<p>This panel discussion is available on [C-SPAN</a> Book TV](<a href=“http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/Mismat]C-SPAN”>http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/Mismat).:</p>
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<p>Hi CC – I joined specifically to ask my question here. I’m unsure if it’s okay for me to tick the Hispanic box on the Common App. I am an amalgamation of Turkish, Jewish (Sephardic, meaning a Jew from Spain), and German. My Spanish lineage dates back to the 1100s and extends into the 1400s and 1500s, and some of my distant relatives still live in Spain today. I feel a certain connection to my Spanish ancestry, although I’m honestly more of a white kid than anything else. If someone on the street asked me about my ethnic background, I would reply that I’m half-Sephardic and half-German. Is it acceptable for me to claim Hispanic?</p>
<p>There’s a bit of ambiguity in that, but according to the first post in the thread,</p>
<p>Question: “If I am part Spanish (“ETHNICITY-HISPANIC OR LATINO: A person of Cuban, Mexican, Puerto Rican, South or Central America, or other Spanish culture or origin, regardless of race.”), is it correct for me to click “Yes” for this category?”</p>
<p>Answer: “A well posed question. To the surprise of some onlookers, people from Spain or with origin from Spain are perfectly welcome to check yes to Hispanic or Latino ethnicity on college application forms by the federal definitions. What a college specifically does as to admission factors, if anything, varies from college to college and is not well publicized. It may be (or it may not be) that some college will consider origin from one country to be a more desired admission factor than origin from another country. Most colleges are not at all clear what their policies are in this regard. Colleges that care about this issue will look at any information in your admission file that indicates what country you are from (which you can tell the colleges, or not tell the colleges, as you wish).”</p>
<p>If it asks for your country of origin or something along those lines, just list “Spain” and the school will work it out to meet its own requirements.</p>
<p>But if a student has a last name that reflects his/her ethnicity, it doesn’t really matter what box they check off.</p>
<p>wow this thread was really helpful–thanks!</p>
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<p>Sometimes, the surname is not a reliable indicator. For example, the surname Bunker may indicate patrilineal descent from a Chinese person.</p>
<p>Would I be considered Hispanic/Latino if my mother’s grandfather hailed from Spain? (Thus making me one-eighth Spanish.) You can’t see the Spanish in me by just looking at me, though, haha. I’m pretty white.</p>
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<p>I don’t see any reason why not. And what is a “Spanish” look anyway? Aren’t Spaniards white?</p>
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Have you always identified as such?</p>
<p>Well, people of Spanish decent tend to have more of an olive skin tone than those in the north of Europe, where the majority of my ancestry is found. However, there is obviously a very broad spectrum of skin tone in the Spanish race, as there is in all races, haha. I’m not sure that I would get any benefit from checking the box as far as college admissions goes, as I am not culturally Hispanic in the least – other than possessing an insatiable urge for tacos, Spanish Rice, and linguica, lol – but I’m just wondering if I’ve been mistaken in checking “No” to the “Are you Hispanic or Latino” question all these years, haha.</p>
<p>Honestly, it doesn’t matter. Affirmative action exists, and if you want to benefit from it no one can or should try to stop you.</p>
<p>I don’t really think I would benefit from it, haha. No one in my immediate family self-identifies as Hispanic, and it would be kind of awkward to explain it if I went in for an interview, haha, due to my overwhelming whiteness. I don’t want to be thought of as a liar and I think I would rather get into college on my own merits, you know? But thanks for the input.</p>
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<p>There are many white Hispanics, and they aren’t “olive”-skinned either. I think this is a big misunderstanding many people, even admissions officers, have. Hispanic isn’t a racial classification; it’s refers to anyone with ancestry from either Spain or Spanish-speaking Latin America. It thus encompasses whites, blacks, indigenous Americans, Asians, as well as any mix of the above.</p>
<p>Sometimes the surname is not a reliable indicator, but sometimes it is. I know many East Asian kids with surnames that match the country from which their parents or grandparents immigrated. Many of these kids don’t have tiger moms. Their parents struggle below the poverty line but they are just American kids, doing the best they can in high school, without money for cram school or outside college advisors, in schools where the guidance/college office is painfully understaffed and overworked. And they will be penalized by the stereotype of their last names. I’m sure it’s the same for plenty of South Asian kids.</p>
<p>So should I start checking “yes” to that question? Haha</p>
<p>Up to you. You’re not lying if you say “yes.”</p>
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<p>The fact remains, though, that Latin American Hispanics and people from Spain tend, to varying degrees, to have somewhat darker skin and hair than “white” people. I don’t place much stock in our current societal system of racial classifications, but the system does exist and adcoms are no exception to being socialized in it. They may well still have the perception that he isn’t as “Hispanic” as he says he is.</p>
<p>[Data</a> presented at economics meeting show extent of desegregation in higher education](<a href=“http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/01/04/data-presented-economics-meeting-show-extent-desegregation-higher-education]Data”>http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/01/04/data-presented-economics-meeting-show-extent-desegregation-higher-education):</p>
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<p>I doubt it. The limited data from Duke circa 2001-2002 indicates that for those two years, the average family income for Hispanic students EXCEEDED that for Asians. To me, given the history of the Spanish caste system in the Americas, that says that most of the Hispanics at Duke in those two years were white.</p>
<p>Again, I think one of the biggest misunderstandings is that Hispanic is a racial classification. It is not. Fidel Castro, Dayron Robles, and Wifredo Lam are all Cuban and thus Hispanic. But Castro is white, Robles is black, and Lam is mixed Asian / Amerindian.</p>
<p>Would I have anything to gain by listing myself as Hispanic (as opposed to white)?</p>