Mixed Race Studies

Book Review/Compte rendu: Stanley R. Bailey, Legacies of Race: Identities, Attitudes, and Politics in Brazil

Canadian Journal of Sociology
Volume 35, Number 1 (2010)
pages 189-191

Luisa Farah Schwartzman, Assistant Professor of Sociology
University of Toronto

Stanley R. Bailey, Legacies of Race: Identities, Attitudes, and Politics in Brazil. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2009, 304 pp. paper (978-0-8047-6278-6), hardcover (978-0-8047-6277-9)

Legacies of Race is a must-read for anyone who thinks they understand “race” in Brazil, since it successfully challenges many assumptions in the literature. It is also an important contribution to the literature on racial attitudes in the US, highlighting their distinctiveness. Finally, its discussion of the myth of racial democracy provides food for thought for debates on whether multiculturalist discourse can address emerging issues of racism in Canadian society.

For decades, foreign observers have wondered why the Brazilian Black Movement has had limited success mobilizing Brazilian blacks to fight for their rights, despite the existence of glaring inequalities correlated with skin color. Since the 1970s, social scientists have blamed this lack of black mobilization on the myth of “racial democracy” — the idea of Brazil as a unified mixed-race nation — used by Brazilian elites to downplay the extent of racial discrimination for most of the twentieth century. Scholars argued that black Brazilians failed to mobilize in large numbers because they were duped into thinking that racism was not a problem. Bailey demonstrates that this theory simply does not square with current survey data…

Read the entire book review here.

Spaces of Multiraciality: Critical Mixed Race Theory

University of Toronto
Geography  (B.A.) Program
2010-2011
Course Number: GGRD19H3
 
From Tiger Woods to Mariah Carey, the popular mixed race phenomenon has captured the popular imagination and revealed the contradictory logic of categorization underpinning racial divisions. We will explore the complexities of racial identity formation to illuminate the experiences of those who fall outside the prevailing definitions of racial identities.

For more information, click here.

A portrait of couples in mixed unions

Component of Statistics Canada Catalogue no. 11-008-X
Canadian Social Trends
2010-04-20
pages 68-80

Anne Milan, Senior Analyst
Demography Division

Hélène Maheux, Analyst
Immigration and Ethnocultural Section

Tina Chui, Chief
Immigration and Ethnocultural Section in the Social and Aboriginal Statistics Division

As Canada‘s population continues to become ethnoculturally diverse, there is greater opportunity for individuals to form conjugal relationships with someone from a different ethnocultural background. In this study, a mixed union, either marital or common-law, is based on one of two criteria: either one member of a couple belongs to a visible minority group and the other does not; or the couple belongs to different visible minority groups. Using data primarily from the 2006 Census of Population, this study examines the socio-demographic characteristics of mixed union couples in Canada. Studying mixed unions is important not only because these relationships reflect another aspect of the diversity of families today, but also for their implications in terms of social inclusion and identification with one or more visible minority groups, particularly for subsequent generations.

What you should know about this study

Visible minority status is self-reported and refers to the visible minority group to which the respondent belongs.  The Employment Equity Act defines visible minorities as “persons, other than Aboriginal peoples, who are non-Caucasian in race or non-white in colour.” Under this definition, regulations specify the following groups as visible minorities: Chinese, South Asians, Blacks, Arabs, West Asians, Filipinos, Southeast Asians, Latin Americans, Japanese, Koreans and other visible minority groups, like Pacific Islanders.

Mixed couples refer to common-law or marital relationships comprised of one spouse or partner who is a member of a visible minority group and the other who is not, as well as couples comprised of two different visible minority group members. Mixed couples include both opposite-sex and same-sex couples unless indicated otherwise.

Data used are primarily from the 2006 Census of Population, with comparisons to 2001 data where appropriate. Throughout the paper, both person-level and couple-level data are used.

Person-level data are used for characteristics of individuals in mixed unions, such as age, sex, educational level, immigrant status and mother tongue. Couple-level data are more appropriate when analyzing characteristics of the union, for instance, whether it is a marriage or common-law relationship or if there are children present in the home.

Persons of multiple visible minority group status are individuals who reported belonging to more than one visible minority group by checking two or more mark-in circles on the census questionnaire, e.g., Black and South Asian.

List of Tables

• Table 1: Out-group pairing by visible minority group, 2006
• Table 2: Persons in couples and in mixed unions by visible minority group, 2006
• Table 3: Persons in mixed unions by place of birth and visible minority group, 2006
• Table 4: Persons in couples that were mixed unions by highest level of education, 2006
• Table 5: Census family median income by mixed union status, 2006
• Table 6: Percentage of couples in mixed unions by census metropolitan area, 2006
• Table 7: Children in two-parent families by visible minority status, 2006

List of Charts

• Chart 1: Higher proportion of Arab or West Asian, Black and South Asian men in couples were in mixed unions compared to women from these groups
• Chart 2: Longer history in Canada was associated with higher proportion of persons in mixed unions
• Chart 3: Young adults have highest proportion of mixed unions
• Chart 4: Persons in mixed unions are younger compared to those in non-mixed unions
• Chart 5: Persons in mixed unions have much higher levels of education than those in non-mixed unions
• Chart 6: Allophones in mixed unions reported using an official language at home more than allophones in non-mixed unions

Read the entire report here.

Canada’s mixing pot: Multiracial relationships growing at rapid pace

National Post
2010-04-20

Mary Vallis

The number of Canadians in mixed-race relationships and marriages is rising, still primarily a big city phenomenon, but a trend fuelled in part by romances in small cities, according to a new report released by Statistics Canada on Tuesday.

Between 2001 and 2006, mixed unions grew at a rapid pace (33%), more than five times the growth for all couples (6.0%), the agency says in a new report titled “A Portrait of Couples in Mixed Unions.”

According to the 2006 Census, 3.9% of the 7.4 million couples in Canada were “mixed unions,” meaning either one member of the relationship belonged to a visible minority or that both were members of different visible minorities. Fifteen years earlier, mixed unions accounted for 2.6% of all couples.

Residents of small cities with predominantly white populations like Saguenay, Que., Moncton, N.B., and Thunder Bay, Ont., boasted some of the highest percentages of visible minorities in mixed unions. Nearly 63% of all of the visible minorities in Saguenay had spouses or partners from other backgrounds. Saint John, N.B., Kelowna, B.C., Sudbury and Barrie also ranked high…

To read the entire story, click here.

The identity development of mixed race individuals in Canada

University of Alberta
Spring 2010
131 pages

Monica Das

A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Education in Psychological Studies in Education

The purpose of this study was to explore the identity development of mixed race individuals in a Western Canadian context. The case study methodology was used to guide the overall procedure and participant selection. A thematic analysis was used to analyze patterns in the data. Four individuals of mixed race parentage were interviewed and five themes emerged: (a) the influence of family, (b) the influence of childhood experiences, (c) the influence of physical appearance, (d) the influence of racism, and (e) the influence of adult experiences. The detailed explorations of the participants’ experiences add to the Canadian literature on mixed race identity development, which provides several counselling implications and directions for future research.

Table of Contents

CHAPTER ONE
Introduction

CHAPTER TWO
Literature Review
A Sociological Analysis of Race
A Historical Overview of Race Mixing
A Review of the Contemporary Mixed Race Experience
Identity Development
Racial Identity Development
Mixed Race Identity Development Model
Key Presenting Issues and Counselling Implications
Summary and Research Question

CHAPTER THREE
Methodology
Research Paradigm
Case Study Approach
Participants
Procedure
Data Analysis
Trustworthiness: An Evaluation of the Study
The Researcher
Ethical Considerations

CHAPTER FOUR
Findings from the Within-Case Analyses
Ko
Jessica
Alina
Steven

CHAPTER FIVE
Findings from the Cross-Case Analysis
The Influence of Family
The Influence of Childhood Experiences
The Influence of Physical Appearances
The Influence of Racism
The Influence of Adult Experiences

CHAPTER SIX
Discussion
Implications for Counselling and Education
Future Research Directions
Conclusions
References

Appendix A: Recruitment Handout
Appendix B: Information Letter to Participants and Informed Consent Form
Appendix C: Demographics Form
Appendix D: Interview Guide
Appendix E: Pre-Interview Activity Form

…My interest in this research topic stems from my personal experiences as a mixed race individual. My mother is from Czechoslovakia, my father is from India and I was born and raised in Canada. As a child, I was unaware of terms like interracial marriage or mixed race. Once I became aware of my mixed heritage as a young adult, I became curious as to why my racial and cultural identity were so different from either my Bengali or Czech relatives, or from most of the people around me. As I started to ask questions, I found deep commonalities with other mixed race individuals regardless of their particular racial mix. Additionally, I was amazed at the range and depth of opinions I encountered in casual conversations. It seemed that everyone had an opinion about mixed race individuals.

With this diversity in opinions, I was certain that I would find an overwhelming amount of academic data on the mixed race experience. I did find a significant volume of research on American Black-and-White mixed race people and the American history of anti-miscegenation. However, I was surprised at the minute amount of information available on non-Black-and-White mixed race individuals in general and the Canadian perspective in particular. When given the opportunity to conduct my own research as a Master’s student, I decided to explore the topic of non-Black-and-White mixed race individuals in a Canadian context. I hope that this information can be used to increase awareness of the unique issues that mixed race individuals face.

Consequently, the purpose of the present study is to explore the mixed race experience within its complex contemporary framework. The goal is to investigate the factors that influence the development of a mixed race identity. The information gathered from this study will provide a Canadian contribution to theories relating to racial identity development and a post-modern analysis of race as a socially constructed category. Moreover, this study explores the experiences of mixed race individuals that are not of Black and White parentage, which is a topic that is under-represented in the mixed race literature (Mahtani, 2001). A deeper understanding of the factors that influence the mixed race identity will add to the current literature by enhancing our knowledge of the Western Canadian, non-Black-and-White mixed race individual’s lived experience. Additionally, the results of the present study may help counsellors to increase their own awareness of mixed race issues by encouraging them to challenge any qualms they may consciously or unconsciously harbour about mixed race individuals. Considering the increasing mixed race population, it is important that researchers begin to focus on supportive measures to promote healthy mixed race identity development…

Read the entire thesis here.

One of the Family: Metis Culture in Nineteenth-Century Northwestern Saskatchewan

University of British Columbia Press
2010-02-22
360 pages
Hardcover ISBN: 978-0-7748-1729-5

Brenda Macdougall, Chair in Métis Studies
University of Ottawa

In recent years there has been growing interest in the social and cultural attributes that define the Metis as both Aboriginal and a distinct people. The study of Metis identity formation has also become one of the most innovative ways to explore cultural encounters and change in North American history and anthropology.

In One of the Family, Brenda Macdougall draws on diverse written and oral sources and employs the concept of wahkootowin—the Cree term for a worldview that privileges family and values relatedness between all beings—to trace the emergence of a distinct Metis community at Île à la Crosse in northern Saskatchewan. Wahkootowin describes how relationships in the nineteenth century were supposed to work and helps to explain how the Metis negotiated with local economic and religious institutions while creating and nurturing—through marriage choices and living arrangements, adoption and the selection of godparents, economic decisions and employment—a society that emphasized family obligation and responsibility.

This path-breaking study showcases how one Metis community created a distinct identity rooted in Aboriginal values about family and shaped by the fur trade and the Roman Catholic Church. It also offers a model for future research and discussion that will appeal to anyone interested in the history of the fur trade or Metis culture and identity.

Table of Contents

• List of Illustrations
• Acknowledgments
• Note on Methodology and Sources
• Note on Writing Conventions
• Introduction
• Chapter One: “They are strongly attached to the country of rivers, lakes, and forests”: The Social Landscapes of the Northwest
• Chapter Two: “The bond that connected one human being to another”: Social Construction of the Metis Family
• Chapter Three: “To live in the land of my mother”: Residency and Patronymic Connections Across the Northwest
• Chapter Four: “After a man has tasted of the comforts of married life this living alone comes pretty tough”: Family, Acculturation, and Roman Catholicism
• Chapter Five: “The only men obtainable who know the country and Indians are all married”: Family, Labour, and the HBC
• Chapter Six: “The HalfBreeds of this place always did and always will dance”: Competition, Freemen, and Contested Spaces
• Chapter Seven: “I Thought it advisable to furnish him”: Freemen to Free Traders in the Northwest Fur Trade
• Conclusion
• Appendix
• Glossary
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index of Names
• Index of Subjects

Miscegenation Facts […From 1879]

Daily British Colonist
Vicoria, British Columbia
1879-10-07
21st Year
Page 1, 2nd Column

David W. Higgins, Editor and Proprietor

The child of colored parents of different tints, such as quadroon and mulatto, or mulatto and black, will be nearer to the tint of the darker parent.  If both parents of the same color, the child will be a shade darker, and singularly enough, the second child will be darker than the first, the third darker than the second, and so on to the last. In other words, a colored community, left to itself, is fatally destined to return to the original African black after a limited number of generations.  Thus, while each alliance with an individual of pure Caucasian blood brings the negro a step nearer to the white standard, the reverse is the case the moment the Caucasian element is withheld, and the color retrogrades from light to dark…

Continue reading the “facts” in this article here.

My People Will Sleep for One Hundred Years: Story of a Métis Self

University of Victoria
2004
106 pages

Sylvia Rae Cottell, B.F.A.
Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design

A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts in the Department of Educational Psychology and Leadership Studies at the University of Victoria.

“My people will sleep for one hundred years when they awake, it will be the artists who give them their spirit back.”
Louis Riel

As a result of the current political debate that surrounds the definition of Métis, the issue of Métis identity on both community and individual levels is often challenged in a public forum. Metis people outside of the areas considered the main hubs of Metis culture are likely to be faced with a myriad of different factors that impact their identity, including lack of community connections and limited contact with Métis cultural influences. There is a need to openly voice the diverse experiences of being Métis in order to affirm the experiences of many Métis people. This autoethnographic study aims to provide an account of an experience of being Métis and to salvage a sense of identity after many generations of assimilation. Autoethnography provides the freedom necessary for the representation of cultural values that are beyond the traditional assumptions of academic discourse (Spry, 2001) and aims to engage the reader on an emotional level. A purpose of this study is to validate the experience of many Métis readers and to enhance the level of culturally relevant practice provided to Métis individuals and communities by counsellors.

Read the entire thesis here.

Metis Identity Creation and Tactical Responses to Oppression and Racism

Variegations Journal
University of Victoria, Canada
Volume 2 (2005)
ISSN: 1708-9840

Cathy Richardson
Indigenous Governance
University of Victoria, Victoria, Canada

As one of Canada’s founding Aboriginal people (Department of Justice Canada, 1982), the Metis exist at the periphery of the Canadian historical, cultural and social landscape. Today, the Metis are starting to write themselves into larger historical and social sciences narratives, reclaiming their right to inclusion and belonging after generations of living “underground” without public cultural expression. The Canadian Metis are an Aboriginal group who celebrate their mixed ancestry and identify with a unique Metis culture.  This culture evolved and crystallized after the Metis lived together for generations, mixing and mingling with other Metis of both English and French-speaking origins. Due to the forces of colonization, the Metis exist as marginalized Aboriginal people living between a number of cultural worlds within the larger Euro-Canadian society. In “Becoming Metis: The Relationship Between The Sense of Metis Self and Cultural Stories” (Richardson, 2004), I elucidate various tactics used by Metis people to create a personal and cultural identity. In this paper, I draw on this work to present some of the socio-political conditions that set the context for a Metis tactical identity development.

I present and discuss some of the responses enacted by key Metis interview participants in the process of creating a “sense of Metis self.” These tactical responses were, and are, performed by Metis people who are trying to balance their need for safety and inclusion with a need to live as cultural beings in a European Canada. I term the responses “tactical,” as opposed to “strategic,” in response to an important distinction between oppressor and oppressed in colonial societies. Political strategies and strategic responses tend to be developed for long-term use by those in political positions of relative power, on secure ground whereas tactical responses tend to be developed “on the move,” as short-term acts to attack political oppression. For example, General [Frederick Dobson] Middleton implemented strategic military plans to defeat the Metis, while Louis Riel and Gabriel Dumont employed tactical acts in response to Middleton’s attacks. Finally, after discussing various tactical responses, I close with some explanations about how Metis people have developed a third space to create a Metis cultural identity…

Read the entire article here.

The role of Japanese as a heritage language in constructing ethnic identity among Hapa Japanese Canadian children

Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development
Volume 30, Issue 1 (February 2009)
pages 1-18
DOI: 10.1080/01434630802307874

Hiroko Noro, Professor of Pacific and Asian Studies
University of Victoria, Canada

Today, Japanese Canadians are marrying outside of their ethnic community at an unprecedented rate, resulting in the creation of a newly identifiable group of ‘Japanese Canadians’ borne from these interracial unions. Members of this emergent group are increasingly being referred to both by social scientists and self-referentially as Hapa. This term, originally a Hawaiian term, is now a common and empowering tool of self-identification for people of mixed ethnic heritage. Recent sociological research argues that, while the notion of a shared Hapa identity exists, it is less rooted in individual members’ physical appearance or cultural identification and more rooted in their experiences, parental upbringing, and the locality/environment in which they grew up.

Read or purchase the article here.