Census Data Presents Rise in Multiracial Population of Youths |
Census Data Presents Rise in Multiracial Population of Youths
The New York Times
2011-03-24
Susan Saulny, National Correspondent
WASHINGTON — Among American children, the multiracial population has increased almost 50 percent, to 4.2 million, since 2000, making it the fastest growing youth group in the country. The number of people of all ages who identified themselves as both white and black soared by 134 percent since 2000 to 1.8 million people, according to census data released Thursday.
Census 2010 is the first comprehensive accounting of how the multiracial population has changed over 10 years, since statistics were first collected about it in 2000. It has allowed demographers, for the first time, to make comparisons using the mixed-race group—a segment of society whose precise contours and nuances were largely unknown for generations. The data shows that the multiracial population is overwhelmingly young, and that, among the races, American Indians and Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders are the most likely to report being of more than one race. Blacks and whites are the least likely.
In what experts view as a significant change from 2000, the most common racial combination is black and white. Ten years ago, it was white and “some other race”—a designation overwhelmingly used by people of Hispanic origin, which is considered by the government to be an ethnicity not a race.
“I think this marks a truly profound shift in the way Americans, particularly African-Americans, think about race and about their heritage,” said C. Matthew Snipp, a professor in the sociology department at Stanford University…
Read the entire article here.
Tags: C. Matthew Snipp, Race Remixed, Susan Saulny, The New York Times