Heritage and Identity

There was an article in the Week magazine a long time ago about this guy who was suing the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey for a suspension from school because during a cultural diversity class he claimed he was a white African-American. Both his fellow students and his professor found it offensive that he would call himself African-American when he was white. However, he was born in Mozambique and change his citizenship to the U.S. when he was older.

I don't know how the law suit ended up but I can just assume that the student won. Or let me rephrase that, I hope the student won.

I don't call myself Scottish-American so why do we label black people as African-American. They may not have even been born in Africa but their parents were. Doesn't that make them just American?

This happens not only to black people. But also people of Asian and Latin descent. If someone is Asian we call them Asian-American even though they were born in the U.S. Because we see them as different than just American do they feel like allegiance towards the U.S.? Do they even feel American?

I just thought this was an interesting article. Let me know what you think.