Definitional Problem: African-Descended American Immigrants
I was wondering how long it would take after Barack Obama's national debut (and Theresa Heinz-Kerry's [Thanks, Nathanael]) for this question to be raised. Now I know: thank you, Alan Keyes. I wonder if some variation on the Japanese American terminology (issei for first-generation immigrants; nisei for their children, and so on) would be useful? Or perhaps just a single pair of terms -- distinguishing long-term and newcomer -- that could be used when relevant? (Note: I thought about suggesting a distinction based on descent from slaves, but that would still apply to many Africans in Africa as well as just about all of the Americas).
I know, terminology can be divisive, but the divide already exists. We need to examine the divide to see to what extent it is fundamental and to what extent it is perceptual, and to do that we need..... well, jargon, in the sense of specifically defined technical terms. Noting, of course, that well-chosen, well-defined, properly useful jargon pretty rapidly stops being jargon and becomes a component of everyday language. For example? Well, check out the discussion of the Guardian's"Scientists Pick Top Ten SF Movies over on Liberty and Power, and think about the way they added phrases and concepts to the discourse.