MADERA, Calif. — For most people, describing themselves on the U.S. Census form will be as easy as checking a box: White. Black. American Indian.

But it’s not so simple for indigenous immigrants — the Native Americans of Mexico and Central America. They often need more than one box because their ancestry can cover multiple Census categories, and they must also overcome a significant language barrier and a mistrust of government.

The Census Bureau wants to change that in the 2010 count as it tallies immigrant indigenous groups for the first time ever, hoping to get a more complete snapshot of a growing segment of the immigrant population.

In the 2010 Census, the bureau will tabulate handwritten entries specifying that the respondent belongs to a Central American indigenous group such Maya, Nahua, Mixtec or Purepecha. The list of different populations that end up being counted will be made public when results are released in 2011, said Michele Lowe, spokeswoman for the Census Bureau.

“We’re always striving to present an accurate portrait of the American people, and this is part of that effort,” said Lowe.

An accurate count is important to the indigenous groups themselves, and to the federal government, which allocates resources to state and local government according to the results.

The U.S. Department of Labor estimates indigenous migrants make up about 17 percent of the country’s farm workers.

Indigenous organizations are independently working within their own communities to dispel apprehension and encourage participation in the federal survey.

Many have encountered discrimination in their home countries because of their indigenous origin, and in this country for their immigrant status. All this makes them less likely to volunteer sensitive personal information to a government agency.

“In the past, many people wouldn’t want to say they were indigenous,” said Santos Miguel Tzunum Vasquez, from the Asociacion Esperanza Maya Quiche in Florida. “Even I hid it sometimes.”

Vasquez’s organization was founded to help the survivors of a 1997 massacre in a village in Guatemala called La Esperanza. Guatemala’s 36-year civil war left tens of thousands of civilians dead, many of them indigenous civilians who were suspected of helping insurgents.

Vasquez feels safer in the United States — enough to look forward to telling the government of his indigenous background.

“I’m proud of what I am. I am indigenous, I am Maya,” he said. “That is what I will say.”

Hundreds of miles north, in the naval town of Bremerton, Wash., a community of 350 Mam speakers from Guatemala discussed the 10-question form. Hoisting a giant printout of the Census questionnaire, lawyer Andrea Schmitt spoke in Spanish to the group. Mariano Mendoza, a group leader, interpreted in Mam, a tonal Mayan language that about 50,000 people in the world speak.

Schmitt pointed out two questions that will be important for indigenous immigrants: race and ethnicity.

Question 8 asks whether they consider themselves to be “of Hispanic, Latino or Spanish origin.” The next question asks their race. The Census recommends indigenous immigrants from Latin America choose “American Indian or Alaska Native” as their race, then write in the name of their community.

“If everyone agrees to put down Maya, the government will have an idea that in Bremerton there’s a group that is Maya that speaks a language that is not Spanish,” she said.