Hondurans in the Us
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Immigrants from many different nations contribute to the United States growing Latino population, and they bring with them a wide range of cultural and economic experiences and values. Honduran Americans are a very diverse group. They include those of Spanish, mixed, Mayan, black Carib, African, Palestinian and Chinese ancestry, among many others. (3)
There is no particular stereotype of the Honduran American in this country. However, this lack of specific prejudice is part of the prejudice. More established non-Hispanic Americans, when they exhibit prejudice, like to lump all Hispanic Americans together, contributing to the racist notion that all Hispanics are alike. Some will refer to Latin American immigrants derogatorily as “wetbacks,” as economic refugees who “all swam the Rio Grande to live off of the United States.” So, the fact that Honduran Americans are rarely if ever singled out as an undesirable group does not mean Hondurans are free from prejudice; instead, that fact may only suggest ignorance of Latin American people and differences between their countries.(2)
The number of Hondurans in the U.S. in 2006 was estimated at 490,317 .(4)
According to the U.S. Census, 33.7 percent described themselves as being in service occupations, which include waitering, other restaurant work, janitorial work, and work in laundries and retail stores. Only 24.2 percent of the immigrants who arrived before 1980 are in that industry. Of those who came during the 1980s, 27.3 percent were operators, fabricators, and laborers; for those who came before, only 18.7 percent fit in that category. Those who came before 1980 are more heavily represented in managerial and professional specialty occupations, 14.6 percent as opposed to 5.6 percent for the newer
arrivals. The contrast in public administration is similar, with a ratio of three percent for established Honduran Americans to one percent for newer arrivals; the same is true of educational services, the ratio being 4.9 percent to 2.4 percent.(2) These figures demonstrate the trend towards self-improvement as Honduran Americans establish themselves in the United States. While new arrivals have traditionally entered fields involving basic labor, established Honduran American immigrants have shown impressive success in moving into more lucrative professions. (1)
Many Honduran Americans are migrant farm laborers, and their number is difficult to measure since many of them are undocumented residents. The 1990 Census records 1,272 working-age people in farming, forestry, and fishing operations, but