SEVERAL years ago, I attended a conference on nationalism and ethnic identification. At the beginning, we all introduced ourselves. I was early in line and I told my story of academic affiliation and interest and why I was writing on this topic. The next person told the story of his own ethnic identity and he suggested we all do likewise because we must all have strong identifications. Of one thing he was virtually certain—none of us was merely American, which he said was an empty category. Every- one after him then gave an ethnic identity. As he suspected, all had very strong identifications as French-American, Armenian-American, South- African-white-reluctantly-sliding-into-American, Jewish-American, and emigré Russian. Many, maybe most, were born outside North America or were first-generation North Americans. At the completion of the cir- cle, I was asked to divulge my story. The best I could do was say I was American—I was in the empty category. Everything else in my past and heritage had blended into nothing distinctively recognizable or motivat- ing. The nearest thing to an identity I would really claim was roughly the academic identity I had given. Even that one is fractured—I am almost always engaged in bringing the normative and the positive together against the best intentions of virtually all my colleagues. But at that con- ference I was twice over an outsider—I was not even in the group of those who took pleasure and strength from membership in some ethnic group.