(Click here for Spanish translation) Thirty years ago I had to design a study of the prison population of New Jersey. After interviewing every inmate that considered himself Hispanic, the authorities were surprised to find out that they had 10% more Hispanics incarcerated than they knew. That was because in their rudimentary system of classification, they would decide on the basis that the prisoner “looked Hispanic” and they would ask him. The problem was that many Hispanics “didn’t look it”, being blonde or Black, and these were not asked about it (unless they spoke with an accent).
Since immigrating to the United States 45 years ago, I have followed with interest the evolution of the official and unofficial efforts to identify what is a Hispanic. This is no easy task, because it requires one to define the “identity” of an immensely diverse people, in genetics, culture, class and circumstances. We are people who come from an enormously varied continental mass which we ourselves have not been able to fully define. There is no universal agreement about whether we are a single America, or two, or three. (And of course, it does not help that the North Americans of the United States have taken the name all to themselves). Do we come from Hispanic America or from Iberian America? Are we from Latin America (a word coined by the French in order to include their colonies) or from our individual countries?
It is not surprising, therefore, that the authorities in the U.S. have not been able to determine how to define us when it comes to counting us. According to the Pew Hispanic Center http://pewhispanic.org/ there are two ways in which the U.S. government defines us as Hispanics, according to the 1976 law which for the first time required counting an ethnic group, “Americans of Spanish origin or ancestry”. One way to count us as Hispanics is if we come from one of the 20 countries that speak Spanish in Latin America or from Spain. This excludes Brazil and Portugal, as well as Spanish Guinea and Gabon (and, the Philippines, which were also a Spanish colony many of whose people share Hispanic last names). This is the way most federal agencies and the public schools classify us. It's worth mentioning that the annual census of public school attendance that each state carries out, school by school, is a powerful planning tool, since it is available to the public in the Internet. This is by far the best source, the most accurate and up to date, to determine number, distribution and rate of growth of the Hispanic population in any school district.
But, the US Census does not use that definition, but the other, also authorized by the 1976 Act. This one says that a Hispanic is whoever says that he is a Hispanic and that no one who denies it can be considered one. According to this definition, as of July 1, 2008 there were 46,943,613 Hispanics in the US, 15.4% of the total population.
It is interesting how broad (or ambiguous) is the 2000 Census question: “Is this person Spanish-Hispanic-Latino?” That is because some of us (el 36%) call ourselves “Hispanics” and others (21 %) prefer to call themselves “Latinos”. However, when one asks more broadly, “What are you” roughly half answer with their country of origin, a quarter consider themselves Americans, and only another quarter identify themselves as either “Hispanics” or “Latinos.”
What should we conclude from these facts?
1st. That God brought us to this land, and He has done it with a purpose: that we may serve as a bridge people between our nations of origin and this one, and between all the ethnic groups of our new nation. Our mission is to bring from here the best that we need back home and to bring from there the best that is missing and is most needed here.
2nd. Although many of us have been able to maintain a deeply rooted identity in our culture of origin, our children and grandchildren born here consider themselves more as citizens of this country than descendants of their ancestors. Although a certain affinity and warmth will remain, their mission and life are here. Yet, as the Jewish Christians of the New Testament, we must not forget the poor back home.
Send your comments to blog@joselgonzalez.com And read more about our Hispanic culture in www.semilla.org . Until next week...
