The Making of Racial and Ethnic Categories: Official Statistics Reconsidered

One of the most striking features of the end of the twentieth century was the resurgence of the ethnic question in public debates, both in developing and in developed countries. Between conflicts and wars interpreted from an ethnic perspective (the Balkans and central Africa), nationalist struggles (the Basque country, Quebec and Belgium), and demands for recognition and political representation by new ethnic minorities resulting from immigration, every country is currently affected by what is commonly known as cultural pluralism (Hobsbawm 1993; Dieckhoff 2000; Faist 2009; Simon and Piché 2013). This ‘ethnic renewal’, to coin the expression used to qualify the growing interest for ethnic diversity in the 1960s in the US, is not only driven by a sort of obsession for cultural differences as an explanation for all kinds of social and political phenomenon. It derives from different legacies: from the increasing diversity of the population of countries that have undergone large immigration flows to the long lasting cohabitation of national minorities within modern Nation states, from the history of slavery to the post-colonial era. This resurgence or extension of the salience of ethnicity in most of the societies around the world can be found not only in public discourses, policy-making, scientific literature and popular representations, but also in the pivotal realm of statistics. Indeed, at the turn of century, an increasing number of countries are processing routinely data on ethnicity or race of their population. This is precisely what this book is about: ethnic and racial classifications in official statistics, as a reflection of the representations of population and an interpretation of social dynamics through different lenses

Prevalence and Predictors of Abnormal Liver Enzymes in Young Women with Anorexia Nervosa

OBJECTIVE: To determine the prevalence and predictors of abnormal liver enzyme levels in ambulatory young women with anorexia nervosa (AN). STUDY DESIGN: In this cross-sectional study of 53 females with AN, serum concentrations of liver enzymes and hormones were measured. Anthropometric, dietary, and body composition information was collected. Correlational analyses were performed between liver enzyme concentrations and these variables. RESULTS: Elevated alanine aminotransferase (ALT) and gamma-glutamyltranspeptidase (GGT) levels were found in 14 subjects (26%) and 5 subjects (9%), respectively. ALT and GGT were inversely correlated with body mass index (r = −0.27 to −0.30, p ≤ 0.049) and percentage body fat (r = −0.36 to −0.47, p ≤ 0.007), but showed no relationship with lean body mass. Subjects with percentage body fat < 18% had higher ALT levels than those above this threshold (median 26.5 vs. 18.0 U/L, p = 0.01). Liver enzyme concentrations did not correlate with dietary variables, except for GGT and percentage of calories from protein (r = 0.28, p = 0.04). CONCLUSIONS: Serum ALT and GGT concentrations are inversely related to adiposity in young women with AN. Future studies are needed to determine if these liver enzyme elevation signify unrecognized, clinically relevant liver disease