No box to checkEgyptian, Iranian, Lebanese, Amazigh, Arab, American. These are just a handful of ways that thousands of people who responded to a New York Times callout described themselves. The answers were as diverse as the group of individuals behind them. People with roots in the Middle East and North Africa, often abbreviated as MENA, represent a multitude of cultures, religions and languages. And they all have different viewpoints about how they fit into the American mosaic. Accounting for MENA identity in the United States has become particularly relevant this year. The 2024 presidential election could hinge on a handful of swing states like Michigan, where Arab American voters turned out decisively for President Biden in 2020. But Mr. Biden has faced mounting frustration from Arab Americans and others within his party for his support for Israel in the war in Gaza. While people of MENA heritage are by no means monolithic, they do share one common experience in the United States. On official forms, most don't see themselves represented among the check boxes for race or ethnicity. With few good options, many end up being counted as "white." A decades-old federal guideline defines "white" as anyone with origins in Europe, North Africa or the Middle East. In the 2020 census, "Lebanese" and "Egyptian" were offered as examples for the "white" box on the race question. The other categories included "Black or African American," "American Indian or Alaska Native," "Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander," a variety of Asian ancestries and "some other race." While the Times survey and follow-up interviews — conducted from September 2022 through August 2023 — do not represent all Middle Eastern and North African voices, a vast majority of respondents agreed that the current race categories are at odds with how they identified. Community leaders have been advocating for Middle Eastern and North African to be included as an official category for years. The Biden administration last year proposed removing MENA from the "white" definition and adding a "Middle Eastern or North African" box as part of a larger overhaul to combine the question of race and ethnicity on federal forms. Take a look at a proposed example of a form. The MENA addition is highlighted.
The revisions, currently under review, would give official recognition to a large and growing portion of the U.S. population. They would also ripple through the nation's statistical universe and have numerous practical implications for the MENA population, especially around health care, education and political representation. "We spent 30-plus years trying to get to the point where the census would address the massive undercount of our community," said Maya Berry, executive director of the Arab American Institute.
Some experts worry, however, that the addition of more check boxes, along with a write-in option, might confuse respondents and make the census form too complex to generate accurate data. After all, there's no agreed-upon set of countries or ethnicities that would fall under a Middle Eastern and North African category. "This would be the first time since the 1970s that a completely new race or ethnicity category has been added, and that's a very significant change," said Margo J. Anderson, a professor emerita at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and the author of "The American Census: A Social History." "You're asking people to answer in a much more complicated way, and MENA is just one piece of a much bigger need for testing all of these changes between now and the 2030 census." Read the rest of the story here.
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Friday, March 8, 2024
Race/Related: When the census doesn’t reflect you
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