Rainbow Nation

The New York Times has published An American Mosaic, an interactive map visualising the self-identified ancestry of Americans using data from the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey. The map is accompanied by an article which explores how today's America reflects centuries of immigration and migration.

The map uses colour to show the dominant ancestry in each census tract, drawing on responses from nearly 200 ancestry groups. A search bar lets you jump straight to any city, town or neighbourhood in the United States, or search for a specific ancestry group. Search for Italian, Vietnamese, Basque or Yemeni, for example, and the map highlights where those communities are most concentrated today. Zooming in reveals the ancestry mix of individual neighbourhoods, making it easy to explore how different communities overlap across the country.

The accompanying article, How a Nation of Immigrants Traces Its Roots, makes excellent use of the map to uncover some of the fascinating stories hidden in the data. Animated map transitions reveal the geography of Italian, African American, Scandinavian, Mexican, Chinese, Native American and 'American' ancestry before the article broadens into a history of immigration to the United States, illustrated with historical maps and charts. It concludes by zooming into cities including Los Angeles, Chicago and Honolulu, where colourful neighbourhood maps reveal the extraordinary diversity of modern America.

Also See

CNN's Racial Dot Map of America