Prompt: Sociologists often emphasize how race (and ethnicity) and gender (and sexuality) work to separate human beings into different groups, and often into groups that are in conflict with each other. Demographers measure (among other things) how such groups change over time. The United States has taken a census of the population every ten years since its founding, because it is required by the Constitution (in order to apportion representatives among the states). It has grown into a major source of social science data, and is among the largest-scale surveys ever conducted. The methods used to gather data, and to construct certain key variables, have changed from time to time.
In 1790, in the first U.S. census, people were categorized as “free Whites,” “other free persons,” or “slaves.”
In 1860, on the eve of the Civil War, people were either “White,” “Black,” or “Mulatto”.
In 1870, in the midst of reconstruction (and after many Chinese laborers had toiled alongside Irish immigrants and Civil War veterans on the transcontinental railroad), people could be classified as “White,” “Black,” “Mulatto,” “Chinese,” or “Indian.”
In the 1930 census, after many waves of immigration (and xenophobic backlashes), people could be classified as “White,” “Negro,” “Mexican,” “Indian,” “Chinese,” “Japanese,” “Filipino,” “Hindu,” “Korean,” or “other.”
But in all of these censuses, the classification was done by an enumerator who looked at people and decided which single race they belonged to. In the last few censuses, we have begun to do things rather differently. Now, people answer survey forms. You and your family may have done this recently.
Not only do people declare for themselves which race they belong to, but they are no longer expected to belong only to one race. The race question on the 2010 census, for instance, asks people to indicate whether they belong to one or more of the following races: “White,” “Black, African Am., or Negro,” “American Indian or Alaska Native,” “Asian Indian,” “Chinese,” “Filipino,” “Japanese,” “Korean,” “Vietnamese,” “Native Hawaiian,” “Guamanian or Chamorro,” “Samoan,” “Other Pacific Islander,” or “Some other race.”
Unlike the race category, there has been little change in the sex category. The 2010 census asks everyone to choose between “Male” and “Female.”
How should we change our data collection procedures to improve the accuracy of our census (i.e., less over/under counting)?
To what extent does the prospect of multiracial identities undermine the divisiveness that we associate with race?
How likely is it that the census will change to reflect more complexity with respect to “sex” and/or “gender”?
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