I got these 2 confused often

I'm not so sure about that ethnicity definition. Ethnicity is strongly related to the genetical component of a person's background. I don't think it can be freely self-identified and the definition given in this post implies that a black and white person can share the same ethnicity if they went to the same school in New Jersey, as long as one of them adheres to the other's culture and social group. That, to me, is absurd. The difference between race and ethnicity is that one relates to the physical traits (race; a white frenchman and a white englishman can be said as belonging to the same race) and the other relates to someone's genotype. The difference is made quite clear in most african countries. Rwanda's genocide was perpetrated by black people against black people, but by one specific ethnical group against another specific ethnical group.

So do most native speakers 😂

Don't race mean white, black, asian etc and ethnicity mean English, German, Nigerian, Japanese etc?

"And those people who live in the same country as you, follow the same traditions and speak the same language, in most cases belong to the same ethnic group as you." - this is not something that applies to multiethnic countries. two Americans can be from the same country, share some traditions, and speak the same language while having totally different ethnicities. they share a nationality, which is American, but not an ethnicity.

[Well, part of that confusion is because race is a relic of junk science.](https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_racism) What we previously described as 'races' could more accurately be described as different human [phenotypes](https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phenotype). Ethnicity however describes a person's cultural background, rather than their physical body or appearance. These are things like Anglo-Saxon, Hispanic, Afro-Dominican, and Han Chinese, to give a few random examples.

I dont think that definition is precise enough. Race is a continental grouping of people with shared ancestry. For example, the indigenous people of Africa are part of a race we generally call "Black". Shared skin color isn't integral to the concept of race, it's only a byproduct because of the shared ancestry. Ethnicity is a nationally based grouping of people with shared ancestry. For example, the indigenous people of France are part of the ethnic grouping we call "French". This is why services like 23&me can estimate your ethnic composition using your DNA. Its just different groupings of people based on shared ancestry.

Is this a joke? I hope so. If not then it is something that only the USA could have produced. Just in case its not a bit of advanced satire, the concept of "race" has been thoroughly discredited by the scientific community and is not used by any developed nation as a means of classifying human beings. However, I note that this is r/EnglishLearning and not the right place for me to correct poor education. So, I have to admit that in the USA the above table is meaningful and as an English learner, if you dont want to get lynched, it is best to understand the way Americans think..

Just my two cents here. If I was going to make this info graphic I would have tried to avoid making all the examples in race about discrimination. It would have been more useful to talk about how on social levels people will gravitate towards other individuals of the same race because they self identify and empathise easier with those other individuals. I would also avoid throwing sex into the mix for no reason whatsoever. For that reason alone I would be sceptical of this info graphic as it seems to be suggesting that race only matters as a reason to discriminate. I would also add nationality into the mix as I feel that helps people understand ethnicity better. It also helps clear up some of the misuse in the ethnicity example where it assumes that if you were born somewhere and speak the language you are automatically part of the same ethnicity. You can be born in Australia but be Indonesian, Indian or aborigine. The way I see it, for the use of language and social standards the three form a pyramid with race being the larger level at the base, ethnicity in the middle and nationality at the top.

They "mean two very different things and shouldn't be confused"? Hardly... They mean two very, very similar things, and are commonly confused even by native speakers. This infographic looks like the kind of thing created by people who like to **weaponize** concepts like this to stoke hostility. "If you don't understand the difference you're essentially racist, and your views are offensive to me." Most people, especially outside the US, don't think like this.

That’s crazy because I literally thought the opposite. I thought ethnicity was the biological/features one and race was the cultural one

First, because this is a sub for English learning: the wording in this graphic is fairly poor. * "Divide that based on" was probably meant to read "A divide that is based on," but doesn't work as written. * The first word in the Ethnicity box should be conjugated "means," not "mean." * "Uzbeks" should not have an apostrophe. * The last sentence in the lightbulb box reads poorly as a result of questionable comma usage and lacking parallel structure. I would rewrite it to say "people who live in the same country, follow the same traditions, and speak the same language as you usually share the same ethnicity as you." Except I wouldn't, because the content of this graphic is also poorly conceived. The concept of race that is presented is largely incorrect. Race is a cultural construct based on perceived differences in appearance and ancestry, but is ultimately built on arbitrary geographical distinctions. For example, people of Scandinavian descent tend to look very different than people of Italian descent, but we have culturally decided that they both are white. People of Moroccan descent tend to look very different than people of Nigerian descent, but we have culturally decided that both are Black. Furthermore, people of Italian and Moroccan descent sometimes look fairly similar to one another, but since we have decided that they belong to two different races, we treat them differently in western culture. This should make it clear that the sentence "anyone who is the same color as you is also the same race" is unequivocally false. Finally, to bring it back to the poor construction of this graphic: almost all of the examples don't use race/ethnicity in a way that distinguishes them from one another. In all but one example, the sentence would retain its meaning if you switched race and ethnicity (the one about Turks and Uzbeks would not because it is talking about specific cultures). While I appreciate this attempt to help people understand an important distinction, I think this topic is just a bit more complex than can be well-conveyed in an infographic.

I am a little bit surprised at the answers in this thread and now I'm wondering if my understanding of these words is inaccurate. I think this infographic is flat out wrong in using the word nationality to explain ethnicity. The way I've always explained to my students, the real contrast is nationality vs ethnicity. Race, as other people mentioned, is an outdated concept, but it has a lot more in common with ethnicity than nationality. Nationality is a legal status. Ethnicity is about origins and background. This is specially important in countries like Russia where a lot of Russian nationals (i.e. citizens of Russia, often born in Russia) have non-Russian ethnicities (i.e. their ancestors originally came from and have traditions/phenotypes associated with different places/tribes), such as Ukrainian, Tatar, Buryat, Kazakh, Uzbek. I also don't think it's accurate to say ethnicity can be self-identified. I would say that incorporating elements/traditions of a certain culture without having any sort of genetic heritage is probably not enough to characterize a person's ethnicity. This is not to invalidate multicultural backgrounds; my point is that in such a situation other words (such as culture, traditions) would be required to explain one's identity.

It’s similar to confusion around sex and gender—objective biological composition and one’s perception of themselves. Like in sports the only thing that matters is physical composition of the body that will perform the exercise. Beyond that one may consider themselves an assault helicopter, but unless they start shooting rockets, they by definition can only be either male or female.

As someone is multi-ethnic and mutli-racial, I can say that this goes beyond mere linguistics. I speak Spanish because my family is Puerto Rican, but I have coily hair because I am Black. It can also be confusing because in the U.S., due to the legacy of segregation and slavery, Black is a race and ethnicity (the ethnicity would refer to cultural traditions specific to Black New Yorkers for example. African American is also an ethnicity but maybe or maybe not a race in many people's perspectives, all of this changes depending on who you ask. The definitions of these words change because they are intensely political, because race and ethnicity are both cultural, but race is much more defined by broader society, so you begin to see a lot of cracks based on perception. As an example, many Latino people in the US accept Latino as a racial identifier because it is how they are perceived and grouped in the United States, it varies much more throughout Latin America however. The terms are also not separate, every ethnic group draws their own racial lines and in some cases race doesn't really exist as a concept. (Ironically, this does not mean racism doesn't because racism is an American English word based on white Americans' perspective of race, so the concept captures a much broader definition of mistreatment based on social classifications derived from perceived differences).

Well in the U.S. whenever I had to fill out the forms, the only two ethnicities were “Hispanic” or “Not Hispanic.” Which still gets a chuckle out of me to this day. Ultimately this discussion goes beyond the scope of learning English, and you will find that everyone has a different viewpoint and varying levels of hostility towards those opinions they deem incorrect.