Multiracial Classification on the United States Census: Myth, Reality, and Future Impact |
Multiracial Classification on the United States Census: Myth, Reality, and Future Impact
Revue Européenne des Migrations Internationales
Volume 21, Number 2 (2005)
Pages 111-134
Ann Morning, Associate Professor of Sociology
New York University
The 2000 census in the United States provoked a flurry of media attention in the months leading up to it, as well as in its aftermath. At issue was the new federal decision permitting Americans to identify themselves with more than one race on the census form. Advocated in large part by interracially-married couples and their offspring, this bureaucratic change in racial classification practices was widely interpreted in the press as having a wider significance for the nation as a whole. As one reporter put it, “the change is fueling a weighty debate about the meaning of race” (2000). Other articles spoke to the same thought-provoking effect of the new classification standards: the Washington Post ran “Mixed-Race Heritage, Mixed Emotions: In Census and Society, Question of Categories Yields Many Answers” (Fears, 2001), while Newsday asked, “Does It All Add Up? New Census Race Categories Raise Questions About How They’re Used” (Winslow, 2001). According to the latter, “the impact of racial classifications on the latest census has far-reaching implications– socially, politically, even statistically– that have sown anger, suspicion, uncertainty and excitement in varying quarters.”
This essay examines the expectations – both positive and negative- that characterized public discourse about the introduction of multiple-race reporting on the 2000 U.S. census. More importantly, I revisit these predictions in order to assess whether they have proved accurate. In so doing, the paper aims for a clear stock-taking of the impact of multiple-race reporting to date: which expectations have been borne out, which have not, and what unforeseen developments seem most likely to be the medium or long-term legacy of the revision of the federal racial standards?
I begin by recalling both the benefits and the drawbacks that commentators in the late 1990s and early 2000s expected from multiple-race classification. With the understanding that some predictions were too long-term to fully assess today, I nonetheless consider each and offer a prognosis. I then extend the discussion to consider two potential results of multiple-race reporting that have received less attention: its impact on essentialist or biological interpretations of race, and its implications for the classification of the Hispanic population. In conclusion, I argue that the most widely-publicized hopes and fears about multiracial classification are likely to prove minor outcomes, while the unanticipated consequences may well be more significant…
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Tags: Ann Morning, Revue Européenne des Migrations Internationales