Young kids don’t often get enough credit for being curious and observant, and many parents fear discussing sophisticated topics such as race and culture with them.
I recently read from a nonprofit website called Futurity that by the age of 5, children start to “associate racial characteristics with traits, stereotypes and social status, and start to internalize messages about race they have inferred from adults and people around them.”
I’d also add that ethnicity is another characteristic kids recognize early on.
I remember being in first grade and filling out a paper for the teacher with my full name on it. When it came to my middle name, I was embarrassed by “Tania.” In fact, I didn’t enjoy being Greek. I wanted to be French-American like the majority of my fellow students. I wanted a last name such as Cote, Dube, Lavoie, etc. I knew my Mediterranean features, religion and traditions were different, and I felt uncomfortable about it.
My late grandmother’s name was “Sultana.” That was supposed to be my middle name, but my parents thought that Tania sounded better. I asked them what Sultana meant in English, and they told me the closest translation was “Susan.”
And Susan was the name I chose to write for my middle name at school. Like most kids, I wanted to fit in.
Today in New Hampshire, the largest ancestry groups include French and French Canadian (23.3%), Irish (20.5%), English (16.1%), Italian (10.7%), German (8.3%) and American (5.2%), according to data from the World Population Review. The sizable French-Canadian and Irish populations are mostly the descendants of mill workers from long ago, many of whom still live in Nashua and Manchester.
Nashua as well as the entire state is also predominantly white. The racial composition of my city of 90,000 breaks down as follows:
White: 81.73%
Asian: 7.64%
Two or more races: 5.22%
Black or African American: 3.53%
Other race: 1.75%
Native American: 0.12%
Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander: 0.01%
Meantime, I have learned that ancestry is something that can be more complicated than it appears.
I have come to admire and love my Greek roots, but these days, I’m not sure how Greek I really am. It all began in 2018 when my sister-in-law Nina gave me an AncestryDNA kit. She was certain that my family had Native American heritage because of my strong features, including high cheekbones. I chuckled, of course. It would be remarkable if I had, but my family’s roots were Greek/Macedonian. I believed I was 100% Greek.
I spit into the small tube and sent it away to AncestryDNA. All it would take is 1/4 teaspoon of saliva to determine my cultural makeup.
Surprise. The data revealed that I was 76% Greek, Albanian and Turkish.
Huh?
I recently received new 2022 statistics from AncestryDNA. I’m now “only” 67% Greek and Albanian with 27% ethnicity from the Balkans, 4% from East Europe and Russia and 2% from the Baltics.
To determine one’s ethnicity estimate, the company compares your DNA against a worldwide reference panel to see which populations your DNA looks most like.
How could one’s ethnicity change often?
“DNA ethnicity estimates are updated from time to time based on advances in DNA science and an increasing number of samples in our reference panel. With each update, we continue to add new regions, making your results even more precise,” says AncestryDNA.
And there you have it. As unique as we all are as individuals, we’re probably a lot more similar than we think.
