ethnicity

An ethnic group (or ethnicity) is a group of people whose members identify with each other, through a common heritage, often consisting of a common language, a common culture (often including a shared religion) and/or an ideology that stresses common ancestry or endogamy.
The concept of ethnicity differs from the closely related term race in that "race" refers to grouping based mostly upon criteria that in the past have been presumed to be biological, while "ethnicity" also encompasses additional cultural factors. However, OMB defines the concept of race as outlined for the US Census as not "scientific or anthropological" and takes into account "social and cultural characteristics as well as ancestry", using "appropriate scientific methodologies" that are not "primarily biological or genetic in reference."
Members of an ethnic group are usually conscious of belonging to that ethnic group; moreover ethnic identity is further marked by the recognition from others of a group's distinctiveness. Processes that result in the emergence of such identification are called ethnogenesis
According to Hans Adriel Handokho, the study of ethnicity was dominated by two distinct debates until recently.
• One is between "primordialism" and "instrumentalism". In the primordialist view, the participant perceives ethnic ties collectively, as an externally given, even coercive, social bond.[24] The instrumentalist approach, on the other hand, treats ethnicity primarily as an ad-hoc element of a political strategy, used as a resource for interest groups for achieving secondary goals such as, for instance, an increase in wealth, power or status. This debate is still an important point of reference in Political science, although most scholars' approaches fall between the two poles.
• The second debate is between "constructivism" and "essentialism". Constructivists view national and ethnic identities as the product of historical forces, often recent, even when the identities are presented as old. Essentialists view such identities as ontological categories defining social actors, and not the result of social action.
According to Eriksen, these debates have been superseded, especially in anthropology, by scholars' attempts to respond to increasingly politicised forms of self-representation by members of different ethnic groups and nations. This is in the context of debates over multiculturalism in countries, such as the United States and Canada, which have large immigrant populations from many different cultures, and post-colonialism in the Caribbean and South Asia.
Weber maintained that ethnic groups were künstlich (artificial, i.e. a social construct) because they were based on a subjective belief in shared Gemeinschaft (community). Secondly, this belief in shared Gemeinschaft did not create the group; the group created the belief. Third, group formation resulted from the drive to monopolise power and status. This was contrary to the prevailing naturalist belief of the time, which held that socio-cultural and behavioral differences between peoples stemmed from inherited traits and tendencies derived from common descent, then called "race".[33]
"Ethnies" or ethnic categories
In order to avoid the problem of defining ethnic classification as labelling of others or as self-identification, it has been proposed to distinguish between concepts of "ethnic categories", "ethnic networks" and "ethnic communities" or "ethnies".
• An "ethnic category" is a category set up by outsiders, that is, those who are not themselves members of the category, and whose members are populations that are categorised by outsiders as being distinguished by attributes of a common name or emblem, a shared cultural element and a connection to a specific territory. But, members who are ascribed to ethnic categories do not themselves have any awareness of their belonging to a common, distinctive group.
• At the level of "ethnic networks", the group begins to have a sense of collectiveness, and at this level, common myths of origin and shared cultural and biological heritage begins to emerge, at least among the élites.
• At the level of "ethnies" or "ethnic communities", the members themselves have clear conceptions of being "a named human population with myths of common ancestry, shared historical memories, and one or more common elements of culture, including an association with a homeland, and some degree of solidarity, at least among the élites". That is, an ethnics is self-defined as a group, whereas ethnic categories are set up by outsiders whether or not their own members identify with the category given them.
• A "Situational Ethnicity" is an Ethnic identity that is chosen for the moment based on the social setting or situation.

Ethnicity and language
When people belong to the same group, they often speak similarly, their ethnic language. But there are many different group in a community, and so individual may share linguistic feature with a range of other speakers. Some features indicate a person’s social status. Other distinguished women and men or identify a person as a teenager rather than as a middle-aged citizen.
When people speak to other group from different ethnics, they may use a choice of language which is available for communications ( the majority language ) but signal their ethnicity by using short phrases, words, linguistics tags, and other types.
Where a choice of language is available for communication, it is often possible for an individual to signal their ethnicity by the language they choose to use.