The thing we need to remember about this thread is that race, nationality, and ethniciy are three different things and it can be complicated but is important when denoting someone's heritage.
There are technically three races derived from human social construct: Negorid, Mongoloid, and Caucasoid.
Africans and even Austrailian Aboriginals are considered Negorid. Many Asian countries such as Korea, China, Japan, Thailand, etc., are considered to contains people who are of the the mongoloid race. Caucasoid have the blending of ethnicties that are Indo-European. These would who we would call white people. The Celt, Franks, Slavs, etc are considered Caucasian.
So Alek Wek is Black (Negorid), Claudia Schiffer is White (Caucasoid) and Du Juan is Mongolid.
Sometimes people get confused because they say, well what about Native American and Pacific Islanders. Well technically many of these ethnicities derived from Mongoloid Asia so they would racially be considered so.
Now we come to nationality. This used to be simple before man started exploring and setting up shop in places where he was not a native. It used to be that where you came from, for the most part would tell you what you were racially. As in, Claudia Schiffer is German therefore she is white. But we can no longer say that even as the lovely Sabina Karlson is 100% Swedish but not 100% white right? Racially she is black and white. Ethnically she is Swedes and whatever part of African her parent is from if she also embraces that cullture. Nationalty wise, she is 100% Swedish as that was where she was born and raised, and that is her dominant culture, I assume. If I am wrong please forgive, but you see the point I'm trying to make.
So....Gisele is 100% Brazilian. That is her orgin of birth. Racially she is white. Ethnically she belongs to whatever German group she's from sure, but I'm pretty sure she identifies in whole with being Brazilian so she considered ethnically Brazillian or Horizintinian (lol her hometown). So she is not mixed racially. She is just white.
Julia Imai, however is a racially mixed Brazilian having a mixture of mongolid and caucasoid ancestry.
Ethnicity is the one that is trickiest of them all. This term is used to describe a people who share a common language, culture, religion, region, etc. This is synonomous with nationality in a way, but in other ways it differs. For instance, the Ebo and Yourba tribes are both Natives of the African country Nigeria. They are both racially negroid, and of the same nation, but they are of two different ethnicities. They live a different way of life and believe in different things.
So ethnically, Julia Imai is Brazilian because that is her culture, but if she acknowledges and so lives by her Portuguese/Japanese cutlures, she can also say those as well in an ethnic capacity.
Jessica White and Tyra Banks are Americans who share the same race and ethnicity, but Arlenis Sosa (who is also American just not from North) may share the same racial background, but was born in a different part of America and therefore does not share the same ethnicity (She is Dominican Republic). Cindy Crawford is also American, and is of a different racial background but could be considered ethnically linked to Tyra and Jessica as they have all grown up in American culture. So I just wanted to put that out there because as I stated before years ago on this thread, I am multiracial and it urks my nerves when friends will say I'm half black and half cuban. It's just weird. Hope this helped as you we continue to post the multiracial beauties of our beloved modeling world.
