Racial Terms Getting Under Their Skin

Having questioned the use of black , white , Anglo , Latino and Asian by the press, I think I owe it to my readers to let them read more of the enlightened responses I have received.

I know these are dangerous waters for a journalist; but I am not satisfied with these racial names, and neither, I gather, are those to whom they are applied.

“I am not at all sure, I do not really believe,” writes A. S. Young, “that ‘Americans of African descent’ are now being called ‘black’ because that is what they/we wanted when the racial name black became popular some years ago.

“While it is true that the racial name change was promoted by a few vociferous and often-quoted Afro-Americans, I believe the current popularity of the racial name black can and should be attributed mostly to the white-owned mass media. . . .”

At the time black was catching on, Young says, he conducted a poll of 1,462 respondents in an Afro-American newspaper and found that 85% did not want to be called black. “Most of them wanted to be called Afro-American. Virtually all of them wanted ‘American’ in the racial name.” (Why not, as someone has suggested, Aframerican ?)

Young said the results of the poll were validated throughout the country by Afro-Americans of all ages, education and economic class. “The fact is that black is inappropriate for a multicolored race of people. There are no truly black people in the country, if anywhere.”

He notes: “Doug Williams, Debi Thomas and Jesse Jackson . . . are all full-fledged Americans. But, white media people just simply could not, or cannot, get beyond their skins. . . .”

Daniel Barkley of San Diego says his parents had five male children between 1950 and 1963, when America “underwent a tremendous Black cultural awareness.” Ironically, he notes, according to race classifications of the state of Illinois, they produced children of three different races: three Coloreds, one Negro and one Black. “Ironically, my youngest brother, the ‘Black’ one, has the lightest complexion of us all.”

He concludes: “If race classification can vary with time and locality, then what significant value does race classification have?”

In my earlier column I did not capitalize black , nor did I capitalize white , both according to Times style. I did receive two letters alleging that black was the only designation that I had failed to capitalize. (In fact I had spelled white eight times with a small w .)

In pointing out that one of those letters had come from Prof. D. K. Wilgus and Eleanor R. Long of the UCLA Folklore and Mythology Center, I was perhaps unfair in not quoting their argument on this point.

“We realize that when Blacks, as a people, are compared to all Caucasians as a people usually referred to as white , the whole thing gets a bit sticky. But those white people do all have proper names, too. As folklorists specializing in narrative song, we have chosen to ‘split the difference’ when discussing musical styles and capitalize White as well. It’s not a good solution, but until the petty denigration represented by black without a capital ceases to exist, why begrudge the majority its own capital letter?”

I am happy to capitalize both black and white , but I agree that it’s not a good solution.

As for Latino, Jan Jesse of Hacienda Heights points out that Latino , referring to the Latin derivation of the Latinos’ language--Spanish--is just as appropriate to the English, whose language is also derived in large part from Latin.

Jesse says Hispanic is the word used by her Spanish-speaking friends. “I never hear them refer to themselves as ‘Latinos.’ . . . As a description, Hispanic seems to me more authentic and proud. I also believe it is preferred by the Spanish-speaking community.”

“To me,” writes Guillermo Mir y Garza (Will Mir) of Woodland Hills, “ Hispanic is both beautiful and adequate in that it encompasses all Spanish-speaking countries in the Western Hemisphere.”

“You stop calling us Latinos and we’ll stop calling you Anglos,” says Alex Abella of La Crescenta. “It’s neither accurate nor fair to either group.”

“As regards culture, race, or ethnicity,” says Josephine Botello Garcia of Rosemead, “with tolerance and respect given and received, we are all ‘homo sapiens’ under the skin.”

Ah men.