Language Conflicts

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greg-fr
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Postby greg-fr » 2005-06-28, 20:44

Everyone has an ethnicity though - choosing to ignore it or deny you have one is one of the hall marks of assimilation


I disagree as hard I can. I don't have an ethnicity. I don't ignore nor deny any. I'm not assimilated to anything. People like you won't change the way I think because my identity is of my own making, not yours. Your words sound hollow at best, ominous at worst.

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Psi-Lord
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Postby Psi-Lord » 2005-06-28, 21:08

riki wrote:How do you define "ignore" then

'Ignore' as in 'pay not attention to something', 'treat something as unimportant or inexistent'… The unconscious ignore, so to speak (because if they ignore it in a counscious way, then they're aware of the concept of ethnicity, and therefore fall out of the scope of my definition). Even the concept of ethnicity is somewhat vague and varies from place to place (I'm sure a Brazilian don't see it as a Frenchman do, and neither will see it as a Japanese or an African will). I myself give no weight to ethnicity whatsoever in my life; greg-fr seems to be in the same situation; I'm almost 100% sure Saaropean doesn't, either. And the three of us come from different places, with different environments and different ancestry.

In the Brazilian census, by the way, I classify myself as 'white', despite having Italians, Dutch, Africans, gypsies, Portuguese etc. back in my family lines. And, in a way, that's actually what our census treat ethnicity like—how do you see yourself physically. Of course, although it might be surprising, no one would correct me if I chose to answer 'black' instead, but I highly doubt anyone really thinks about the blood running in his veins when answering the census form.
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Ariki
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Postby Ariki » 2005-06-28, 22:47

ethnicity is what makes up your psychological as well as physical identity. There is no way you can be a "non" ethnicity, even people who claim they are from "no where" understand that.

Your words sound hollow at best, ominous at worst.


I can say the same about yours, ditto, ditto.'

Ignore' as in 'pay not attention to something', 'treat something as unimportant or inexistent'… The unconscious ignore, so to speak (because if they ignore it in a counscious way, then they're aware of the concept of ethnicity, and therefore fall out of the scope of my definition). Even the concept of ethnicity is somewhat vague and varies from place to place (I'm sure a Brazilian don't see it as a Frenchman do, and neither will see it as a Japanese or an African will). I myself give no weight to ethnicity whatsoever in my life; greg-fr seems to be in the same situation; I'm almost 100% sure Saaropean doesn't, either. And the three of us come from different places, with different environments and different ancestry.

In the Brazilian census, by the way, I classify myself as 'white', despite having Italians, Dutch, Africans, gypsies, Portuguese etc. back in my family lines. And, in a way, that's actually what our census treat ethnicity like—how do you see yourself physically. Of course, although it might be surprising, no one would correct me if I chose to answer 'black' instead, but I highly doubt anyone really thinks about the blood running in his veins when answering the census form.


Well if you dont give any weight to ethnicity then why do you answer the ethnicity part in the Brazilian census? Surely it must have some weight or bearing on your concious if you answer it (even if it maybe that you will get fined for not completely filling in the census, in this way, you are not completely ignoring ethnicity). It doesn't matter if your views concur with Saaropeans, greg-fr because it is obvious that these opinions spring from popular Indo-European. After all, you identify as white, and more than anything else, and therefore, European culture and way of thinking (if you allow me to generalise here) obviously has shaped the way all three of you think. I mean, let's also not ignore the fact that Germany and France border each other (chance for cultural exchanges between both countries) and Portugal and Italy that much further away either and obviously because of the history Brazil and Portugal has had with each other, cultural exchanges have occured (or directly transfered with immigrants) and therefore related (but not always similar or the same) mindsets between two distance places have a chance to exist.
Linguicide IS genocide. :)

He ingoa ōpaki a Riki; he ingoa ōkawa a Ariki.

Riki is an informal name; Ariki is a formal name.

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Postby Psi-Lord » 2005-06-28, 23:00

riki wrote:ethnicity is what makes up your psychological as well as physical identity. There is no way you can be a "non" ethnicity, even people who claim they are from "no where" understand that.

Again, people can definitely ignore that, especially in an environment that doesn't stress the concept.

riki wrote:Well if you dont give any weight to ethnicity then why do you answer the ethnicity part in the Brazilian census?

Because the question is there to be answered. If I could write the questions myself, I might probably ignore it. And, even then, 'white' doesn't really define much—it's just a colour. In the past, you'd probably be required to choose from white, black, yellow and red.

riki wrote:Surely it must have some weight or bearing on your concious if you answer it (even if it maybe that you will get fined for not completely filling in the census, in this way, you are not completely ignoring ethnicity).

As far as I know, we don't get fined. But the reason why I answer that, besides what I wrote in the paragraph above, can be inferred from my original post—I look in the mirror and that's what I see. Again, it only boils down to colours once again—black people and mixed people are known to answer using a huge number of different shades to that question: black, brown, brownish, chocolate-brown, maroon, yellowish brown, dirty white, coloured etc. Some claim this is mostly because they're ashamed of being identified by 'black' alone, but there's no denying that the only concept they're actually using is the same anyone would use to answer about the colour of his eyes or hair—and I highly doubt that anyone's tried to define ethnicity put that simply since Hitler and was any successful.
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Ariki
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Postby Ariki » 2005-06-29, 2:27

Again, people can definitely ignore that, especially in an environment that doesn't stress the concept.


Yes, you can ignore it as much as you can, but you can't qualify a statement as "I have no ethnicity"....

Because the question is there to be answered. If I could write the questions myself, I might probably ignore it. And, even then, 'white' doesn't really define much—it's just a colour. In the past, you'd probably be required to choose from white, black, yellow and red.


But if ethnicity does not matter?.... By answering the question you identify with a particular culture (although, there should be another seperate question on that too).

If you choose to say "I have no ethnicity" then really you've placed yourself in one...one that I would label as "isolate" which is what happens when one decides not to identify with a group (individuality is a great thing, but even an individual, an independent person, subconciously needs someone else because how can a person be independent if they have no one else to compare themself to to describe themselves as independent).
Linguicide IS genocide. :)

He ingoa ōpaki a Riki; he ingoa ōkawa a Ariki.

Riki is an informal name; Ariki is a formal name.

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TaylorS
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Re:

Postby TaylorS » 2009-01-16, 2:06

Gormur wrote:
Sounds like an isolated situation. Definitely people speak whatever they want in California - there are Spanish tv, radio, you name it - also many Portuguese (Brazilian) areas with their own media, Norwegians with their own churches (service conducted in Norwegian), 2 China towns in LA, Korean, Japanese, Vietnamese, and no doubt others. Small-town America may be less tolerant, simply because it's less diverse and people can be narrow-minded.

I think Canada is far more liberal about things - esp considering that there is so much printed in Chinese (Mandarin), French, and other languages - depending on the area. Languages are better protected here too I think.

A friend told me a lot of Manitobans have kept their culture because they have been the only groups to actually want to settle here, therefore they've remained relatively isolated from the outside world. The ironic part is that it's probably true. :twisted:

All of the immigrants I know here say they were denied US entrance so they came here. All I can imagine is that things must be quite bad back home. :P


Here in Fargo one can hear Spanish, Somali, Hmong, Serbo-Croatian, Dinka, and Chinese. And we are a medium-sized city of 150,000 people
Native: English
Learning: Spanish, Latin

Linguistic Interests: Historical Linguistics, Typology, Phonology, Phonetics, Morphology.


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