Ahyphenated ethnicity (or rarelyhyphenated identity) is a reference to anethnicity,pan-ethnicity,national origin, ornational identity combined with thedemonym of a country ofcitizenship-nationality, anothernational identity, or in some cases country of residency or country of upbringing.[1] The term is an extension of the term "hyphenated American". The term refers to the use of ahyphen between the name of an ethnicity and the name of the country incompound nouns:Irish-American, etc., although modern English language style guides recommend dropping the hyphen: "Irish American".
The concept should not be confused with that ofmixed ethnicity andmultiraciality, i.e., the ethnicity or race of a person whose parents have different ethnicities/races, which can also be written in a hyphenated way.
The term "hyphenated American" originated in 1890s and was used disparagingly as a reference to immigrants who, by brandishing their ethnic origin, allegedly demonstrated an incomplete allegiance to the United States, especially during theWorld War I period.[2]
Jeffrey Lesser wrote: "While there are no linguistic categories that acknowledge hyphenated ethnicity (a third generation Brazilian of Japanese descendant remains 'Japanese' while a fourth-generation Brazilian of Lebanese descent may become aturco, anarabe, asirio, or asirio-libanese), in fact immigrant communities aggressively tried to negotiate a status that allowed for both Brazilian nationality and ethnic difference".[3]
