People's notions of themselves evolve quickly in America's mobile society, but past centuries still weigh differently on Whites, Blacks and American Indians.  Often "Hispanic" seems to be closer to a race than to an ancestry category such as "Scandinavian."  But clearly many people of "Hispanic" stock have already  melted down into the undifferentiated American majority, as a great many descendents of today's "Hispanics" will also do.  A neighbor of Japanese ancestry in today's Riverdale is not thought of in the same way as such a neighbor in San Francisco in 1940.  Even today, "being Black" and "being White" involve enormous differences, but the significance of each phrase and most of the differences continue to change from decade to decade.

Down through the 1990 census, people were required to put themselves into one single racial category: they could be White or Black or Asian or American Indian.  If you were from Pakistan, Japan, or Indonesia you were "Asian."  If you were from Afghanistan, Morocco, or Norway you were "White."  Although "Hispanic" is not considered a racial identification, it is used in constructing the largest useful racial category, "Non-Hispanic White."  Another racial category, "some other race," was added to the traditional ones, to try to satisfy those who could not fit themselves into the traditional pigeonholes.

Some attempt has been made in the 2000 census to accommodate the changes and the ambiguities of race.  The number of categories has been increased (but only to separate Pacific Islanders from Asians).  And people have finally been allowed to put themselves in two or more of these boxes; in fact, anybody who felt like it could have chosen all six racial categories on the 2000 form.  But now there is a new problem:  how to compare 2000 data on race with the data from previous decades?  It seems likely that today a person who recognizes he is Black but also "something else," something not associated with another traditional race, will be part of the Black community.  The same is likely true for Asians, Native Americans, and even Whites.   So it might be useful to to add those choosing "Black plus some other race (but not White or Asian or Amerindian)" to those who choose the single "Black" designation.  The same could be done for Asians, Whites, and so forth.  In fact, by doing this, more than half of all multirace choices would be accounted for, and we would have figures that could be compared with the single race categories of past decades.

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