Table Of ContentEthnic Options
Ethnic Options
Choosing Identities
in America
Mary C. Waters.
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS
Berkeley • Los Angeles • Oxford
University of California Press
Berkeley and Los Angeles, California
University of California Press, Ltd.
Oxford, England
© 1990 by
The Regents of the University of California
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Waters, Mary C.
Ethnic options: choosing identities in America / Mary C. Waters,
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 0-520-06856-4 (alk. paper).-ISBN 0-520-07083-6 (pbk.
alk. paper)
1. Ethnicity—United States. 2. United States—Population.
1. Title.
E184.A1W29 1990
305.8*00973—dc20 89-49150
CIP
Printed in the United States of America
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements
of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence
of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984 ©"*
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For my mother and father
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Contents
List of Tables ix
Preface xi
Acknowledgments xv
1. Introduction 1
2. Flux and Choice in American Ethnicity 16
3. Influences on Ancestry Choice 52
4. Class, Neighborhood, and Ethnicity 90
5. Cultural Practices 115
6. Social Psychological and Character Traits 129
7. The Costs of a Costless Community 147
Appendix A: The 1980 Census Ancestry
Question 169
Appendix B: Interview Questions 171
Appendix C: Respondents 177
Bibliography 181
Index 191
vii
Tables
1. Percentage of “Correctly” Labeled Children in Families
Where Each Parent Was of a Different Single Ancestry 28
2. Percentage of Children Labeled American, by Ancestry
of Parents 29
3. Percentage of Children Labeled “No Response,” by
Ancestry of Parents 31
4. Parents, by Children’s Stated Ancestry 32
5. Simplification of Children’s Ancestries 33
6. Percentage of Children Whose Ancestry Was Simplified
to Paternal Ancestry 34
7. Ancestry Choices for Children, Controlling for Parental
Influence 35
8. Consistency of Ethnic Response 38
9. Ethnic Origin as Reported in March 1971 and March
1972 40
JO. Domicile of Third-Generation Non-Blacks, by Age 42
11. Ancestry Response of Third-Generation and Later
Non-Blacks, by Age and Domicile 42
12. Reporting of Ancestry, by Age 43
ix
Preface
This book, like many before it, is the result of a puzzle that surfaced
when its author was working on an earlier project. One day in 1984
Stanley Lieberson and I were conducting a detailed review of tables of
numbers the computer had spewed forth after going through five
magnetic tapes containing a sample of the 1980 census. The figures we
were looking at contained data from the ancestry question on the 1980
census form and compared people who had reported various ancestries
and combinations of ancestries in terms of a variety of socioeconomic
indicators. Thus, for example, we were comparing the incomes of
people who said they were of Italian descent with those who said they
were of Polish descent, or with those who said they were Italian-Polish
or German-Irish-English. In interpreting the data and comparing the
numbers, Stan and I kept getting involved in questions the numbers
could not answer to our satisfaction. Questions like, what does
it mean to be both Italian and Polish? If you have both of those
ancestries, do you feel closer to one or the other? Did the people who
said simply that they were of German descent really have no other
ancestries in their backgrounds? What about people who said they
were American? Did they know where their ancestors were from and
just not want to say? How would families with varied ethnic back
grounds and lots of ancestries choose among them to answer the
question? What did a question about ancestry mean to people? If
xii Preface
people did identify a specific ancestry, did it make any difference in
their lives? Did the aggregate numbers we were comparing describe
groups, statistical categories, or merely individual whims?
One thing that became clear from the data was that there was an
awful lot of flux going on among these later-generation Americans—
intermarriage was high, parents were not giving the same ancestry for
their children as for themselves, and reinterview studies indicated that
some people were changing their minds about their ancestry from
survey to survey. I believe that most things sociologists ask about in
censuses and surveys are complicated, and that good survey re
searchers should think about what is going on behind the scenes, but
this issue seemed to me to be even more complex and interesting than
most. How did people come up with an answer to a question on
ethnicity, and did their answers have much meaning at all?
Discussing these issues, Stan and I ended up in effect interviewing
each other about what we would say to the census. Stan is Jewish,
which presents problems right away, because the census does not
accept religion as an answer to the ancestry question. His wife is part
English and Scottish. Stan began telling me what he knew about where
his parents were from and began wondering what he would answer for
his children, since they had a mix of ancestries; what they would
answer if they were to fill out the form; and what his wife would
answer if she were asked. I, too, began to talk about how I would
answer the question—my four grandparents were all immigrants from
Ireland, and the census question accepted Irish as a response, so in a
way I didn’t appear to have many choices. But as Stan and I talked, it
became clear that even my apparently straightforward Irish ethnic
identity had some twists to it. First of all, I had always been annoyed
at people who made a big deal about being Irish—especially on Saint
Patrick’s Day and I began to wonder whether filling out the form on a
census day just a few weeks after Saint Patrick’s Day might have made
me think of just saying American. Sometimes I am tempted to just say
American when people ask, especially when I think I might be lumped
together with people I don’t necessarily consider to be authentically
Irish. When Stan pointed out to me that Irish on the census form
would include both Irish Catholics and a good proportion of Irish
Protestants, I really began to wonder what I would have said, since I
had always considered these to be very separate groups.
The more Stan and I worked with the data and analyses, which
would become our monograph(From Many Strands: Ethnic and Racial
- ■ • - .
..r. —
Groups in Contemporary America, the more we wondered about the
process that went on before the question on ancestry was answered,
and in general about the role of ethnicity among later-generation
whites in America. We reached the conclusion that someone ought to
talk to some “regular people” in depth about this. So, with Stan’s
encouragement, I abandoned my previous dissertation topic, bought a
tape recorder, learned about interviewing, and set out in search of
some regular people.
This is the story of what I learned about the process of answering
the census question on ancestry, about ethnicity in general, and
ultimately about American culture and ideology, from talking to some
very nice regular people in suburbs of San Jose and Philadelphia. I
learned that Stan and 1 were not alone in having long and sometimes
surprising stories behind our answers to questions about our ethnic
backgrounds—stories that reveal the fascinating history of American
immigration and ethnic assimilation, but that also reveal aspects of
our own shared American culture and ideology—our shared values of
individualism and community and the unique ways in which ethnic
identities fulfill very American needs. I also learned that ethnicity is \
still a complex and changing subject, which still has real political and j
social consequences in shaping American thinking about race rela- I
tions. Finally, I learned that combining quantitative and qualitative ^
research techniques is an endeavor that, while difficult and time-con
suming, is rewarding and productive. The interviews allowed me to
pursue some interesting questions generated by looking at aggregate
census data, and the patterns available in census and survey data
suggested questions and areas to ask people about in the the inter
views. Some sociologists have described quantitative and qualitative
approaches as being somehow inherently antagonistic, but I have
found them to be very complementary. The census gives us a picture
of the relative size and characteristics of ethnic ancestries in the
country as a whole, and the interviews give us some suggestions about
the processes behind the identities and about the meanings people
attach to them. Together these investigations suggest that ethnicity in
America is an endlessly fascinating and constantly changing phe
nomenon.
Acknowledgments
There are people who love to spend their days by themselves writing
books, but 1 am not one of them. I find that it is a lonely and
sometimes frightening thing to do. As a result I never would have
been able to do it without the emotional and intellectual support of
family, friends, teachers, and students. This book exists because I
have been blessed with a large and wonderful supply of all of them.
Stanley Lieberson encouraged and guided this project from its very
beginning. It was in conversation with him that the idea was born,
and from that moment on he provided wise counsel, cheerful encour
agement, useful and supportive criticism, and unfailing humor and
accessibility. Christine Williams read every word of every draft of this
book with interest, enthusiasm, and keen sociological insight. She had
just the right blend of discouragement for my long and wordy digres
sions, and encouragement for my often hidden ideas. Her red pen was
a terrific help throughout the process, but especially with the final
manuscript. Since these acknowledgments are the only part of the
book that escaped her watchful and ruthless eye, the reader can judge
from their length how unwieldy the book would have been without
her. Judy Auerbach also endured countless early drafts and provided
much advice, criticism, and enthusiasm and good spirits along the
way.
I am very grateful to the many others who also took the time to
xv
