Definition Race Vs Ethnicity

It also refers to a person s ethnic traits background allegiance or association.

Definition race vs ethnicity. It is defined as a social group. Census bureau defines race as a person s self identification with one or more social groups the social groups include white black african american asian american indian and alaska. This also exposes the major distinction between race and ethnicity. Like race the meaning and use of the word ethnicity has changed over the last few centuries.

Of course these social groups are humongous since we are talking about nations. Where does ethnicity come from. Race is in our biology it is something we are born with while our ethnicity is defined by other things. Race is defined as a category of humankind that shares certain distinctive physical traits the term ethnicities is more broadly defined as large groups of people classed according to common racial national tribal religious linguistic or cultural origin or background.

An ethnicity is a social group that shares a common and distinctive culture religion or language. Race is usually seen as biological referring to the physical characteristics of a person while ethnicity is viewed as a social science construct that describes a person s cultural identity. Race and ethnicity are two concepts related to human ancestry. So there you have it.

Race refers to a person s physical characteristics such as bone structure and skin hair or eye color. Ethnicity on the other hand is a state of belonging to a specific nation or culture. Race refers to physical characteristics. Ethnicity and culture each contain the letter t so remembering this fact can help you decide when to use ethnicity to describe categories of humans.

Ethnicity however refers to cultural factors including nationality regional culture ancestry and language. Ethnicity refers to cultural characteristics like language and religion and can include race as well. While race is ascribed to individuals on the basis of physical traits ethnicity is more frequently chosen by the individual.