No, I did not mean that Haitian were included in our demographic count. What I meant
was that in general when we refer to a person being" black," we are talking about Haitians. But when in the DR we classify a Dominican to be black, it is because there is no question of a doubt there is no cream in the coffee. In most cases then not those Dominicans are of Haitian ancestry, although not necessarily. Dominicans from San Cristobal, Sto Dgo, San Pedro, La Romana all along the South East coast all the way up to Samana and the border area with Haiti have little to no mixtures and where the greatest concentrations of Dominican "blacks" are found.

Does anybody know the process of how Dominican citizens are labeled in the country's census? I've done a little searching, but found no results. Is it based on only appearance? If so, the white percentage seem a little bit low since I've seen quite a few Dominicans with the "Amelia Vega" phenotype. Admittedly, I personally see Amelia as a light skinned india, but most seem to disagree .

What needs to be clarified if whether or not the only people who qualify to be white are Nordic Europeans, such as fair skin, blue eye, blonde hair scandinavians, Germans, Northern Italians and Dutch.

If that is the case then dark hair and dark eye, olive skin Southern and Eastern Europeans located by or near the Mediterranean such as Portugal, Southern Spain, Southern Italy, Greece, Islands of France, Croatia and Malta among others would therefore not qualify for white. The fact is all of them are members and belong to the same Caucasian race, people who come in all sorts of colors and various skin hues, even hair textures. Therefore Amelia Vega would likely qualify to be predominately Southern European white with features they are typically known to have such as swarthy skin, dark hair and eyes, slender nostrils and an elongated bridge.

Amelia can not be considered "India" because she does not display any of the commonTaino phenotypes, although it is possible that she may be a carrier of the gene. Tainos belong to the mongoloid race that although have very straight hair, they tend to have high check bones, small slanted eyes and a flatter less of a leptorrhine nose, meaning long and narrow.

To avoid the confusion, race must be better defined, however the traditional understandings have become diluted, more hazy, vague and the reason for so much jumble, because it still remains pretty much a subjective concept and the initial meaning has varied and changed over time and throughout history.

That's a good point, though people shouldn't always expect the stereotypical Scandinavian phenotype when they think of white Dominicans since most of our heritage stems from Southern Europe, particularly Spain. Speaking of which, don't some Spaniards have admixtures of Moorish and Arab blood? I'm curious as to whether Amelia would fall into the "White" percentage if ,for example, she had a sibling that fell into the "Mulatto" phenotype. Such diversity is pretty common amongst Dominicans, at least from my experience. So if Amelia is "white" while her sibling (who is fictional and is only fabricated for the sake of my question) is "mulatto", would this make Amelia white or mixed in the Dominican census? I'm wondering if the census is based only on appearance alone, or if it's based on heritage and actual admixture. In regards to the Indio subject, I heard that most Dominicans refer to Indio as a description for brown skin. However, me and my family usually use it to describe people of a particular phenotype. For example, Juan Fernandez de Alarcon, Andy Andy, and Irka Mateo are the types Dominicans I usually would consider as "Indio". Does the meaning of "Indio" tend to vary from region to region within the DR, or is the definition just ambiguous?

I believe you are using a bad example for the question you are asking. Amelia has no known racial admixtures. Both of her parents come from upper middle class backgrounds and are considered to be white by most standards and in the DR traditionally the higher the class the whiter it gets. And I am not solely referring to "economic standing". There are plenty of people with money who are considered to be socially poor and vice versa is true. There are also those who hold a high social position, yet may not have the money to equal their status. Although in the DR all races are represented in almost every level of the socio-economic scale, the peak of the summit remains and has always been lilly white.

Nevertheless, Amelia's mother was a former beauty queen and her father is a practicing physician in New York City. Neither does her mother nor father and even grandparents have any visible signs to indicate a possible non-white ancestry. Therefore, it is unlikely, she would have a sibling that would be born mulato. However it is not at all unusual to see this phenomena among tri-racials families, where among siblings all the colors of the rainbow are represented.

Now again, we must be careful when and how we throw racial terms around without being clear, otherwise we create misconceptions. For example, a mulato is a bi-racial person like president Barack Obama. He is a perfect example of exactly what is a mulato, a child born of black and white parents. However, some countries use the term rather losely particularly Cubans. They tend to call or label "mulato" anyone who might have the possibility of a non-white ancestry. I do not believe this applies to Amelia Vega, she has absolutely nothing that racially resembles a person like Obama, otherwise there would be at least some traces of black or even Taino traits evident among her relatives. In order to have a mulato sister or brother one of the two parents must be black--no ifs ands or buts.

In reference to "Indio", yes, you are correct in the DR the term is used as an adjective to describe skin color, particularly when the race of the person is not well defined. However, because I did not know or was aware within what context you were using the word "indio," I followed the standard textbook definition instead, as one who is a member and belongs to the mongoloid race.

Nevertheless, when the race issue comes up in a government document that question is never actually asked, at least not directly, but rather the inquiry is made about skin color and not race. Generally the response is answered and completed at the discretion of the government official taking the application. Because 70% of Dominicans are of mixed race ancestry, most times the answer falls within one of three categories: "Indio", indio oscuro and indio claro.

When the race or color of the applicant is clear, definitive and without question of a doubt, the answer is equally firm-color negro or blanco. Nevertheless, my father who I consider to be a Southern European white looking guy, with green eyes, light olive skin, straight Jet-black hair and Roman type nose, his passport describes him as"trigueno" and 10 years later when it came up for renewal, he was identified as "indio claro" instead of white. Now go figure.

The conclusion to all this is that in the DR determining race or the color of a person is an art and not an exact science. But this should be of no surprise, particularly when many times in the Dominican Republic a person can easily fall into an undefined race, where it is next to impossible to firmly classify the person to fit exactly into one specific category.

Finally, Irka Mateo and Andy Andy are Dominicans who have overwheliming evidence of Taino characteristics, but I am not so sure about Juan Fernandez Alarcon. While Mateo and Andy appear to be mestizos with pronounced European features, Juan Fdz Alarcon seems to be more tri-racial with accentuated Afro and less of aTaino phenotype.

It is obvious that my response boils down and falls back on individual interpretation, the person making the observation and doing the evaluation, which proves there is no clear and unanimous consensus of what makes a person white, black, Taino, mestizo and mulato in the Dom Rep. Therefore, this topic still remains inconclusive, open to debate and must proceed for further discussion.

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Your accusation against this group is fgalse.
.
It was NOT the people of the ETHNIC
group currently referred to by the false
misnomer of 'African-American' (AA)
that created the racist-'One-Drop Rule'
-- NOR are they the ones who support it
-- BUT RATHER -- the various racists in
the U.S. have unfarily applied the very
racist-'One-Drop Rule' to the AA group.
.
You are "blaming the victim" when you
make your false accusations against
that particular ETHNIC group.
.
Please educate yourself before you post falsehoods.
.
The information found in the links below should
be of some help in familiarizing you with the truth.
.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Generation-Mixed/message/4160
.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Generation-Mixed/message/4162
.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Generation-Mixed/message/4153
.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Generation-Mixed/message/4154
.
http://www.facebook.com/allpeople.gifts/posts/309460495741441
.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Generation-Mixed/message/4238
.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Generation-Mixed/message/4239
.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Generation-Mixed/message/4240
.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Generation-Mixed/message/4236
.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Generation-Mixed/message/1923
.
-- AllPeople (AP) G.i.f.t.s.
.
soaptalk AT hotmail DOT com
.
Founder and Moderator of the following
online Lineage-Discussion Communities
.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Generation-Mixed
.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MGM-Mixed
.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FGM-Mixed
.
https://www.facebook.com/allpeople.gifts
.
http://www.youtube.com/user/APGifts
.

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According to the CIA World Factbook, the Dominican population is 73% multiracial, 16% white, and 11% black. The multiracial population is primarily a mixture of European and African, but there is as well a minor Taíno element in the population; research published in 2010 showed that 15% of Dominicans have Taíno ancestry.

In the Cibao region, 33% of the population has Taino ancestry.

In the Cibao region, 33% of the population has Taino ancestry.

That often quoted "15% taino ancestry" is really 15% Taino mtDNA which just means you had ONE ancestor among thousands that was a taino female. My mtdna is A2, a Taino haplogroup. Much more than 15% of Dominicans have Taino heritage, though at low levels. It seems consistent despite being low throughout the population.