<p>This is nothing new, but it is interesting nonetheless.</p>
<p>
[quote]
]The nation's most elite colleges and universities are bolstering their black student populations by enrolling large numbers of immigrants from Africa, the West Indies and Latin America, according to a study published recently in the American Journal of Education.</p>
<p>Immigrants, who make up 13 percent of the nation's college-age black population, account for more than a quarter of black students at Ivy League and other selective universities, according to the study, produced by Princeton University and the University of Pennsylvania.</p>
<p>The large representation of black immigrants developed as schools' focus shifted from restitution for decades of excluding black Americans from campuses to embracing wider diversity, the study's authors said. The more elite the school, the more black immigrants are enrolled.
[/quote]
</p>
<p><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/05/AR2007030501296.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/05/AR2007030501296.html</a></p>
<p>"As a child, she was steered away from black Americans by her protective Yoruban mother, who emigrated from Nigeria in the 1980s.
'My mom wouldn't let me go next door for a sleepover with African American kids, but I could go five houses down to Asian houses.'"</p>
<p>My God, I got it! I know how to solve the black/asian affirmative action conflict. We just get more African-American mothers to force their children to interact with Asian-American children and family and indoctrinate them into the Asian cultures. So when colleges admit a black kid, they also admit an asian kid. They will be so asian that the only thing black will be their parents (we'll also give them an accent too; so many to choose from). There, affirmative action problem solve. I should get the Peace Prize for this.</p>
<p>In Miami, this is a common thing. Most Carribean blacks refuse to associate themselves with American blacks.</p>
<p>I've always wondered about how many of the people at colleges today are descended from US slaves black. There also seems to be a dearth of minorities from the poor neighborhoods (the ghettos). I might be wrong, but I've never met any, despite having lived in 3 college towns.</p>
<p>It's interesting that the authors of this article count American born children of African and Caribbean immigrants as "immigrants." If only those who were born and currently live in the Caribbean and Africa were counted as immigrants, the numbers at these schools would be a lot lower. If this same method of counting "immigrants" is to be used, then a child born in the US of Mexican born parents would be an international student, I guess.
As 6rings mentioned...Barack Obama. It seems that someone has decided that there's some type of litmus test for blackness. Some blacks are considered blacker than others. West Indians and Africans are in danger of having their "black card" revoked. It seems silly and divisive as someone pointed out in the article. It is true that West Indians and Africans may not have ancestors who were slaves in the US (there was slavery in the Caribbean), but that does not mean that they or their children did not face discrimination in the US or were not present for the civil rights movement. If someone is going to discriminate against a black person they usually don't stop to ask what the person's country of origin is-they just see black.</p>
<p>The isssue has been posted earlier on CC in the recent past.</p>
<p>In response to such concerns, Admissions officials (like at Harvard, where reportedly one recent "Black" Freshman class had few African-Americans) have begun to place more emphasis on the cultural and not geographical context of "African-American," i.e. the decendants of victims of American slavery and Jim Crow.</p>
<p>Well, I'd say an overwhelming majority of the Blacks from the Caribbean, especially the Dominican Republic, Cuba and Haiti, and also in the rest of mainland Central and South America are descended at some point from the original slaves. It is really the families of recent immigrants from sub-Saharan African countries that are the issue, because many of them have come to this country with white-collar jobs, more than satisfactory incomes, etc.
Its like they are on an entirely different playing field than the majority of American Blacks. </p>
<p>As for a litmus test for blackness, prefect, I'd argue that your claim supports something akin to the "DHS Terrorism Threat Scale" or something of blackness rather than a litmus test. The "litmus test" has been in this country ever since Louisiana passed the "one-drop" law in the 19th Century. As for discrimination, even the most minute differences cause the gang violence and degradation that we see today. If people have a reason to discriminate, they will use it.</p>
<p>A racist society does not discern between a Barack Obama and a Jesse Jackson. Does anybody here honestly believe that an African or a Carribean would be treated any better by David Duke and Co. because they're not descended from slaves? As much as I hate to say this, African-Americans who differentiate themselves with the Barack Obamas of America seem like they are just afraid of adjusting more of the blame towards themselves and less towards others (whether it is the White Man or Korean grocery owners). After all, if a Black person, albeit from Africa or the Carribean, can make it, why can't they? Oh wait, those Africans or Carribeans aren't really Black! Whew...</p>
<p>It's a cultural difference mainly....education is pushed much more in a household from Africa or the Caribbean usually. Just getting by is looked down on.....though Africans and Caribbeans who grow up in the inner city opposed to surburban areas do not perform as well. It's funny because not for a second would I not consider myself an average African-American despite where my parents come from. The only difference is I know my history...American blacks have lost theirs. My parents do share some stereotypes that African parents have about other people, and my mom's best friend who is Jamaican struggles so that her kids have to go to private school. Sometimes I can't blame them other times I think they are way off. However many American blacks don't like being called African anyway and have stupid stereotypes of Africans based on what the news shows...plus they don't know that history(redundant isn't it?). No one has ever known I was not just an American Black unless I've told them...the media has given them a certain picture.</p>
<p>I agree it's a cultural, not racial, difference, because they're all Africans. There's just this wide gap where Afro-Carribeans and Africans seem to want to excel academically, while African-Americans think that reading a book is "acting White". BTW, I think the Chinese invented books, so if anything, reading means you're acting Chinese.</p>
<p>In the WP article, there's a quote from an African-American who says that it's not fair that Afro-Carribeans and Africans benefit from affirmative action because they're "leeching" off the suffering of Black slaves. But, aren't African-Americans doing the same then? I thought the principle of Affirmative Action was to lessen the disadvantage one has by looking Black in America (a disadvantage that exists because contrary to popular belief, racism didn't magically vanish with the "I Have a Dream" speech). </p>
<p>I hate this mentality that Afro-Carribeans and Africans aren't genuinely Black because they're more willing to get along with other races, especially Whites, and are willing to achieve success in mainstream society, as opposed to being minstrels in the NBA or the rap industry. It's just a self-defeating notion, and until African-Americans shake off this stubborn adherence to denigrating stereotypes perpetrated by a racist society, how can they possibly succeed? Bill Cosby may have been blunt, but he spoke the truth.</p>