A similar problem exists today for scholars of gay culture: how to deal with conservative and sometimes closeted homosexuals who avoid the label of "gay" and sometimes attack aspects of mainstream gay culture. In this instance, many sociologists differentiate between "homosexual," defined by sexual orientation, and "gay/lesbian," a cultural characteristic not altogether limited solely to homo/bisexuals. Whereas not all Jews practice Judaism (secular Jews), not all women are feminists, and not all homosexuals are gay/lesbian, there is no easy term for African-Americans who are not "Black" culturally except for the term of "Uncle Tom."
Similarly, up until 1930 the US Census differentiated the American population by degrees of African heritage using legally defined race categories such as "mulatta/mulatto" (one parent being of African heritage), "quadroon" (a grandparent being of African heritage), and "octoroon" (a great-grandparent being of African heritage). Almost all states have at one time (and/or still do) defined a person as Black who has any African heritage. This U.S. socio-legal philosophy on race is quite distinct from Caribbean cultures' views on race where the reverse may be true: a person may be viewed as non-Black if they have any European heritage.
Whereas historians have pointed out long-standing tensions between "house" and "field" slaves, mulatto and full-blooded Africans, and light- and dark-skinned African-Americans, the effects of segregation laws and the philosophy behind the prohibition of interracial marriages have been the construction of the concept of racial purity.
Under this socio-legal philosophy, the distinct racially mixed (mulatto) classes and neighborhoods recognized in some Southern cities (New Orleans especially) have disappeared. After emancipation and subsequent segregation laws put serious constraints on interracial couplings, mixed race individuals and their descendents largely either passed as Whites and became submerged into that racial grouping or became re-assigned as Blacks and became submerged into that racial grouping.
Several African-American genealogists have written of their searches for their family tree and the discovery of relatives who are legally defined as White and who know nothing of their African heritage.
Thus, American law with its roots in a Segregation Era philosophy of racial purity continues to define people into bounded categories of White and Black (and other categories), but the historical reality is that many (and probably most Southern) Americans' ancestors are drawn from several continents. Yet, mechanisms such as the US Census and racist inequalities continue to re-inforce identities based on race.
Today there is a move to integrate a more geographic or ethnic terminology for racial labels. Thus, Oriental, Eurocentric Latin-derived name for people to the orient, or east, of Europe, is now out in favor of Asian-American. Asian-American, however, collapses together such ancient and diverse cultural groups as Indians, Chinese, Thai, and Japanese. Similarly, the now popular term of African-American has similar problems because it is normally used to substitute for the earlier term of black. Thus, there are difficulties between literal and relative meaning for this term when applied to light-skinned American of north African heritage or non-American black Africans. Moreso, the Afrocentric movement in the US seeks problematically to create an African-American heritage based on a common 'African' history and culture. As with Native Americans and Europeans, however, there are many diverse African nationalities, languages, and ethnic groups with their own individual histories and cultures. As a reaction to Eurocentric teachings of history, Afrocentricity instead seeks to define a linear history from ancient Egypt through west Africa to modern African-Americans counter to the linearity of an Eygptian-Greek-Roman-northern European view of history. Both views, however, problematically define cultural links and successions that meld together groups and cultures.
On a final note when explaining the sociological perspective on race, I ask my students how many have any Native American ancestry. About a quarter of my students usually raise their hands. When I ask my largely African- and European- American classroom how many consider themselves to be "mestiza/mestizo," the Mexican term for someone who is of mixed Native American and other heritages, I have never had a student raise her or his hand. This strong association with only one heritage, however, may be changing via a controversial push by mixed race individuals and their families to include a "Mixed Race" category on the 2000 U.S. Census.
Thus, the many terms for people of primarily African heritage reflect a changing and dynamic concept of what race itself means. In 300 years ...or even less... terms such as White, African-American or even race itself may be as anachronistic as Saxon, Norman, Angle, Pict, and Dane are today in modern England. Whereas some people view the histories and geographies of groups they don't 'belong to' as irrelevant, the history of Them today will be the history of Us tomorrow. Towards this vision of joint pride in who We are, I dedicate this website.