrong, but aren't a lot of the countries in Africa created artificially by the European colonialists, rather than from a shared history and culture? If you look at a map, a lot of the borders are straight lines, without regard for geography and tribes. That's the root cause of a lot of the internal problems in Africa today. In that sense, perhaps it's better to be referred to as African, rather than a country which was perhaps artificial in the first place.
Would he rather be called an African Carribean American? Social labels have become so messed up that I don't know if you're joking with the irony.
I don't use the term asian just cause I think it is stupid. Asia is gigantic and an Asian could technically be Korean or Syrian, two vastly different cultures. It makes not sense to me.
