Statistically, racial groups that have come to be known as minorities (African American, Latino, Asian, mixed race and others) are becoming less of a ‘minority’ in America. As this shift continues, should there be a new term to replace “minority”?
The United States has reached a drastic shift in racial demographics. For the first time in the country’s history, white births are no longer the majority. With this, the 2010 Census has predicted that by 2042, non-Hispanic whites will be outnumbered in the general population.
Leslie Berestein Rojas from Multi-American says that the replacement of the term ‘minority’ is a complicated issue. While there is a high Latino population in the U.S., over 50 million, the demographic is still underrepresented in the work force. Because of this, she questions whether or not phasing out ‘minority’ would be appropriate.
She says that “their children [Latinos], combined with the children of other racial and ethnic groups, are a part of what is now a broad, multicultural majority that will one day constitute the working-age population of the United States. But on their own, these different groups don’t have majority status, let alone majority representation. ”
This stems from the large wave of immigration of the past four decades. As immigrants saw their way into the U.S., the recently immigrated, illegal or legal, had their children here. This resulted in a sort of minority baby boom.
While Rojas is hesitant to reconsider the use of the term ‘minority,’ Rinku Sen, , pres, president and executive director of the Applied Research Center (ARC) thinks otherwise. She is an Indian immigrant and considers herself a ‘person of color.’
In a push to widely adopt the term, Sen says that “calling myself a person of color enabled me to identify with African Americans, Latinos and Native Americans. The new identity freed me from the model-minority slot that I had been given by the media, politicians and by Americans themselves.”
The population shift will have a direct effect on public policy, especially education. As a country, our record is not spotless in the effort to educate ‘minority’ children — and things will need to turn around in order to fix the holes in the education system. While there is some cause for concern, the shift lends promise for many.
Roderick Harrison, a former chief of racial statistics at the U.S. Census Bureau, believes that “this is an important landmark,” because, “this generation is growing up much more accustomed to diversity than its elders.”
What do you think? Is the term ‘minority’ outdated? Or will the phasing-out of the term be detrimental to those groups on their way to becoming the majority?