Freida Pinto
Pinto in 2011, photo by Featureflash / Shutterstock.com
Birth Name: Freida Selena Pinto
Place of Birth: Bombay, Maharashtra, India
Date of Birth: 18 October, 1984
Ethnicity: Konkani Indian [Mangalorean]
Freida Pinto is an Indian actress and model. She rose to fame as Latika in her debut film, Slumdog Millionaire. She has also had leading roles in the films Miral, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Trishna, Immortals (2011), Desert Dancer, Love Sonia, Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle, Hillbilly Elegy, and Mr. Malcolm’s List, and television’s Guerilla. She supports humanitarian causes, and has been a global ambasador for Plan International’s Because I am a Girl, and part of non-profit We Do It Together.
Freida is the daughter of Sylvia, principal of St. John’s Universal School in Goregaon, and Frederick Pinto, a senior branch manager for the Bank of Baroda in Bandra, both in West Bombay. She had a middle class upbringing in Malad, North Bombay.
Freida was quoted in an article saying that she is of 100% Indian descent, of Mangalorean Catholic origin. Mangalorean Catholics are also known as Konkani people. Freida’s surname is Portuguese. Many Indians took Portuguese surnames from missionaries who converted them to Christianity.
Freida is married to American photographer Cory Tran, with whom she has a son.
Source: http://www.audreymagazine.com
She is obviously Indian doesn’t look portuguese really!!!! But i thought she looked pretty Mexican or something like that not Portuguese/Spanish/Italian at all !!! I’ve seen some dark Italian/Spanish/Portuguese people with this girl’s skin tone but their features are completley different than hers you can tell this girl has non european features ! Some Southern Europeans who have really tan skin like hers you can still tell are white because of their facial features, body and everything !
@C Yeah India has many ethnicities and stuff, but majority of Indian muslims are surely not Pashtun/Pathan/Afghan! I don’t know where you heard that one from, because statistics show there are only 15,000 ethnic Pashtuns in India, and even most of Pakistan isn’t Pashtun, it has the largest Pashtun population in the world which is 44 million, but still that’s only 25% of Pakistan! Afghanistan is the land where Pashtuns originate and truly come from and we’re 50% Pashtun, the highest in terms of % !! Pakistan has a considerable amount of Pashtuns, but tbh Pakistan should not even be a country as the eastern half east of the Indus river should be given to India since that part of Pakistan is Punjabi/Sindhi who are similar to north indians except religion of course, and the western part is Pashtun and Baloch who are the same as Afghans/Iranians ! So it should be divided up all the eastern half in India, the Northwest in Afghanistan as it was always, and the southwest in Iran !
You just rambled on and on about the Pashtuns and this had little to do with the data that I provided. I said that Pashtuns come originally from Afghanistan and many modern Muslim Indians (ex. Shahrukh Khan) are of Pashtun descent, not Indo-Aryan, though both ethnicities are of the larger Caucasoid race. I am not saying ALL, but am just saying that they are an example of an ethnicity that Indian Muslims are of. I am sure there are other central Asian ethnicities that they belong to as well :)
She doesn’t look Portuguese really, but yeah her name is really portuguese but so are so many black peoples in Brazil it doesn’t make them ethnic portuguese. I think she looks like a Mexican!
She is Indian of India. You said she looks Mexican. Now people can understand why Colombus thought he was in India when he landed in the Americas in 1492!
sha doesn’t look mexican if anything she looks portuguese. don’t forget portugal invaded india.
she doesn’t look Portuguese at all
Okay first of all there is no such ETHNICITY as “Kokani Indian”. That’s like saying someone’s ethnicity is “Texan American”. Kokani is a cultural/language group, and India (like the US and Canada etc.) is made up of more than one ethnic group. It’s not as diverse as these North American countries, but you can still not just say that someone’s “Indian”. The people living in India today are:
1. Indo-Aryans: A caucasian ethnic and cultural group (that were in the beginning all Hindu)- caucasian because they have the same physical features as Europeans, North Africans, Middle Easterners etc.- who migrated initially to NORTH India from around Central Asia, thousands of years ago. Many Indo-Aryans are confused for Southern European (like Spaniards), Italian, or mixed ethnicity (something + European).
Here is a woman of Indo-Aryan descent:
http://www.hairstyles24.com/hairstylepics/celebrity/preity_zinta/preity_zinta_hairstyle_21.jpg
2. Dravidians: Who are thought to be the true first inhabitants of the Indian-subcontinent. I think they are technically also of the caucasian race but are significantly darker in color. Once the Indo-Aryans migrated to North India, most Dravidians fled to South India to avoid conflict. They are also mostly Hindu today, but some converted to Catholicism due to the Portuguese influence in South India (which is why I think Frida is most likely Dravidian- maybe with a mix of Indo-Aryan-since her features are somewhat more European, and she is not as dark-skinned as most South Indian women)
* Google Nandita Das- she in an actress of Dravidian Descent*
3.Pashtuns: Easter-Iranic Ethnic Group (Most Muslims in India are of this ethnicity) that invaded India during the Moghul age I beleive. Most Pakistanis and Afghanis are also of this ethnicty.
4. Mongoloids/Other: Mostly in Eastern India, the people who tend to look more Tibetan or South-Eastern Asian.
SO THIS IS WHY YOU CAN NOT JUST CALL SOMEONE “INDIAN” (in regards to ethnicity). Indian is a nationality NOT an ethnicity.
I am a Canadian OF Indo-Aryan ethnicity. I wasn’t born in India, and have never lived there-don’t have Indian citizenship either. Therefore I am not Indian (not that there is anything wrong with being Indian, I just don’t like having my identity confused, lol).
Hope this clears stuff up for people :)
what about this article on Konkani people?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Konkani_people
The article is on the Kokani people AS a cultural/language group NOT an ethnicity! There is an article on “Americans” as well, but it is on the American people as a nationality and cultural group NOT an ethnicity. A wikipedia article proves nothing in your favor.
OK C, first of all i appreciate your informative comment on this post.
So would you say freida should be Indo-Aryan as her ethnicity?
Thanks for appreciating what I wrote. Most people are unwilling to change what they think when they are presented with differing views and even logical evidence so thank-you :)
And I’m not 100 % sure, but I have a feeling that she is a mix of Indo-Aryan and Dravidian, but probably more Dravidian, as she looks slightly less European and more native to South India. Whatever she is, I like her unique look :)
Seriously, you cannot use these Bollywood women as examples of various Indian subtypes. Do you know how much plastic surgery, skin whitening, and colored contacts these women endorse? Trust me, India is possessed with skin color…the lighter the better. I too am of Indian heritage and have lived there off and on for many years. Frieda is a lovely woman, but is not be the face of all Indians. I see you also left off the “Siddis”…..they are also Indian, but of African heritage, and treated very poorly. BTW, until recently, you would have had dual Indian/Canadian citizenship.
ACTUALLY I have never had dual Indian and Canadian citizenship. I have JUST Canadian citizenship (though there is nothing wrong with having both). You do not know me so I suggest you stop making bizarre claims over my nationality.
I did not mean to leave off the “Sidi” people. I was talking about the major ethnic groups of India today. I meant no offence, but clearly with your comments you did.
This is ridiculous, there is no Indo-Aryan ethnicity. The term is used to represent speakers of Northern and Central Indian languages, a very diverse group of over a billion people.
ACTUALLY INDO-ARYAN IS AN ETHNICITY. I have done extensive research and readings into the Indo-Aryan invasion during my time as a double history major in university, and THERE IS evidence of an invasion from a central asian (Eurasian) people into the northern Indian subcontinent. You can ignore the facts but that will not change them.
Just because 1 billion people speak Indo-Aryan languages does not mean they are of that ethnicity. I can speak French fluently as well as English(my first language) , but that does not mean that I have French or English ancestry.
I am not saying that Dravidian is completely different in terms of ethnicity from the Indo-Aryans because both are of the Caucasoid race, JUST as the English and French are. But if you told a French person that they were actually of English ethnicity since there is not much genetic difference between the two, I have a feeling they would be quite offended.
I believe the Dravidians came from East Africa and looked like Ethiopians or Somalians . I dont think they ever were caucasians. Thats a racial myth and lie. ALSO the Europeans invaded North India much later . Dravidians were very dark Africans. There is no such thing as a chocolate black skinned ccaucasian. In fact Friedo is being cast in an upcoming movie where she plays a half black half white mulatto.
Who gives a —- if she is Portugese ,or not. Pinto is a portugese name. She looks darker than the average portugese person. If she says she is 100 percent Indian Than she is in MY BOOK. Her family may have adopted the name as the portugese colonized the Indian Goa region. It’s my experience that most Portugese do have the olive complexion with dark hair and dark eyes, but not all. Depending on what region your family is from in portugal, or spain. Typically you will see more a germanic type features on people from northern portugal, and spain This is due to the germanic tribes of centries ago. The Moors never made it up to the north, so the north was never influenced by them. Thank god for El Cid! But on the other side of the token if it wasn’t for the dark complected people(moors) we ,the portugese and spaniards would have never had the education and advancement to become a world power then! Either way everyone should be proud of who they are, If they are not, they should read up on their cultural history. There is Beauty in every race.
Average? There is no Portuguese person as dark as her. There’s no denying she isn’t fully Portuguese, but people are arguing she has Portuguese ancestry, and given her European facial features (I know a lot of Indians have Caucasian facial features but hers are very western European/Iberian) it’s very probable. Most of her ancestry of course is Indian.
Of course she has some Portuguese ancestry. It may be diluted, but it’s there. Her facial features have a tad bit of European to it. Mediterranean. Just a tad.