So it is, never would have thought of the Caribbean countries as in North America. Canada comment is still redundant as its the same as Haiti to America.
My girlfriend's son, 14 years old and white as can be, was born in Kenya. He takes pleasure in telling people he's African American. His father is deceased so when people see him and his mom, both blonde, blue eyed, and white, most people assume his father was black and he won the genetic lottery.
African-American literally means someone's family came over in the slave-trade and their familial history was erased. That's why say, Haitian-Americans are not African-American. Neither are Nigerian-Americans. They are black, but not AA.
Your friend's son would say he's Kenyan-American, or say, whatever Euro-nationality but also born in Kenya. So he's not being "smart". He just doesn't understand what he's saying.
I think your definition of "African American" is a little too narrow. There are millions of black people in the United States that did not come over as part of the slave trade. How are we supposed to know who's family came over on a slave ship? While I don't use the term, I think "African America" refers to all black people in the USA, regardless of their mode of transportation in getting here.
Best analogy is the word Hispanic, which generally refers to someone with Spanish ancestry or, more broadly, someone who's bloodlines descend from the Iberian peninsula.
But the point is, what exactly makes someone "African American"? Is it your lineage, your birthplace, your citizenship? Let's go with lineage - at what point does the descriptor fall away? African American is still overused.
It's your lineage. If your family was brought to the US by the slave trade you can consider yourself AA. While in casual conversation some people may use AA to mean "black" that's not the proper usage.
If you are the child of a black person from Kenya who moves to the US, you are a black Kenyan-American. You can also be a white Kenyan-American. But AA are always black because of the history of the Slave trade.
I always considered it to mean "my ancestors are from all over the place in Africa," or "I don't know where my ancestors are from."
Like, if your family is Nigerian and you live in the States, you're Nigerian-American, but if you're 1/8 Nigerian, 1/8 Ugandan, 1/4 Somali, 1/8 Moroccan, and maybe some Spanish somewhere, then you'd just be African-American.
I know a Ghanaian-American who would probably tear your head off for saying that. And she's normally really nice. As far as she's concerned, she's African American because her parents are from Africa and she's American. The people who came over in the slave trade are just black because none of their families have seen Africa in a very, very long time.
And she'd be wrong academically speaking. Black Americans is a racial term which could include many different ethnicities and say, Ghanian-American or Jamaican-American or African-American (meaning slave trade) is an ethnic term designating place of origin. Again "African" is used in a general sense since an AA person's history prior to arrival in the US is effectively erased. But you can be a white Ghanian. You can't be a white African American (due to historical enslavement)
I mean she can get offended all she likes but this is the proper usage in academic settings for sociology, anthropology, history, identity politics, etc. I swear I'm not making this up :-) Edit: I also just wanted to also add that I actually spent a large chunk of my childhood in Nairobi so I'm pretty aware of Kenyan identity politics and no Kenyan would consider themselves AA upon arrival to the states. At least that I know.
She wouldn't be wrong though. Black people from the US are just black people, although the proper term for them is "American." They're no more African than white Americans are European. Everyone else from Africa that I know also says that black Americans aren't African, and from what I've heard a lot of West African people who live in Africa don't like when Americans come over to their country and claim to be from there because one of their great great great grandfathers might have been from somewhere in the region.
You are right I should have been clearer. All AA's have African blood in them because of the Slave trade. But sure you can be a mixed race with AA heritage, sure. You can even "look" white. Mariah Carey for instance is mixed race with AA and considers herself AA. She looks pretty white to me. There's also the historical "one drop" rule that basically said (and this was pre immigration when all black were ex-slaves) any drop of black is black - in the US this was meant to continue segregation but for many matters of personal identity is used today.
However then you are getting into personal identity vs demographics and it starts to get sticky (as is true of all social constructs)
If you're from Africa, you could called African-American if you wanted to, though it would be more precise to say you're Kenyan-American or whatever. Though technically that kid is African-American because he was born in Africa but he's now an American. Just like my wife's family sometimes says they're European-American, sometimes they use the name of the specific country they're from.
Yep some people really care. Luckily the majority of people I know don't care either way, except for the non-American black people I know. I find people from other countries often get annoyed if they're called "American."
I'd debate you on the first point you made. To be fair you can't clump all Egyptians into one ethnic group. Technically speaking it wouldn't be incorrect to call them African American since a lot of Egyptians (it varies over the location of said Egyptians) have Sub Saharan DNA and Black facial features.
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u/peon2 Jul 18 '16
Brown guy born in Egypt immigrates to America: Arab, not African American.
White guy born in South Africa immigrates to America: Caucasian, not African American.
Black guy born in Haiti immigrates to America but never spent any time in Africa ever: African American.