what counts as asian/pacific islander?

Applying to College
101

<p>For data collection purposes, racial/ethnic definitions have been establised by the US Office of Management and Budget. These definitions are used throughout the Federal Government for collecting information unless Congress has set a different standard in a particular law. These are the categories used by colleges since they are generally collecting this information in response to the Federal Government. These are not definitions of who is a minority.</p>

<p>
[quote]
Asian. A person having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Indian subcontinent including, for example, Cambodia, China, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Philippine Islands, Thailand, and Vietnam.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>In the 1997 re-draft, OMB seperated Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander out from the Asian category. The former category is defined as:</p>

<p>
[quote]
A person having origins in any of the original peoples of Hawaii, Guam, Samoa, or other Pacific Islands.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>NOTE. Geography is not a definition of ethnicity/race. Your race/ethnicty is based on your biological origins not your location. </p>

<p><a href="http://clinton4.nara.gov/OMB/fedreg/ombdir15.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://clinton4.nara.gov/OMB/fedreg/ombdir15.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Now you can argue all you want about whether these are right, but these are the definitions.</p>

102

<p>Yes, sure Rissians are counted as white. My point was that georgaphically/culturally/ethnically it is not quite correct.
Nevertheless nobody in his right mind will call my son an Asian. The classification is flawed.</p>

103

<p>Fizik</p>

<p>Where does the OMB categories define your son as Asian?</p>

104

<p>The "Asian" category is defined as "A person having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Indian subcontinent including, for example, Cambodia, China, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Philippine Islands, Thailand, and Vietnam." </p>

<p>A lot of Russians have dark hair which is due to a heavy mix of Mongolian blood in our veins. :)</p>

<p>Just to clarify: the Russians are not defined in the OMB as far as I could see (granted, I did not look really closely). Everytime you do not define something precisely you have a room to wiggle. For example, "having origins in any of the original peoples...", how many generations are we talking about here?</p>

<p>I am joking, but you can justify belonging to any race if you really want to.</p>