[Ads-l] Possible Antedating of "Majority Minority"

[John Baker]

I now have access to the 1978 citation for “majority minority,” and it does seem to be the modern term; possibly this should be a bracketed use, but perhaps others can weigh in on that point. Here is the relevant citation, with additional text for context:


“Federal guidelines which exclude the Houston Independent School District from receiving magnet school funding should encourage HISD to seek suburban participation in its desegregation, an official with the U.S. Office of Education said Sunday. 

Thomas Fagan, chief of the special projects branch, said at a national conference on magnet schools here that HISD will not be eligible for federal magnet school money while its magnet schools are more than 50 percent minority. 

He said his office, in a controversial decision, declared it would not be proper to offer federal money to schools which his office classified as “minority isolated,” or more than 50 percent minority. 

“There is nothing to prevent Houston from drawing kids from the suburban districts,” Fagan said. “We see the 50 percent cutoff as an incentive to majority-minority districts to cooperate with primarily Anglo districts in joint magnet school programs.””


Jorjanna Price, “Suburbs seen as aiding magnet schools,” The Houston Post, Jan. 23, 1978, at 1 (Newspapers.com Publishers Extra), https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-houston-post-early-use-of-majority/204210267/ (shared clipping). 


John Baker


> On Aug 3, 2026, at 6:15 PM, John Baker <jb5911 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> 
> 
> I agree that the restriction to legislative districts is not significant and that the term properly should apply to another kind of geographic area in which the majority of residents are racial or ethnic minorities. That may well be what is going on with the 1978 citation.  But it is not what is going on with the 1970 and 1971 citations. Those instead address transfers of (White) majority or (African-American) minority students from one school to another in order to achieve racial integration.
> 
> 
> John Baker
> 
> 
>> On Aug 3, 2026, at 5:12 PM, Bill Mullins <amcombill at hotmail.com> wrote:
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>>> 
>>> This is not the intended meaning of majority-minority district, which as noted below is a legislative
>>> district drawn so that a majority of its voters belong to a racial or ethnic minority.
>> 
>> 
>> I don't see any reason to limit "majority-minority district" to legislative districts.   When it is applied to school
>> districts, as in the cites provided, it seems to carry the same meaning and comes from the same purpose - to create
>> an arbitrarily-drawn geographic area in which the majority of residents are racial or ethnic minorities.
>> 
>> 
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> 
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> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org