It's common for Americans to identify with their ethnicity followed by their nationality, especially for non-whites. However, the opposite also exists but is often overlooked.
For example, Mitski prefers to identify solely as American despite being half-Japanese, as she doesn't feel comfortable calling herself Japanese American.
This made me wonder: as a non-white minority, do you feel comfortable and content identifying solely as American? Does it affect the way you see yourself, others and your life? When do you start identifying as one? And what led you to adopt this identity?
26 comments
This stuff doesn’t matter as much in real life as Reddit Europeans think it does.
To outsiders or foreigners outside the U.S. I’m American, but if people ask more than that I’m black. Inside the U.S. then it’s more expanded on. As a black person what else am I supposed to be other than American lmao there is no where else literally for us.
Im not entirely sure, to me I can’t separate the afro from the American
Being black shapes who I am just as much as being American. I still consider myself 100% American but I guess the difference between being Afro American and other hyphenated Americans is that Afro American is absolutely an ethnicity born from this nation and has been here for 400 years
You can be both, with situation dictating which you claim.
Almost every American identifies as “American.”
Some people like to add their racial or ethnic background but that’s separate.
It depends on the context. If someone asks my nationality I say I’m American. If they assume I’m white because of it, that’s on them.
When filling out paperwork, I specify my ethnicity.
Inevitably, when someone wants an explanation for how I look, I’ll tell them my ethnicity if their tone doesn’t make me blow them off altogether (ie *Where are you from?*).
Yes I do. Frankly, I sometimes find it annoying how non-white Americans are often described as “hyphenated Americans”, implying that the default American is white.
i mean mitskis mom is from japan and mitski herself grew up in several countries. it would obviously be different for like a fourth generation japanese american from california.
Here in the US, ethnic background and Americanness do not compete with each other. I’m Chinese-American, but I only bring up the “Chinese” part in conversations or contexts where it’s relevant. People can choose to wear or not wear their ethnic background like I do; it’s a personal choice. If someone just calls me “American” they’re not saying anything wrong.
We’re all American. That’s just basic fundamentalism. All our passports are the same. That’s one identity. Every human being has multiple identities, though, and one of them is social / cultural / genealogical. That doesn’t take the place of any of the other ones. That’s where you get into Japanese Americans and Italian Americans but they’re still all Americans. All our votes are equal. Then you have things like your job and your sports and your hobbies and your state and community. Those are all identities too. They all exist simultaneously. It’s not either or.
You can be a Japanese American doctor who loves his hometown of Philadelphia and who loves baseball and travels the world on an American passport.
As a white American, I’ve noticed that Europeans still like to go to the non-white Americans and ask where they are really from. It needs to be handled better. Some like the label and others don’t.
I don’t know Mitski. Her wiki says she was born to an American State department service member in Japan and was moving all around as a kid. Having knowing someone who was with the State department, they sent their daughters to American schools when they were in Egypt, Thailand, and DRC. So they had English classes and were around other Americans. She then settled in the USA as an adult. It was her call to say that she feels mixed and doesn’t see herself as Japanese.
Honestly, there’s no hard rule about it.
I find more recent immigrants tend to be especially patriotic and often prefer just American, while later generations adopt some kind of reference to their heritage in addition to American. After yet more generations, it seems silly to use any others as your heritage is hopelessly mixed.
Yes, I do.
Yeah
I’ve never lived anywhere else
I’m nothing but American RAHHH 🗣🗣🇺🇸🍻🎆
I am American. My parent’s background is irrelevant.
To anyone outside the US. I’m American. Within the US if anyone asks with genuine curiosity and not as a way to insult me, I’ll tell them my parents heritage as Indian.
When people hyphenate their identity like that, it’s about race and culture, not nationality.
Americans are Americans
It’s both to me. I’m Japanese-American, which is the same as solely “American.”
“Japanese-American” is just a subcategory of American, the way “female American” or “millennial American” are, which are two labels I also identify with. I’ll use any one of those labels if they’re relevant to the conversation.
I’ve always identified with “Japanese-American” because there are things about me that are culturally Japanese, and I’m certainly identifiable to other people as ethnically Japanese, but I’m definitely not “Japanese” from Japan. I’m not from an immigrant family. My parents and grandparents were all born here speaking English as their first language. I don’t feel any real connection with Japan as a country and I don’t relate much to Japanese people from Japan.
So, at this point, I feel like Japanese-American is its own separate ethnic group, the way “Singaporean Chinese” is separate from “Chinese” from China. We have our own language, our own distinct culture, our own cuisine, our own history, and so on.
>as a non-white minority, do you feel comfortable and content identifying solely as American?
I prefer it.
Funnily these days I keep seeing dumb stuff on twitter which is more or less akin to “You have to go back” (Mostly from a certain crowd) towards people who are naturalized citizens and/or were born here, they just aren’t white, which either irritates me or makes me incredibly sad.
To me, citizen is a citizen. This is home. What else would I be?
also minor nitpick that when people say stuff like “Indian-American” it’s amusing sometimes because India’s not an ethnicity and doesn’t allow dual citizenships, so there’s no “Indian” part left except for origin. There are hundreds of ethnicities in India itself. at that point it’s more accurate to say stuff like “Mewari-American” than “Indian-American” but that’s just me ranting and being pedantic lol.
Yes, as that’s my nationality. But my ethnicity is African American / Black American. I can and do identify as both, mostly all Americans do.
Mitski is a bad example – colloquially, in US English, “Japanese” is an ethnic signifier, but in Japan, speaking Japanese, it’s a *nationality.*
Additionally, Japan doesn’t allow dual citizenship, so being Japanese is a hard binary – you are either 100% Japanese or 0% – despite colloquial use of “half” it’s not a thing.
You might ask, ok, what’s the Japanese word for “ethnically Japanese”? That’s just it – there isn’t one. The ethnic majority just assume and act like they’re the only ethnicity here (they aren’t).
Indigenous Japanese people sometimes call the majority “Wajin,” but that’s a bit niche and limited to indigenous circles.
Now, I don’t know anything about Mitski – I understand that she’s a bit of a major figure to the Asian-American community. But if she’s American, then by Japanese law she is not and can not be Japanese.
This is a really good example of why Americans have to be so careful of turning to Japan for “representation.” Japan doesn’t represent you – Japan doesn’t *want* you – Japan even rejects their own diaspora. They don’t “represent” anyone but themselves.
But you gotta understand that this is *why* Americans identify by hyphenated ethnic identities: we *don’t* reject you for it. We celebrate it.
But, again, I know nothing about Mitski, just giving some context.
Absolutely. I often tell folks when traveling and they’re surprised that I’m an American that there aren’t many things more uniquely American than Black folks. Black American culture is absolutely a product of the USA.
yes
What do you mean by solely? I am solely an American. That is my only nationality. I am also solely Korean. That is my ethnicity. I am solely Catholic. That is my religion. I am solely Asian. That is my race. I am solely bisexual. That is my sexuality. I am solely male. That is my sex. I am solely a man. That is my gender. But I am a human. All the different aspects of me come together to form who I am. Admitting that I am one of those does not mean I am any less one of the others.
In how we talk, we will bring up the parts of us that are relevant. To many people, our ethnicity has a large impact on who we become. A lot of people, when trying to point out their perspective or explain themselves, will mention at some point the parts that are relevant. Like someone on the Internet mentioning their gender when discussing a topic where one’s gender might give a different perspective, such as abortion. Or a homosexual person discussing LGBT+ rights or gay marriage bringing up their sexuality.
Now, you may point out, well, these people aren’t saying they are Woman-American, or Homosexual-American, or Baptist-American, and so on. Because it isn’t needed. However, with how English works, it is unfortunate that the words for many nationalities happen to be very similar to the words for a dominant ethnicity. French, Korean, Japanese*, Vietnamese, and so on. We combine it with American to clarify and also be more specific. Also, we cannot ignore the fact that nationality is often where you grew up. In that case, your nationality and ethnicity have a lot of overlap when it comes to influencing different aspects of you. Things like cuisine you grew up with, languages you are fluent in, and cultural customs you follow.
Think of it this way. If I go into a Reddit thread asking about Redditor’s customs, would it be a bit confusing to say, “As an American, we bow to greet each other, avoid eye contact out of respect, mostly speak Korean, and eat rice as my main grain?” It would make much more sense to clarify that these are my customs as a Korean American. And lets be honest, I consider these my customs, but many of the people who say I am American, not Korean American, do not accept these as American.
*It isn’t always the case. Technically, the dominant people would be the Yamato, not Japanese, or Han, not Chinese. But, in everyday American English, a lot of people are not aware and use, for example, Japanese when talking about the Yamato specifically.