Race question: Describing someone in America

Caucasoid, Mongoloid and Negroid are the three 'great races' of the world under racial categorisation and is still used in the field of cranial anthropometry as well as some other anthropological fields.

It's been my observation that referring to someone who is dark skinned as Negroid or someone with East Asian colouring as Mongoloid is deemed as racist, or at least insulting. Something which I think is fine to not do because if you can not insult someone you don't know through simple changes in parlance then do so.

My question here is about describing someone by their looks.

When I see an American TV show or film featuring cops trying to describe suspects a white person is generally referred to as Caucasian were as someone with dark skin colouring is described as Afro-American and someone with East Asian features as Oriental or Asian.

Were I an Aboriginal Australian or from Jamaica I would want my cultural identity to be defined by who I am and not as Afro-American. Likewise were I an Inuit or Māori I would like to be described as such and not labelled Oriental or Asian.

As a person with white skin colouring who was born in Europe I would prefer the term Europoid to determine my appearance as oppose to Caucasian as I find the term too broad to determine my particular look. Caucasians, like people from other categories, have many defining characteristics which can be traced from their heritage. Red hair, green eyes, blue eyes, blonde hair, brown eyes, cheek bones, jaw lines and all the other factors which identify a 'race' of people are all apparent over this hugely vast sector of the world.

With Caucasoid, Congoid, Capoid, Mongoloid, Australoid and many more variations being drafted into racial categorisation how do we describe someone correctly?

So thanks for reading all of that as a back ground to these questions I'd like you to answer. Based purely on seeing the following briefly (pics on links) and with no knowledge of their background (no cheating by reading!!):

1)How would you describe Jean Reno?

2)How would you describe Dave Allen?

3)How would you describe Sacha Baron Cohen?

4)How about Salif Keita?

5)Ben Kingsley?

6)Kalpen Modi?

7)Russell Crowe

I realise I've picked men only, but this is to see how you would describe each person purely on looks. Please don't cheat - just have a quick flash of the page and then come back and describe how you would describe them (nothing long or anything, concise is nice!).

Hopefully we will get some interesting results.

Thanks for your participation!

-m0r

Originally posted by m0r1arty
1)How would you describe Jean Reno?

2)How would you describe Dave Allen?

3)How would you describe Sacha Baron Cohen?

4)How about Salif Keita?

5)Ben Kingsley?

6)Kalpen Modi?

7)Russell Crowe

1. White
2. White
3. White
4. Black
5. White
6. Indian
7. White

That's how I would do it.

reply to post by m0r1arty


I agree 100 percent OP. The history of the U.S is still fresh since the civil rights movement. Many Americans have their way of describing people of appearance and people outside this country it's different. And as the way you wanted me to describe the people you picked to see what race I think they're of is by far characterizing it in a different picture.

Hehehe...

A Maori as an Oriental or Asian??



...daaaaamn...

...still...some say we Maori all look the same...

Originally posted by minute2midnight
4. Black

Hey minute2midnight, thanks for answering!

If you just had a placing glance at number 4 you would describe him as black?

You're better at this than I am then. I'd have called him an old balding white guy. Good to see the difference of perception that we each have.

Originally posted by Romantic_Rebel
And as the way you wanted me to describe the people you picked to see what race I think they're of is by far characterizing it in a different picture.

The US is still young however these days it's made up from people from all over - there is no American genotype (bar those unlucky Native Americans) yet Caucasian, Asian, Afro-American and Hispanic is used to categorise most people there. If you look at different parts of, let's say Caucasian America, you'll see some people are proud to be descended from Irish blood, others Scottish, French, English etc.

Originally posted by alien
Hehehe...

A Maori as an Oriental or Asian??

I hear ya Alien, that's exactly what I'm trying to push for - it's funny isn't it? Mongoloid is what the native people of New Zealand as classified as when it comes to broad racial classification so you can see why I'm trying to see how people distinguish various peoples.

I'm smart enough to know if I see a fern or a fishhook tattoo on a man with a darker complexion than me I'm keep my manners and ask him what he thinks of cricket

-m0r

1. Human
2. Human
3. Human
4. Human
5. Human
6. Human
7. Human

That is how i generally classify people by their respective race. I wonder how many people actually understand how big a wall it is to hurdle when talking about equal rights when they still insist on labeling us differently, from our birth certificate to our death certificate and everything in between. I wish a huge extraterrestrial craft would land right smack dab on the white house lawn so we could actually start realizing that we indeed are part of the same race.

reply to post by m0r1arty

how do we describe someone correctly?

By describing them. Political correctness be damned.

Were I an Aboriginal Australian or from Jamaica I would want my cultural identity to be defined by who I am and not as Afro-American.

...yes, I'm reminded of a conversation I had with a black girl who insisted that it was racist and inaccurate of me to call a guy from Peru "black." Because his race was "african american."

Me: "But Peru is in south america. He's neither african, nor is he american. He's black."

Her: "OMG yer so racist!!!"

1)How would you describe Jean Reno?

White and scruffy.

2)How would you describe Dave Allen?

White. Looks british.

3)How would you describe Sacha Baron Cohen?

White.

4)How about Salif Keita?

Black, but with unusually light features. That might be the lighting, or he might be mixed race. The picture looks like it has a lot of glare.

5)Ben Kingsley?

White.

6)Kalpen Modi?

Kind of looks like an indian/white mix, or possibly greek. He has that "golden" skin tone that a lot of people envy. Probably a mix.

7)Russell Crowe

White.

Mongoloid

The choice word in my part of the world seems to be "asian." which doesn't make much sense to me. When I hear "asian" I tend to think...you know, asia. And there are a lot of people in asia who aren't even remotely mongoloid. But even "monogloid" itself implies...mongolian. Which is also not necesarily correct. "Oriental" seems the most descriptive choice to me, but apparently orient/occident went out of common usage about a decade ago. And yes, I did have a conversation with a girl once who claimed that being called oriental was offensive because it made her feel like a rug. Calling a chinese asian makes sense to me. But calling a russian asian also makes sense to me.

"Oriental" might be chinese, japanese, thai...you don't know. But you know it's one of a particular set. "White" might be english, irish, finnish, again...you don't know, but you know it's one of a particular set. If you ask me where I live and I say "in the US" that's vague, but it's correct. Calling a peruvian "african american" is incorrect.

I don't mind vague. But incorrect bothers me.


[edit on 28-2-2010 by LordBucket]

Cheers LordBucket for your detailed answer.

It would seem that the incorrectness is what bothers me too. Whilst ventian has a good point about everyone being human, we need to categorise in order to make sense of things.

Were a court of law to ask you how someone looked and you answered human you'd be held in contempt as it is a basic tenant of society that you are able to describe someone as accurately as you can.

Hope to hear more answers from anyone at all.

Cheers.

-m0r

1. balding french guy with big nose
2. Funny as hell
3. An embarrassment
4. Angry
5. bald, jewish....*I saw shcindlers list, Shrugs* Good in lucky number sleven aswell
6. Indian / Apu
7. dickhead

I found it interesting that I described so many as the generic "white" and others based on their (supposed) nation of origin. It's an interesting study.

1)How would you describe Jean Reno? White, European
2)How would you describe Dave Allen? White
3)How would you describe Sacha Baron Cohen? White, European
4)How about Salif Keita? African (because of name and dress)
5)Ben Kingsley? East Indian
6)Kalpen Modi? East Indian
7)Russell Crowe White (I know he's from Australia or thereabouts, though)

Not all Australians are white mate!

reply to post by wayaboveitall


Oh, I know that. But that's how I would describe Russel Crowe. I'd probably say, "He's white. I think he's from Australia." That doesn't mean I think that everyone from Australia is white.

Hey, I've seen Crocodile Dundee! I amused myself.

Cheers for your replies wayaboveitall and Benevolent Heretic!

It's interesting seeing how we each take people. Benevolent Heretic, for example, read into a name and assumed African - perhaps I should do a blind test and see what comes out...That's not a bad idea actually. Cheers for that!

Originally posted by wayaboveitall
Not all Australians are white mate!

Absolutely true wayaboveitall, however I carefully titled the thread to 'Describing someone in America'. Were an Aboriginal Australian seen in America they would most likely be described as Afro-American purely on their looks. Wereas Russell Crowe would be considered Caucasian.

I think what I'm trying to say is that there is as much variety to the individual cultural identities that Caucasians have as there are with people with darker skin. Something that is overlooked most of the time.

Again thanks for your replies guys!

-m0r

Absolutely true wayaboveitall, however I carefully titled the thread to 'Describing someone in America'. Were an Aboriginal Australian seen in America they would most likely be described as Afro-American purely on their looks.

Yes no doubt, though Aboriginals and black Americans look distinctly different, but folk tend to 'pidgeon hole' each other.
What I find odd is that though we too are a multi cultural nation, we dont describe people the same way.
To each other, its more likely something like 'he/she looks like....X..on 'x' movie/tv show, or 'has really big hair', wears corderoy trousers...
We generally dont physically describe folk by cultural/ethnic appearance so much, unless we are giving police a description for example.
We just arn't as..'hung up' about where folk are from or what color they are, they are simply "Aussys'.
We do have a racist element, as anywhere else unfortunately, but they are a minority.
we tend to disciminate or pigeonhole folk based more on what kind of people they 'appear' to be.
For example, here in Sydney, we 'take the piss' (rib, deride) people from the more southern state of victoria, I dont know why, but they are considered 'high brow snobs'. Likewise from area to area locally, people from poorer areas like the western suburbs are described as 'westies'. They dress a certain way, tend to drive the same kind of cars etc etc.

America seems to tend more toward Afro-american, asian, caucasion, latino and so on. Just an observation, personally I would hate to be so culturally mired in ethnic origins.

Originally posted by m0r1arty
Were an Aboriginal Australian seen in America they would most likely be described as Afro-American purely on their looks.

Not by me. I don't use the term African-American simply because it has (incorrectly) become synonymous with black. And not all black people are African-American or even African. I use the term "black". I said African because I think that guy is from African. Don't know if that's correct, but that's how I would have described him.

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
Not by me.

I don't use the term African-American simply because it has (incorrectly) become synonymous with black. And not all black people are African-American or even African. I use the term "black".

I said African because I think that guy is from African. Don't know if that's correct, but that's how I would have described him.

One of the high school kids that worked for me was applying for college aid. He asked me what he should put down for his race. I said African-American. He said, "I'm not black". I said you are from Egypt, which is located in Africa. You now reside in the United States, which, in my opinion, makes you African-American. It was interesting because he reported to me that he got a better aid package then his twin brother who listed his race as something else.

The American racial classification system depends on the context. People will be classified differently depending on the contexts

Cops use race in suspect descriptions. Cops will use the major ethnic groups present in the area as the available classes. They will classify the suspect based on which class they fit into best. For example, in Los Angeles, the major ethnic groups are Hispanic (Latin American), Black, White, and Asian. An Australian Aboriginee who commits a crime would likely get classifed as "Black" because there are not many Australian Aboriginees in Los Angeles. A blonde hair, blue eyed person from Latin America would be classified as White, even though that person would be a Latino.

Race is also used in compiling demographic information. Again, demographers will use the major ethnic groups as the available choices and have an "other" category for everyone else. If we use Los Angeles as an example, a demographer would classify people as Black, White, Asian, Hispanic, or "other." The fair complexioned Hispanic would be Hispanic. The Australian Aboriginal would be "other."

I think there is a very big difference between skin color, ethnic origin and country of origin... I.E. :

An African black male born in Japan but raised in Canada... What do you call him?

Race is a geopolitical designation that was created by mankind to discriminate and alienate people...

Also, religion is often mistakenly used as a race...

I.E. :

The Islamic race, the Jewish race, the Christian race...


Once again these are all ways to divide the HUMAN RACE that we are all a part of... When I bleed, it's red, and it's the same for the 6 billion other people on this planet...

Magnum

Russel Crowe is a kiwi - he was born in NZ.

Another case of those stinky Aussies stealing our famous people...

...thieves the lot of them...literally...thats what Aussie was founded upon and by...convicts...

...but then what do you expect from a country that committed such dastardly unforgiveable actions as bowling underarm...

Trevor Chappell is the DEVIL!

Feb 1st 1981...a day of infamy!

Originally posted by alien
Russel Crowe is a kiwi - he was born in NZ.

Another case of those stinky Aussies stealing our famous people...

Sorry! I did say it was Australia or thereabouts... I'm a silly American. What can I say? But I will forever remember that he is a Kiwi, I promise!