Panethnicity in the United States

Though little studied, ¹ panethnicity—the development of bridging organizations and solidarities among subgroups of ethnic collectivities that are often seen as homogeneous by outsiders—is an essential part of ethnic change. Indeed, in the United States today it may well be supplanting both assimilation and ethnic particularism as the direction of change for racial/ethnic minorities. In this article we first present a theoretical framework that specifies factors that facilitate and inhibit panethnicity. Within this framework, we review panethnicity among four sets of ethnic subgroups in the United States: Asian Americans, Native Americans, Indo Americans, and Latinos. ² We conclude with a discussion of the relative importance of structural and cultural factors for understanding panethnicity.