the flash point
represents a much larger theme: the often contentious way the Census both
reflects and forges our evolving understanding of race.
2000 Census, more than 56,000 people wrote in Negro to describe their identity — even though it was
already on the form
Consider that in a 2006 study of 138 censuses from around the
world, New York University sociologist Ann Morning found that only 15% of
those asking about ancestry or national origin used the term race. Almost
all of those that did were former slave economies.
This represents a significant risk of "racialization"
The first Census, in 1790,
explicitly asked about only one race: white.
The antidiscrimination laws written in the 1960s and the
affirmative-action policies that followed relied on Census data to determine
if minorities were underrepresented in any number of realms, from home sales
to small-business loans.
One of the possible changes the
Census is testing during the 2010 count is allowing respondents to check
more than one box not just for race but for Hispanic origin as well.
Another change under review is letting people who check "white" or "black" to
write in more specific information afterward.
For the time being, write-in responses still often need to be shoehorned
into broader categories for the purpose of following certain laws based on
official statistics.
Census categories reflect
perceptions. But they also forge them.