Demographics of Appearance: What do the stats say?

As I walk around my neighborhood and wave to my neighbors who sit on their porches or work on their lawns or when the whole neighborhood gets together for our annual parties, I note that my family is the only family of the whole block that is Hispanic.

On a side note, however, I have never really understood the difference between race and ethnicity. As I write this now, I looked up the definitions from the Encarta Dictionary of both terms:

Race-“one of the groups into which the world's population can be divided on the basis of

physical characteristics such as skin or hair color.”

                Ethnicity-“relating to a person or to a large group of people who share a national, racial,

linguistic, or religious heritage, whether or not they reside in their countries of

origin."

When I take surveys, they always ask about race and ethnicity. You’d think it would be easy, but I always stumble when I come across the race and ethnicity questions. So, ethnicity is usually always the easiest. I am Hispanic. My whole family is Hispanic. Yay Latinos. Then I get to race. I am not white or African-American or Asian or a Pacific Islander (well, at least I don’t think I am when I look in the mirror). So does that mean I am an “other”? But sometimes there is not an “other” option. Well, if we are going by physical characteristics (i.e. skin color) and there are options of white, black, yellow why can’t there be a brown option? I think that would make my life easier when taking surveys. Okay, now back to focus.  

                So when I pass by my neighborhood which is in the suburbs of Damonte Ranch, the demographics show that approximately 95% of my neighbors are Caucasian/white, 4% are Asian/Pacific Islander, and then 1% is other (which includes African-American/black and brown people). This is my statistical analysis of my neighborhood, by the way, so my stats are probably off by a margin of error that I cannot calculate at the moment. Gender in the neighborhood, on the other hand, is pretty equally distributed. At the University of Nevada, Reno it is almost the same thing. There are greater percentages of people who are Caucasian and Asian versus people who are African-American or Hispanic, and then there is a pretty equal ratio of females to males. I saw more minorities when I passed by recruiting fraternities and sororities and when I went and checked out some sports; I see more Caucasians and Asians in my classes and Honors classes. Then the question that I ask myself is why it is so. Why are there so many “white” and “yellow” people and so few “black” and “brown” people? (Does it even matter that there is a difference?) Is it because of the area? Or cost? Or culture? I could propose reasons, more like guesses, for why I think this may be so, but I really do not know the reason why. I think I would further like to research as to find some reasons why.

There are stereotypes in this world by the way people look; unfortunately, I don’t think we as a species could overlook the way someone appears. We are different, but that is not a bad thing either. Anyways, stereotypes can be positive or negative. I found a picture online of the globe being divided up by stereotypes.

 

 

 

                I thought it was interesting how the globe was divided and then how those sections were labeled. I don’t really feel comfortable analyzing why the stereotypes are the way they are; race/ethnicity is always a touchy subject, so I don’t think I will but I might if I plan to make this topic my research paper for the class.

                Overall, demographics of looks reveal that there is a difference. A BIG difference. Now the question becomes: Why?