Census Questions

If you are doing a Census return ( a bit late? ) they are only interested in your immediate ethnicity, not where your Grandparents came from. I think on my Passport mine says U.K. citizen, presumably taken from my Birth Certificate when I first applied many years ago.
Same as all census returns in the past really, except in the past they were only asked where they were born and where they lived at the time of the Census return.
Not sure why you think the Governments are interested in helping Genealogists of the future.

I think Nanna8 is in Oz (apologies if I am wrong) so their census is at a different time?

Sorry Nanna8

I'm in Sydney Nanna8 and haven't yet received any paperwork for the census. Nobody I know has either! Supposed to have it done by 10 August, and I plan to do it on line.

I presume you mean one of the opinion poll surveys. Although they sometimes do multiple choices as you mention it asks you to pick the one you feel most comfortable with. The purpose of it is to get people with different profiles taking part in the survey.

Oopsadaisy1

If you are doing a Census return ( a bit late? ) they are only interested in your immediate ethnicity, not where your Grandparents came from. I think on my Passport mine says U.K. citizen, presumably taken from my Birth Certificate when I first applied many years ago.
Same as all census returns in the past really, except in the past they were only asked where they were born and where they lived at the time of the Census return.
Not sure why you think the Governments are interested in helping Genealogists of the future.

Your ethnicity has nothing to do with your citizenship. You may have been born in a country and be a citizen of that country, but your ethnic group could be anything. Most western countries now have a diverse population. So for your ethnic group it is actually relevant what your grandparents are, whether you are black, white, mixed race or whatever. There is no such thing as your 'immediate ethnicity'.
Where you were born does not show your ethnicity, and older census returns simply listed where you were born. So the OP is quite correct is questioning why there are only two options for ethnicity.

Thanks Chestnut. Also, those of us who have done DNA Tests might have slightly different answers. My daughter did her Australian census a week ago and we did ours yesterday. It is due in a week or so. I put English and Scottish but I only know the large amount of Scottish via DNA because all the grandparents were actually born in England/ Wales.Come to that, Welsh wasn’t there, either.

I think as far as ethnicity goes all the white Europeans are often lumped together, then a few other countries, plus mixed heritage and 'other'. It usually can't be detailed to the point of splitting English, Welsh, Scottish and Irish. Much depends on the majority groups in that particular country. For instance, the USA might have a large number of Mexicans but the UK won't. So in the UK they would come under 'other'. Australia will have a large number of Aborigine people, but other countries very few if any.

I'm in Melbourne, I only received my papers yesterday 4th August

I always put - any other white background - as my father and his family were all french immigrants and my mum was English. They weren't British nationals until after I was born.

If we are going to fill in census forms based on our DNA, maybe we should put Neanderthal.

Sounds more like nationality than ethnicity. Everywhere else, UK and Europe at least have a long list of about 10 options. White has been split into White and White European. Asian has been split into several categories including Asian Bangladeshi. I’ve been retired three years and worked in HR so used these all the time. Not sure if they’ve expanded in my retirement but they definitely never had countries. (I’ve had my DNA done and they included Scandinavia. Must be Vikings going back a couple of thousand years. Don’t think surveys want that far back lol)

If your Irish, that is what you are, I would never put English or British because I am neither!!

I was asked to complete a questionnaire when I went for my 2nd covid jab. This also asked for my ethnicity: I could be white European, white British, white Irish, white Welsh or white Scottish. When I asked ‘where is white English?’ I was told it was either British or European!

I worked as a school secretary for many years and when the subject of ethnic origins came up, for the admission form we were told parents could enter whatever they wished (whatever ethnicity they felt their children were). I did bore people at meetings complaining that it should be blood ethnicity and they could not be 'Cornish' when they had only moved to the county a couple of months earlier. (This happened quite a lot.)

I'm in Adelaide and I received mine a week ago.

I remember filling in a long form which the Civil Service suddenly thought was necessary in the early 2000s. We received a solemn note back, telling us our colour and ethnicity, which we all knew because we'd filled in the forms!

rubysong this is often a problem as people don't seem to understand it is not where you live that gives you your ethnicity. If a Chinese person went to live in the UK, or Norway, or France, or Australia he would still be Chinese (I'm not sure they would allow for all the various regions as it will not be that detailed I imagine). He might be an Australian citizen but he would still be Chinese by ethnicity.

rubysong

I worked as a school secretary for many years and when the subject of ethnic origins came up, for the admission form we were told parents could enter whatever they wished (whatever ethnicity they felt their children were). I did bore people at meetings complaining that it should be blood ethnicity and they could not be 'Cornish' when they had only moved to the county a couple of months earlier. (This happened quite a lot.)

What is "blood ethnicity"?

Chestnut

rubysong this is often a problem as people don't seem to understand it is not where you live that gives you your ethnicity. If a Chinese person went to live in the UK, or Norway, or France, or Australia he would still be Chinese (I'm not sure they would allow for all the various regions as it will not be that detailed I imagine). He might be an Australian citizen but he would still be Chinese by ethnicity.

There isn't an agreed definition of ethnicity.

Don’t bank on the DNA results Nanna8 there are some funny anomalies there

nanna8

Thanks Chestnut. Also, those of us who have done DNA Tests might have slightly different answers. My daughter did her Australian census a week ago and we did ours yesterday. It is due in a week or so. I put English and Scottish but I only know the large amount of Scottish via DNA because all the grandparents were actually born in England/ Wales.Come to that, Welsh wasn’t there, either.

All a DNA test will tell you is that people with DNA similar to you tend to be clustered in a certain area.

In the UK, a person can freely move from Scotland to England, from Wales to England etc. If your great grandparents (for example) came from generations born in Scotland, but then moved to another part of the UK, it will probably be reflected in your DNA, even though you might not be aware of any connections with Scotland. It's all fairly meaningless really.

The vast majority of white British people have northern European DNA, despite having no obvious connection with another country. It could even be that the group with similar DNA migrated from another part of the world.

A female's DNA test will only show results from the maternal line via mitochondrial DNA, so 50% of ancestral DNA will never show up.

All anybody can say with any certainty is that we all belong to the species "homo sapiens".

Where did you get the idea that a woman's DNA test will only show results of the maternal line growstuff? That is plain wrong.
I thought I was three quarters Scottish/Irish and one quarter English (my paternal grandfather was from Yorkshire). My DNA shows some Scandinavian (my paternal grandmother was from Caithness so no doubt some viking influence) and my paternal grandfather does indeed show up in my DNA as English, nobody in my maternal side got nearer to England than the Scottish central belt.

Esspee

Where did you get the idea that a woman's DNA test will only show results of the maternal line growstuff? That is plain wrong.
I thought I was three quarters Scottish/Irish and one quarter English (my paternal grandfather was from Yorkshire). My DNA shows some Scandinavian (my paternal grandmother was from Caithness so no doubt some viking influence) and my paternal grandfather does indeed show up in my DNA as English, nobody in my maternal side got nearer to England than the Scottish central belt.

It's not plain wrong. Tests for women can only show mitochondrial DNA.

You need to do some research on DNA tests.