We propose „New Ethnic Studies“ aiming at positioning wider research on ethnicity in Latin America. We reject trends aiming at the uniqueness and homogenization in migration history. Instead, we support an approach which emphasizes the locally and nationally conditioned circumstances of ethnical identification.In this respect the process of becoming Italian Brazilian could resemble more the one of becoming German Brazilian than Italian Chilean. This approach of historians also reminds that the presence of groups resulting from (im)migration movements challenges the ideas of whiteness, indigenousness and/or blackness, which impact the contruction of national identities.