SomaliNet Forums

I always tick the African American/Black box but the other day It only had the African American part.
Are we african americans or is that term only reserved for those that arrived during the slavery days?

Aren't Somalis in America "African-Americans" in the most literal sense iskaba daa ee wax kale

Yes it does refer to mostly the descendants of slaves but you're still black & African and in terms of categories available its likely the one which most applies to you so errr......Of course you are supposed to tick African-American

The term may also be used to include only those individuals who are descended from African slaves However, immigrants from African, Caribbean, Central American, and South American nations and their descendants may or may not self-identify with the term.[8]

Sxb you can't be African American if your ancestors never came on a boat. Even my burundian classmates don't call themselves AA but Burundian american or something like that.

Is a donkey a horse?

No

Somalis are from Africa so it's literally self explanatory. The problem is calling Caribbeans African American. that is just stupid

Literally speaking, we are. We are Africans and those of us who have become citizens are Americans.

But practically speaking we are not. African American is a term reserved for the descendants of those who came from West Africa as slaves centuries ago.

I think African American is politically correct term for black people (including Somalis).

"African American" when checking race on a form denotes any person with origins in Africa.

There is no distinction between South Asian, Southeast Asian and Asia proper, it's all "Asian." Why, when it is that narrow of a scope, should there be a difference between the descendants of slaves in America, the descendants of slaves in the Caribbean and recent African immigrants?

ciddhartha wrote:"African American" when checking race on a form denotes any person with origins in Africa.

There is no distinction between South Asian, Southeast Asian and Asia proper, it's all "Asian." Why, when it is that narrow of a scope, should there be a difference between the descendants of slaves in America, the descendants of slaves in the Caribbean and recent African immigrants?

I agree,

I joined a collaborative resource group for african American/black and when I got to my first volunteer event, they were all females and gave me "you don't even look black" look. I told them I was more african then all of them put together

Obama is an african american

I think one way to clear up this apparent identity confusion is to bring back the 'Negro' box in the old US census forms.

For years the US Census has used the term Negro to denote all men of color regardless from whence their ancestors hailed. The term seemed to work just fine up until few years ago when, out of the blue, some crazy-libs big shots deemed it very demeaning to the Race and pressured the agency to scrap the Negro term and replace it with the more 'politically correct' one of Black/African American.