"African-American" vs. "black" at the Olympics

[Alice Faber]

I've read interviews with black hockey players, born in Canada of
Barbadian ancestry, expressing mild confusion at being labeled
"African-American" (especially in the press) when they play for US teams.

David Bergdahl wrote:
> Last fall some of my students referred to the blacks in Conrad's "Heart of
> Darkenss" as African-Americans--I think they assumed that Af-Am is the
> polite form of "black" and the nationality issue never occured to
> them--these same students constantly referred to "British imperialism"
> despite the fact that the novella is set in the Congo--ruled by Belgium at
> the time.  I think something similar is going on with the sports-writer.
>
> On 3/7/06, Benjamin Zimmer <bgzimmer at babel.ling.upenn.edu> wrote:
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> -----------------------
>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       Benjamin Zimmer <bgzimmer at BABEL.LING.UPENN.EDU>
>> Subject:      "African-American" vs. "black" at the Olympics
>>
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> From King Kaufman's sports column on Salon:
>>
>> -----
>>
>> http://www.salon.com/sports/col/kaufman/2006/03/07/tuesday/index1.html#olympics
>>
>> Two weeks ago I wrote about NBC giving American speed skater Shani
>> Davis short shrift by calling him "the first African-American" to win
>> an individual gold medal at the Winter Olympics when he was in fact
>> the first black person of any nationality to do so.
>>
>>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org


--
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Alice Faber                                    faber at haskins.yale.edu
Haskins Laboratories                           tel: (203) 865-6163 x258
New Haven, CT 06511 USA                        fax (203) 865-8963

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