Antedating of "Hispanic"

[Michael Newman]

There's a book by my colleague Angela Reyes (of part Filipino origin) called "The other Asian" that refers to Southeast Asians.

It is interesting that there is no real satisfactory name for any racialized group. "Oriental" became associated with bigotry, but there is nothing really about the semantics of the term to suggest that it encoded any less respect than "Asian," which replaced it in the US. In a way, the term Asian (and it is usually "Asian" not "East Asian," is more problematic. It can include or not South Asians, and it clearly doesn't include West Asians or Russian Asians.  Yet people become sensitive to the connotations of these terms. I'm no exception. I'm fine with European American or White, but every time I hear "Anglo" to refer to people like me my skin crawls.

The similar semantic scope problems can be said for Latino, which may or may not include Brazilians. Hispanic at least can have a tenuous connection to linguistic heritage of larger societies, although not only do plenty of so-called Hispanics not speak Spanish but some have ancestors who never did.

There are semantic scope problems with African American too.





Michael Newman
Associate Professor of Linguistics
Queens College/CUNY
michael.newman at qc.cuny.edu



On Mar 27, 2011, at 7:59 PM, victor steinbok wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       victor steinbok <aardvark66 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: Antedating of "Hispanic"
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Are Cambodian and Hmong immigrants "Asian-Americans"? By all standards
> they should be, but they are often completely excluded from
> Asian-American stereotypes. Even the history of Vietnamese and Thai
> immigrants is usually ignored in favor of East Asians. On the other
> hand, in bigoted eyes, they are all "Oriental". Are the bigots more
> progressive than well-meaning but ignorant multiculturalists from the
> Departments of the Interior, Education and Labor?
>
> VS-)
>
> On Sun, Mar 27, 2011 at 7:48 PM, Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at yale.edu> wrote:
>>
>> Aren't Dominican-Americans or Colombian-Americans or Panamanian-Americans as Hispanic as Cuban-Americans or Mexican-Americans or people of Puerto Rican origin?
>>
>> Fred Shapiro
>
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