Ethnic studies refer to studies of so-called racialized people in a particular country or region. It involves an interdisciplinary approach in terms of studying the history and culture of various colored people or various races in a particular region. In the case of the US, Ethnic studies involve courses that relate to the actual stories of American Indians, African Americans, Orientals, among many others that have lived and settled in the US in the ancient times. The study of the various races and supposed ethnicity of groups in the US came about in the second half of the 20th century as a response to various criticisms that most history books or stories of various cultural groups were written under European influence or with a Eurocentric perspective. For ethnic studies that evolved from various writings of the past, these are now based on the things that happened in the past to various cultural groups according to their own accounts or terms.

The curriculum for ethnic studies at various schools across the US for example are formed based on the primary assumption that people’s race or racism ideas are very influential in terms of social and cultural development both in the past and even in the present. Many historians and archaeology experts for example believe that what has been defined in the past socially and culturally for all African Americans, Latinos, and Native Americans continue to become the basic influence of how they are treated and perceived in modern times. with this basic assumption, ethnic studies focuses on the different aspects of the lives of racialized people in the past and in the present. Their untold stories about their triumphs and struggles were documented using an interdisciplinary approach to come up with facts that are actually based on how these people lived according to their own terms and not within the perspective of being ruled by more powerful races like those of the European race for example.