Ethnicity Essay

Very few of us accurately describe the difference between ethnicity and race, simply because we tend to lump them into the same definition. While the dictionary can represent each of these words to be highly similar, there are differences.

Ethnicity is not just a person's race. We can say that a Caucasian is white, but that doesn't describe his ethnicity. If we lined up a Caucasian from Ireland, Israel and Canada in a photograph, it would be difficult to discern from which country each person originates. Yet, if we gave them appropriate items from their culture, it becomes easier to determine their country of origin. Ethnicity is about tradition, learned behavior and customs. It is about learning where you come from, and celebrating the traditions and ideas that are part of that region.

At one time it was easy to tell one's ethnicity, but as the global conglomeration offered more choice and change (as well as borrowing styles and ideas from other cultures), it has become impossible to identify ethnicity based solely on distinctive features.

Ethnicity gives us room to change because we can reject our own and embrace another. You can move from one region to another and assimilate your beliefs, actions and customs to identify with that ethnic orientation. You cannot do the same with race.

Race is your biologically engineered features. It can include skin color, skin tone, eye and hair color, as well as a tendency toward developing certain diseases. It is not something that can be changed or disguised. Race does not have customs or globally learned behavior. Going back to our three Caucasians, each could be cloned and placed in different cultures throughout the world that were primarily not Caucasian. While their behavior would change, their physical and biological features would not.

Race can be used to describe other elements of biological and regional differences. For instance, you can be born Jewish (which is usually referred to as a religion), but it does not mean that you have embraced the Jewish customs or religious beliefs. In such cases, the same term can be used to describe either ethnicity or race.

Ethnicity does not always describe color either. One can claim to be African, which indicates an entire multi-regional, multi-cultural continent. You can enhance the definition by assigning a sub culture to the ethnicity, such as South African, or Ethiopian. There can be a wide range of skin colors and tones throughout Africa, ranging from the white skin and fair haired faces many associate with the Aryan race to the dark skin, black haired faces that many associate with African regions.