African-American vs. Black

Kanzler

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    When is the appropriate context for either of those terms to be used? To what extent are they interchangeable? Does your personal identity affect how appropriate either of those terms are?

    I ask this question because I notice that in certain scenarios people say African-American yet in others people say Black, but I'm not too sure what those circumstances specifically are or even if there is truly a distinction in the circumstances when either term is used. In short: who uses which term more often when and why?
     
    I usually call them African American as a technical term but black as a regular term. My black friends aren't bothered by it either.
    To answer the question about when to use each context. African American (if they are African American and not a different nationality) should be used in anything professional as it shows more respect to their heritage rather than saying "black". But in anything else black should be fine. Calling them black or African American can in no way be racist either. It's not like calling them the n word which I still don't understand why they call eachother that...
     
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    Well apart from African American being less-than-casual, the two terms aren't always synonyms.

    Generally in situations where people are trying to be PC they say African American, but it's pretty rare that you hear the term used outside of Africans who also happen to be American. Black is rarely ever a trigger word, and generally when it is, whoever it is probably isn't black, themselves.

    Now, as a black male, I'd rather not be called an African American unless someone is talking about my heritage or me as a specific demographic, because black is an aesthetic descriptor (or it should be, at least), African American says basically nothing. I have no ties to Africa, so it says so little about me that there's really little reason not to just call me black.
     
    The way I see it, African-American is a description of your ethnicity, whereas black is just a physical/aesthetic descriptor for the most part (e.g. you'd call a Jamaican person black, but African-American wouldn't be accurate). Generally speaking, I don't tend to have much of a preference for which of the terms people call me, although it does bug me a bit when people capitalize "Black" or "White", just from a language/grammar perspective--they're colors so capitalizing them doesn't make sense. But all-in-all the terms mean two different things, but within the context of race in the U.S. they tend to overlap more often than not.
     
    Honestly, I think people make too big a deal out of simple physical descriptions. You're African-American, cool. You're still black.

    You're Mexican-American. You're still Hispanic.

    You're a Romanian-American. You're still white.

    Some people just make mountains out of molehills although I have noticed this seems to be a bigger issue in the US than it is here.
     
    gimmepie said:
    Honestly, I think people make too big a deal out of simple physical descriptions. You're African-American, cool. You're still black.

    You're Mexican-American. You're still Hispanic.

    You're a Romanian-American. You're still white.

    Some people just make mountains out of molehills although I have noticed this seems to be a bigger issue in the US than it is here.
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    You don't notice that in certain cases people say African-American and in other cases people say Black? Do you ever wonder if there's a rhyme or reason to this? That's what this thread is about and I believe it's more than a issue of mountains out of molehills. I think it's revealing about the way language is used.
     
    As an American, I think that there is a huge problem of being "Politically Correct", where whatever you say you shouldn't offend people. Having had visited other places in the world, its a very different experience.

    In America, I rarely use the term black when talking with people who may or may not be, its just one of those things that I grew up with being taught to say "African-American". Now that I think about it though, I rarely even use the term black. When it comes to race, I tend to treat people like people, not usually using racial terms. Really the only time that I use racial terms is when I really know the other person well, like my roommate from Panama for example.

    I have had the chance to travel though, and I feel that in some areas people are less worried about political correctness. Mexico is a pretty great example of this. My Spanish is a bit rough, but I could understand enough to know that not everything said around and about me was "politically correct". I also had the chance to go to Hong Kong once, and there the people were often less respectful, particularly about Americans.

    I guess I subconsciously avoid terms that could offend others, including both black and African-American. But I think that's a kind of dangerous way to live. Not because I am avoiding racial slurs, but by avoiding topics that are not "politically correct", some serious problems simply don't get solved. I'm not sure if the topic we are discussing is really that big of a deal when it comes down to it, but political correctness is.
     
    STARDU5T said:
    As an American, I think that there is a huge problem of being "Politically Correct", where whatever you say you shouldn't offend people. Having had visited other places in the world, its a very different experience.

    I guess I subconsciously avoid terms that could offend others, including both black and African-American. But I think that's a kind of dangerous way to live. Not because I am avoiding racial slurs, but by avoiding topics that are not "politically correct", some serious problems simply don't get solved. I'm not sure if the topic we are discussing is really that big of a deal when it comes down to it, but political correctness is.
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    Hmm...I'm a bit confused as to why political correctness and people being "offended" keeps coming up as a factor in the use of the terms. I was never even aware that one or the other was taken as "offensive" by anyone of the race in question--at least I'm not offended by either of them and I've never met anyone who is. As far as I know, they're just two different terms that mean two different things, but both are equally applicable in most cases.
     
    Sopheria said:
    Hmm...I'm a bit confused as to why political correctness and people being "offended" keeps coming up as a factor in the use of the terms. I was never even aware that one or the other was taken as "offensive" by anyone of the race in question--at least I'm not offended by either of them and I've never met anyone who is. As far as I know, they're just two different terms that mean two different things, but both are equally applicable in most cases.
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    It's just because African-American is the legal term that replaced negro/coloured, which occasionally causes people to think it's a form of political correctness and what not.
     
    Harley Quinn said:
    It's just because African-American is the legal term that replaced negro/coloured, which occasionally causes people to think it's a form of political correctness and what not.
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    Is it really? I thought it was in its own class of terms that includes Italian-American and Chinese-American and all the other Hyphenation-Americans. I wonder when those terms starting coming about.
     
    Hi there! Black person here. Just gonna throw my two sense into the ring :3

    If I were to give my two-sense on all of this, considering my ethnicity and how I was raised, I would just say that it really doesn't really matter. I think we live in a society that tries to be too politically correct in the efforts of not offending people. We end up using terms like "Black" and "African-American" to describe people of colored. And I do it all the time. There's literally nothing wrong about it.

    If I were to actually give an educational-based answer combined with my experiences with now... "African-American" and "Black" are two terms that are not synonymous. It's easy to give labels to make something simple in a conversation (and by no means am I going into the "labels are completely wrong" route). Looking at it now, there are many ways to describe a colored person. What one needs to take into account is the fact that colored people are just about as ethnically deserve as a person of a fairer skin tone. I don't feel like listing all of them, but you can just about have an African-British. Tons of South Americans possess a darker skin color than what their region lets on about them. It's a fact.

    What you guys classify as "Black" is just a unification of all these politically correct terms into one, casual term. Who has time to think about each and every race out there in a casual, friendly conversation? I wouldn't go out of my way to find out if a "White" person is 10% German and 60% Irish. Do they get offended? Sometimes. Same with "Black" people. So if I see a person of color down the street and I was to describe them in simplest, casual terms that anyone can understand... "Black" is the word I go for.

    Is it always right? No. If you're called out, should you correct yourself? Yes.

    It's the difference between connotative and denotative terms. We all love to make such a hissy fit for descriptive, connotative words when they aren't bad at all to use. Unless you're writing a formal paper, speaking to someone with authority, or something that's more on the professional side, in which that case, use the PC correct term.

    If a random, caucasian stranger were to walk up to me and say, "Hey, you're black!"
    I'll say, "Hey, you're white!"

    I feel like we live in a society where we're looked down upon for not using the PC term. Maybe it's the thicker skin that I had to grow in.

    I honestly don't care. And yes, NO self-respecting, conscientious "Black" person will get mad at you for calling them "Black". Please... stop making it such a big deal. It's okay. You can say "Black". I don't get why you're all so scared. (Of course, I'm joking) We literally do not care. As long as you don't say the N-word out of context, then we're all peachy-keen! So don't be afraid of being so damn PC correct all the time. Just don't use it as a means to better yourself or subjugate others. :3

    But hey, that's my two-sense. I'm just not all that sensitive.
     
    Kanzler said:
    Is it really? I thought it was in its own class of terms that includes Italian-American and Chinese-American and all the other Hyphenation-Americans. I wonder when those terms starting coming about.
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    I'm not sure about the rest - I'd say it's safe to imagine that once African-American got popularised, the other terms naturally sprang up by virtue of association and wanting a contemporary way to be described as well. From what I can tell, African-American predates the rest, if only by a few years.

    But yeah, 'negro' was the definitive legal & social term for American black people for a LONG time, even past the civil rights era in some instances. Interchangeable with coloured but I think the latter was used with a more direct intent of being derogatory than negro was at the time. I wasn't quite sure about when African-American got widespread usage but apparently it was in the '70s and '80s that it really sprung up.

    https://www.jstor.org/stable/2962878?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
    https://www.msnbc.com/the-last-word/watch/the-origin-of-the-term--african-american--431844419894

    MSNBC says that Jesse Jackson popularised an apparently much older term than I would have imagined, so there we go, I guess.
     
    Black unless specified otherwise

    not everyone who is black is actually from Africa believe it or not
     
    Kanzler said:
    You don't notice that in certain cases people say African-American and in other cases people say Black? Do you ever wonder if there's a rhyme or reason to this? That's what this thread is about and I believe it's more than a issue of mountains out of molehills. I think it's revealing about the way language is used.
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    I can honestly say I have never seen nor heard of a difference in contexts.
     
    gimmepie said:
    I can honestly say I have never seen nor heard of a difference in contexts.
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    I feel that African-American is used more formally. I find that politicians tend all to use the term African-American, especially when speaking in a more formal style or occasion. I recall in first year political science, when I was talking about inequalities and blacks and used that term, the whole tutorial hushed. And I was like what's up with that? It's not okay to refer to black people as blacks? To give some context, yeah the tutorial was 70% white.

    Actually just found a good example of what I'm talking about - speaker uses both terms in the same sentence:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FeQi3w_0VkU&feature=youtu.be&t=6m35s

    From 6:35 to 6:58
     
    Kanzler said:
    I feel that African-American is used more formally. I find that politicians tend all to use the term African-American, especially when speaking in a more formal style or occasion. I recall in first year political science, when I was talking about inequalities and blacks and used that term, the whole tutorial hushed. And I was like what's up with that? It's not okay to refer to black people as blacks? To give some context, yeah the tutorial was 70% white.

    Actually just found a good example of what I'm talking about - speaker uses both terms in the same sentence:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FeQi3w_0VkU&feature=youtu.be&t=6m35s

    From 6:35 to 6:58
    Click to expand...

    I think maybe it's a culture difference?
    Here in Australia you're pretty much black, white or Asian. Occasionally we'll make a distinction between Aboriginal people and others of dark skin and Hispanics are rare. We don't really seem to do the formality side of it or the PC side of it or whatnot.
     
    I've heard people use the term "blacks" or "the blacks" as a plural to describe black people and that always felt and sounded derogatory and I'm pretty sure in some cases it was meant to be. So I think that I and other people who don't want to come off like the people we've heard try not to use "black" by itself. I know that I usually would say "black people" and structure how I word things so that I can use that phrase or something similar. "African-American" like most hyphenated-Americans always feels too fancy and unnecessary to me. But then I'm a white person in the western US and out here it seems like white people here don't seem to stick so closely to their hyphenated identities.
     
    I just call them black, solely for description purposes only. I don't use the term 'African American', because I don't care what your ethnicity is, or even your nationality. You're a human being, regardless of your origins. There's no need to single people out by basically saying, "Oh, you're a dude who came from Africa."
     
    Coming from a black family, I find the term to be somewhat useless, but I'm glad people are trying to be respectful, though it doesn't really matter IMO. Most people I know say the term to avoid offending anyone, which is the right mindset, but "black" isn't really derogatory where I'm from, but that may not go for other areas of the world.
     
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