Residual People: A Comprehensive History of the U.S. Census Enumeration of Minorities

2016 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 26370852
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: History of Europe and America
• Research Institution: Tokyo Gakugei University
• Principal Investigator: Suga Miya 東京学芸大学, 教育学部, 准教授 (50376844)
• Research Collaborator: Margo Anderson ミルウオーキー大学ウィスコンシン校, 歴史学部, 特別栄誉教授 ; David Pemberton 米国商務省センサス局歴史部門, スタッフ
• Project Period (FY): 2014-04-01 – 2017-03-31
• Keywords: 米国センサス / 人種 / マイノリティ / 連邦とローカル / 調査の実態 / 「その他」 / 総合的な歴史像 / 移民政策

Outline of Final Research Achievements

This project tries to delineate the comprehensive history of the U.S. Census, with special emphasis on the local enumeration of “residual” people, who did not clearly fit into the “color” or “race” classification, from “all other free persons,”Chinese, Japanese, and “mixed-race” populations. In 1790, local enumeration of “all other free persons” was sometimes a means of surveillance. In the mid-19th Century, the boundary of “whiteness” became ambiguous, which meant that some enumerators reported Chinese as being “White.” Based on these enumerations at a local level, the U.S. Census in the late 19th Century started to function as part of a “comprehensive race policy” toward immigrants from Asia.

Free Research Field

アメリカ史