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BI-RACIAL

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Race

These 2020 census results break down people’s race and ethnicity into details

Updated September 22, 20239:59 PM ET 

By 

Connie Hanzhang Jin

, 

Hansi Lo Wang

People walk past posters encouraging census participation in Seattle in 2020.

Ted S. Warren/AP

The latest set of 2020 census results, released Thursday, offers a nuanced look at the racial and ethnic diversity of the United States.

Forms for that last U.S. census not only let people check off multiple boxes to answer the race question but also allowed more participants to report detailed responses about their race and ethnicity than past national head counts.

Race

Changing how U.S. forms ask about race and ethnicity is complicated. Here’s why

For the first time since 1960 — when the Census Bureau started allowing U.S. residents to self-report their identities — the agency asked people who marked the box for “White” and/or “Black” to also fill out a write-in area with their non-Hispanic origins, such as German, Haitian, Irish or Jamaican.

Those prompts also encouraged more people of Middle Eastern or North African descent — who, for now, are officially categorized by the U.S. government as white — to share details about their backgrounds.

The bureau has tried to match all of the write-in responses to its public list of official categories. But identity can be messy and hard to capture neatly, so some of those classifications can be hard to decipher. Additionally, some people chose not to write a detailed response about their identity. In those cases, the Census Bureau described their responses as “not specified.”

Here’s the breakdown of people’s responses:

https://apps.npr.org/dailygraphics/graphics/census-ethnic-data-20230920/aian.html?initialWidth=953&childId=responsive-embed-census-ethnic-data-20230920-aian&parentTitle=2020%20census%20results%3A%20Here%20are%20breakdowns%20by%20race%20and%20ethnicity%20%3A%20NPR&parentUrl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.npr.org%2F2023%2F09%2F21%2F1200130022%2F2020-census-results-race-ethnicity

https://apps.npr.org/dailygraphics/graphics/census-ethnic-data-20230920/asian.html?initialWidth=953&childId=responsive-embed-census-ethnic-data-20230920-asian&parentTitle=2020%20census%20results%3A%20Here%20are%20breakdowns%20by%20race%20and%20ethnicity%20%3A%20NPR&parentUrl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.npr.org%2F2023%2F09%2F21%2F1200130022%2F2020-census-results-race-ethnicity

https://apps.npr.org/dailygraphics/graphics/census-ethnic-data-20230920/black.html?initialWidth=953&childId=responsive-embed-census-ethnic-data-20230920-black&parentTitle=2020%20census%20results%3A%20Here%20are%20breakdowns%20by%20race%20and%20ethnicity%20%3A%20NPR&parentUrl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.npr.org%2F2023%2F09%2F21%2F1200130022%2F2020-census-results-race-ethnicity

https://apps.npr.org/dailygraphics/graphics/census-ethnic-data-20230920/hispanic_latino.html?initialWidth=953&childId=responsive-embed-census-ethnic-data-20230920-hispanic_latino&parentTitle=2020%20census%20results%3A%20Here%20are%20breakdowns%20by%20race%20and%20ethnicity%20%3A%20NPR&parentUrl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.npr.org%2F2023%2F09%2F21%2F1200130022%2F2020-census-results-race-ethnicity

https://apps.npr.org/dailygraphics/graphics/census-ethnic-data-20230920/mena.html?initialWidth=953&childId=responsive-embed-census-ethnic-data-20230920-mena&parentTitle=2020%20census%20results%3A%20Here%20are%20breakdowns%20by%20race%20and%20ethnicity%20%3A%20NPR&parentUrl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.npr.org%2F2023%2F09%2F21%2F1200130022%2F2020-census-results-race-ethnicity

https://apps.npr.org/dailygraphics/graphics/census-ethnic-data-20230920/pacific_islander.html?initialWidth=953&childId=responsive-embed-census-ethnic-data-20230920-pacific_islander&parentTitle=2020%20census%20results%3A%20Here%20are%20breakdowns%20by%20race%20and%20ethnicity%20%3A%20NPR&parentUrl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.npr.org%2F2023%2F09%2F21%2F1200130022%2F2020-census-results-race-ethnicity

https://apps.npr.org/dailygraphics/graphics/census-ethnic-data-20230920/other.html?initialWidth=953&childId=responsive-embed-census-ethnic-data-20230920-other&parentTitle=2020%20census%20results%3A%20Here%20are%20breakdowns%20by%20race%20and%20ethnicity%20%3A%20NPR&parentUrl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.npr.org%2F2023%2F09%2F21%2F1200130022%2F2020-census-results-race-ethnicity

https://apps.npr.org/dailygraphics/graphics/census-ethnic-data-20230920/white.html?initialWidth=953&childId=responsive-embed-census-ethnic-data-20230920-white&parentTitle=2020%20census%20results%3A%20Here%20are%20breakdowns%20by%20race%20and%20ethnicity%20%3A%20NPR&parentUrl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.npr.org%2F2023%2F09%2F21%2F1200130022%2F2020-census-results-race-ethnicity

National

This Is How The White Population Is Actually Changing Based On New Census Data

Edited by Alyson Hurt and Benjamin Swasey, with copy-editing by Preeti Aroon

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About joelsnell99

Who's Who in all U.S and U.K. Honoraries (Marquis) Numerous publications in over 80 venues DANA SPIRIT AWARD/2009 Oxford Roundtable, Editor of FOCUS, a student Social Science Journal Author Snell Life Cycle Lonliness Curve Professor Emeritus - Kirkwood College Omicron Delta Kappa Grants Online Editor for Psychology and Education.com Research Fellow - Arlington Institute Outstanding Teacher at Kirkwood College Membership in numerous editorial boards or a reviewer of manuscripts Associate Editor - Psychology and Education Co-Author of Snell-Green Professor Index Author of Snell Educator Effectiveness Index Contributer to FutureEdition.com Co-Author of Snell-Allen Medical Rank Index Fellow in Kennedy Foundation Co-Author of Snell-Allen Subjective Assessment Sex Role Index Honors >>> Positions and Courses Taught >>> joelsnell@hotmail.com http://www.socialvibes.net Research Council, Advisory Board

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