Do you have to be black to be an "African American"?

Question

ex. if i'm a white guy that was born in africa, when I move to the USA am I now an "African American" or am I just a "white guy"?

Answer 1

you would be an african american wanna be, you must have the coloring to be african american, they are pretty people! If you mark on a application for a job, african american, and they call you for an interview, how do they think they will react, when a white person walks in? common sense

Answer 2

A lot of South Africa is white. If you were born there and moved to the US, you would absolutely be an african american! This is a fact!

Answer 3

You would be a white guy from (blank) country in Africa. You would be Moroccan, for example, if you were from Morocco. You know which country you came from and would refer to yourself as such.

The term African-American is used only for black born in the USA who have ******* ancestry. If you were not born in the USA, you would not be called an African-American. Also, if you were born in the USA and have African roots that are Caucasian or Mediterranean, you would not be an African-American.

Answer 4

Interesting question and I have a really good example of an answer to that. A former colleague at work was born in the U.S. to a mother of German extraction and his dad was from Tunisia.
As Tunisia is in North Africa, he regards himself as African-American but, as Arabs are still Caucasian, he considers himself white as well. So ethnically, he is African-American but racially, he is white.

Answer 5

This is why I refuse to say "African-American" to refer to blacks. Many can't even trace their roots back to Africa. There are plenty of white South Africans, who if they came to the USA should rightly be called African-Americans. They would be more African-American than most of the blacks using that term. Just say black or white. Enough with the ethnic labels. Better yet, just say AMERICAN. And yes, I realize that this includes the peoples of all the Americas, all the way down to South America.

Answer 6

You'd be just a white guy, but you could also be a South African-American or a Namibian-American. The term African-American means someone with true African blood. Whites in Africa are imports from Europe.

Answer 7

I guess from an "American viewpoint" you could say you are African American. However being a Black African American myself, I think the whole notion of labeling "African American, Mexican American, Chinese American" and so on is racist in itself. America is all about "What race are you?" We are a race-obsessed society, I believe other countries (even though they also suffer racism) are more Nationalistic. If you were born in Mexico then you would be Mexican, not African Mexican or Chinese Mexican.

Here in America if you are not a white person born here then you cannot simply say you are "American", you have to include your race. Only White's born here seem to be the one's allowed to say they are "American". They never say "I'm Caucasian American". Even the original peoples of this country are downgraded from "American" status and are now known as
"Native Americans".

Here's an interesting bit of information...
Many "African Americans" are mixed with Caucasian, Asian, Mexican, Native American and so many other things. Why are we still called African Americans? Because of the "one drop rule" that apparently still applies in most of America's eyes. See the link below.

http://www.tysknews.com/Depts/Constitution_Issues/one_drop_rule.htm

In reality the concept of race is a man-made social construct. We are all one race (there is no gene to determine race).

Answer 8

Realistically, any person born on the continent of Africa and moves to the U.S is an African-American -- regardless of color. African-American is a nationality as opposed to race.

Answer 9

I think that any person who was born in Africa or had ancestors from Africa are techinically "African American". Because many people in Africa are in fact black, most people think you must be black to be African. Therefore, I think you are "African American" as you are both from Africa and America.

On a side note, I think the whole "African American" . "Asian American", etc labels are a little silly. My ancestors were from Wales and I don't call myself a "Welsh American" I think I'll just stick to American, but to each their own!

Answer 10

Excellant question. I guess that you are an African American. Or maybe a White African American.

Answer 11

Afrikaner American