1997
Revisions to the Standards for the Classification of Federal Data on Race and Ethnicity
5. Comments on Recommendations for Terminology
Comments on terminology largely supported the Interagency Committee's recommendations to retain the term "American Indian," to change "Hawaiian" to "Native Hawaiian," and to change "Black" to "Black or African American." There were a few requests to include "Latino" in the category name for the Hispanic population.
Revisions to the Standards for the Classification of Federal Data on Race and Ethnicity | The White House
From a Blog:
If you do not want to read all of this, the term "African American" emerged in the 1980s. I remember that too. Prior to that, the term used to classify the race of African Americans was"Black". Prior to "Black", which emerged in the mid 60's, the term used was "Colored" which began after the return of Vietnam Vets. Prior to colored, the term used was "Negro" which began in the north where the slaves were free.
When Did the Term "African American" arise in the US? - whereabouts's Blog - Blogster
From Answer . com
A poem by the name of "I Can" created the term African American in 1987. The poem was written by Johnny Duncan. It appeared in The 1987 Black History Calendar, and all subsequent editions through 1993.
Read more:
Answers.com - Where did the term African-American originate
From the New York Times
'African-American' Becomes a Term for Debate
"I've had to check several different boxes in my lifetime," said Donna Brazile, 44, Al Gore's campaign manager in the 2000 presidential race. "In my birth certificate I'm identified as a Negro. Then I was black. Now I readily check African-American. I have a group of friends and we call ourselves the colored girls sometimes, to remind ourselves that we ain't too far from that, either."
The term African-American has crept steadily into the nation's vocabulary since 1988, when the Rev. Jesse Jackson held a news conference to urge Americans to use it to refer to blacks.
"It puts us in our proper historical context," Mr. Jackson said then, adding in a recent interview that he still favored the term. "Every ethnic group in this country has a reference to some land base, some historical cultural base. African-Americans have hit that level of cultural maturity."
Since 1989, the number of blacks using the term has steadily increased, polls show. In a survey that year conducted by ABC and The Washington Post, 66 percent said they preferred the term black, 22 preferred African-American, 10 percent liked both terms and 2 percent had no opinion.
In 2000, the Census Bureau for the first time allowed respondents to check a box that carried the heading African-American next to the term black. In 2003, a poll by the same news organizations found that 48 percent of blacks preferred the term African-American, 35 percent favored black and 17 percent liked both terms.
'African-American' Becomes a Term for Debate