People who have some knowledge of American geography and humanities must have heard of such a concept: Latino American, also known as Hispanic American. Generally speaking, Latino Americans are not counted among whites. American whites refer to European-American whites. Latinos are generally regarded as minorities. If so, Latinos occupy 16.9 of the United States. % Of the population, 53 million people, is the largest ethnic minority in the United States.
However, for ordinary Chinese people, they may not know the difference between Latino and white. After all, the characteristics of Asians and blacks are very obvious, and Latinos seem to be the same as whites. Why are Americans? Will these two types of people be distinguished? Isn’t the Spanish considered European?
American Latino distribution map
This is actually a misunderstanding. In fact, Hispanics in the American context have nothing to do with modern Spain. You can make an assumption if it is Those who migrated sporadically from Spain to American cities, General English, and accepted American mainstream culture (WASP, paraphrased as Anglo-Saxon white Protestants, today constitute the vast majority of American upper class society)). You may also be considered white, but the Hispanics in the United States are actually South Americans.
American Latino refers to immigrants and ethnic groups who immigrated to the United States from Latin America. The cultural attributes of these people are far from the mainstream of the United States. For example, many of them speak Spanish as their mother tongue and believe in Catholicism. , And from the perspective of blood, these people are usually not pure European blood. Many of them are Europeans, or their ancestors are mixed races (Mestizos) born through marriage with Native Americans, because of the Spanish and Portuguese People have colonized South America for a long time, much later than when European whites colonized the United States, so in fact they have almost become two major ethnic groups.
European-American white
Also, although Latino is often confused with Hispanic, it is strictly different. Hispanic is the absolute mainstream of Latino, Spain Ethnicity = Hispanic + Spanish-speaking Latino-Portuguese-Brazilian; Latino = Latin American ancestry; and the people of Caribbean countries who speak English dominate sometimes with Dutch-speaking Surinamese and English The main Guyanese and Belizeans are excluded, but French-speaking Haitians are generally included. In short, it is more complicated, but in general, those who are influenced by Latin American culture and those who speak Spanish are Latinos. , Because there are too few other situations.
Why doesn’t the United States directly count these people as whites? (Whites in the United States usually refer to non-Hispanic Americans). This is actually related to history. Everyone knows that the United States is a country of immigrants. Now the English culture is Mainstream, but in fact, American whites include many European countries, and the most ancestry is German. However, these whites have since been assimilated into English speaking. German (German) is now spoken in the United States. Russian (Russian) and French (French) are almost non-existent, but Spanish is special because Spanish is very densely distributed.
Latino looks different from ordinary whites, because Latinos basically have a large number of Native American descent
At the end of the 15th century, a large number of Hispanics conquered They began to marry local aboriginal women, and gave birth to a mixed Latin ethnic group called the Mestizos, which is widely distributed in New Spain from Argentina in the south to California in the north, and has become the dominant ethnic group in Latin America. After the United States became independent in 1789, it expanded aggressively and invaded a large amount of Mexico's land south. Tens of thousands of Latin ethnic groups who originally lived on this large land, except for a small number of people who supported the Mexican government and hated American aggression, moved back to Mexico. Outside the mainland, most Latino people continue to live in the United States, becoming the main body of the American Latino ethnic group today. After that, because the United States was strong and had many opportunities, a large number of South Americans moved to the United States, mainly in the border areas, so there were so many Latinos.
Although only New Mexico is listed as the official language in the United States,Most of the websites, documents, shops, product descriptions and public places of the US federal government, some state governments and local governments also provide Spanish.
Spanish distribution in the United States
Then someone may want to ask, what about mixed blood? This is even more interesting. Everyone knows that white supremacy once prevailed in the United States. How to judge white people? One principle is the "one-drop rule" (one-drop rule), which was originally aimed at black people, meaning: even if you have a drop of black blood, you are black. Later, it expanded to other places, that is, as long as white people have even a little blood of color, they will not be judged as white.
In fact, at that time, due to the tight barriers between races, mixed races were rare.
The "a drop of blood principle" was a blatant racist discrimination. Later, the discrimination on the surface of the United States disappeared. Instead, the political correctness of "respect for minorities" was officially formed. But in fact, this principle is still Exist, but the meaning has changed: respect for ethnic minorities. Generally speaking: What is the point of you, do not even recognize your non-white blood, are you discriminatory?
Anyone with black ancestry is black instead of white
Anyway? Whether it's because of racial discrimination in my heart or pursuing political correctness, I basically agree with this rule. For example, Obama basically thinks that Obama is black, but in fact Obama's matriline is white. Therefore, as long as there are other ethnic descents, that is, people of mixed racial descent, they are generally not considered white.
Author: Yun-Fan
