Talk:Heather Raffo

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[edit] What is her real ethnic origin?

It seems Heather Raffo was tagged as Arab American simply because she is Iraqi American. I have removed that tag and I will explain why.

Not all Iraqis are Arabs. Raffo's father is reportedly Iraqi American of Catholic Christian faith (which there seems no reason to doubt). Most people would therefore jump to the conclusion he is an Arab. But Iraq contains a prominent Assyrian minority. Assyrians are not Arabs. They are a highly endogamous group whose cohesive historical identity dates back before Christ. They are Christians. A subgroup of them has been traditionally known as Chaldeans, a designation that the members of this subgroup reportedly now avoid.

In America, the main concentrations of Assyrians are in greater Detroit (where Heather Raffo is from) and greater San Diego, CA. Casual observation shows that a large percentage of them have surnames which end in 'o' and are of two syllables (see for example http://www.ana-ashur.com/, which mentions an Assyrian named Raffo). Therefore, someone who is from Iraq, is Christian, and has the surname 'Raffo' is almost certainly an Assyrian, which means they're not Arab.

Lacking objective confirmation, I have not yet tried to put Heather Raffo into the category of Assyrian Americans. Hurmata (talk) 19:34, 28 March 2008 (UTC)