General or umbrella terms

If you’re writing about an individual’s or group’s ethnic background, we recommend that you talk to the subjects about how they describe their identity. This will help you be as specific as possible.

However, there may be situations where it’s not possible or appropriate to include specific details about an individual’s or group’s ethnicity. In these cases, you may need to use a general or umbrella term.

Use minority ethnic when you can’t be specific 

While we recommend avoiding broad categories or labels, if you can’t be specific and need to write more broadly, then at Imperial we prefer that the term ‘minority ethnic’ is used. Depending on context and audience, a general term may be useful. For example:

  • IMPACT is Imperial’s talent development programme for minority ethnic staff.
  • This outreach initiative is aimed at supporting students from a wide range of minority ethnic groups into university.

Again, we recommend only using minority ethnic, and other terms, where ethnicity is relevant to your communication work.

Why use minority ethnic?

We prefer minority ethnic as it recognises the fact that everyone has an ethnicity, but some people are minoritised by society or systems.

In comparison, the term ‘ethnic minority’ puts the emphasis on ‘ethnic’ – a term which has become synonymous with ‘non-White’ in the UK and can have negative connotations.

The problems with general terms

Please be mindful that any general term or umbrella label is limited in its usefulness.

General terms can:  

  • emphasise or focus on certain groups while excluding others
  • portray people as less multifaceted than they are and devalue individual experiences
  • be confusing. People have different understandings of general terms and what they mean – this can cause confusion or mistakes when communicating with your audience.
  • obscure meaningful data insights. You may see general terms, such as ‘Black, Asian and minority ethnic’ (BAME), used as a statistical grouping in a data set, compared against a White group, for example in NHS data. Data collection and statistical analysis (sample size permitting) should seek to move beyond these simplistic general comparisons – otherwise one may fail to recognise disparities between different minority ethnic groups and create misleading interpretations of data. 

General terms should not be used to describe an individual, unless the individual prefers to be identified in this way.  

Other general terms

While we recommend using minority ethnic at Imperial, we recognise that there are a range of other general terms in usage, and individuals and groups may choose to use them. They may also be more appropriate to use in certain contexts.

When using general terms, we would suggest explaining why a particular term has been used and acknowledging its limitations, to create a shared understanding with your audience. 

Other general terms

‘Black, Asian and minority ethnic’ (BAME) and ‘Black and minority ethnic’ (BME) have often been used in the UK in the past as broad racial group labels. One problem is that these terms emphasise certain groups while excluding others, for example White minority ethnic groups such as Roma or Romani people.

While still used in the UK, BAME and BME are becoming increasing unpopular.

As stated at the top of this page, we recommend using the term 'minority ethnic' instead.

However, if these terms are used, then we would recommend that you:  

  • initially use the full term (Black, Asian and minority ethnic) followed by the acronym in block capitals (BAME)
  • avoid writing ‘Bame’ in lowercase and, if reading aloud, spell out the letters ‘B-A-M-E’. These approaches help highlight that the term is an acronym, and not a word in and of itself.

‘People of colour/color’ (sometimes abbreviated to POC or Poc) or ‘Black, Indigenous and people of colour/color’ (BIPOC) are common terms in the USA. While they are now being used more in the UK, they could cause some confusion to a UK-based audience.

In the USA, they have often been used in the past to refer to people of African heritage. They are now being used more inclusively, covering many groups as a general term, and there can be a sense of political identity as well.

It is important to be aware that minority ethnic communities in the UK are majorities in other parts of the world. Black, Asian and minority ethnic groups currently represent approximately 80% of the world’s population, making them the global majority.

The term ‘global majority’, or ‘people of the global majority’ (PGM), has become more popular, as a positive affirmation of the majority representation of these groups in a global context, showing that Whiteness is not the global norm.

It is important to note that this term has not reached a mass consensus. But it is deemed useful by many groups.

White is widely used as a standalone ethnic group descriptor, as well as an umbrella term for many ethnic groups. For example, as was listed in the 2021 census in England and Wales:

  • White English/Welsh/Scottish/Northern Irish/British 
  • White Irish 
  • White Gypsy or Irish Traveller 
  • White Roma 
  • White Other

It is also used in many Mixed ethnic group descriptors including Mixed White/Asian and Mixed White/Black Caribbean.

In the US census, White describes people with “origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa”.

The term ‘Caucasian’ is widely considered an obsolete descriptor, based on the outdated theory of biological race.

In the UK, ‘ethnic’ has often been used synonymously with ‘non-White’. 

The term ‘non-White’ is problematic as the term others all minority ethnic groups into one category and defines them against an assumed White norm or majority. In the past it was often used as a category when working with data, similar to BAME.

Generally, this term is now avoided in the UK.

The term ‘racially minoritised’ reflects an understanding that people are actively minoritised by others, rather than naturally existing as a minority. It recognises that individuals are minoritised through a social process, in contrast to definitions of race based on perceived biological differences.

The term therefore can change on context and audiences’ understanding may difference.

Some people find it helpful to use the term ‘visible minority’ when thinking about or discussing shared experiences.

Different ethnicities may share experiences of racism, that a White minority ethnic group or person may not. For example:

  • someone who identifies as Black and someone who has Indian heritage may share similar experiences being a visible minority in the UK, which a White German-born individual does not.  

You should be aware that the Government of Canada defines a visible minority as ‘persons, other than aboriginal peoples, who are non-Caucasian* in race or non-White in colour’ in the Employment Equity Act. The term is used as a demographic category by Statistics Canada.  

*NB we do not recommend the use of the term ‘Caucasian’. See ‘White’ above.