Mixed Race Studies

Psychoanalysis and Interraciality: Asking Different Questions

Psychoanalysis, Culture & Society
Volume 12, Issue 3 (2007)
pages 205–225
DOI: 10.1057/palgrave.pcs.2100121

Annie Stopford, Ph.D., Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist and Adjunct Research Fellow
University of Western Sydney, Sydney, Australia

In this article, the author questions psychoanalytic responses to interracial relationships and subjectivity. She argues that much psychoanalytic discussion on interraciality has been shaped by denial and repression of race, fears of miscegenation, and normative assumptions about the superiority of endogamy. From the perspective of hybridity studies and analytic frameworks predicated on the primacy of relationality, it is time to ask different psychoanalytic questions.

Introduction

In recent years there has been a marked increase in discussion about race, racism, and racialized subjectivity in psychoanalytic literature. One area of “race relations” which requires more attention, however, and a different kind of attention from that which it usually receives, is the area of interracial intimacy. In this article, I raise some questions about psychoanalytic responses to interracial sexual intimacy and interracial subjectivity. I argue that historical psychoanalytic responses to interracial desire, intimacy, and subjectivity were shaped by denial and repression of race, and by (unconscious) fears of miscegenation. In addition, I argue that psychoanalytic writers, past or present, who overtly or implicitly pathologize interracial desire deny full subjectivity to those in interracial relationships and of interracial parentage, inadvertently perpetuate forms of racial segregation, and mandate endogamy as the proper choice of “healthy” individuals. When informed by the insights of hybridity/critical mixed race studies and contemporary psychoanalytic frameworks embedded in notions of relationality and intersubjectivity, however, psychoanalytic perspectives can provide important insight into the intersubjective complexities, subtleties, and specificities of interracial desire and intimacy.

The article begins with some background information and discussion on general historical attitudes toward miscegenation, and the relatively recent emergence of hybridity/mixed race studies. I then show how “anti-miscegenism” permeates psychoanalysis, first by looking at the historical picture and the implications of covert racist and colonialist formulations for interracial couples and individuals, and then by examining some contemporary psychoanalytic writing on white desire for black bodies. In order to illustrate and elaborate some key issues, I utilize extracts from my research interviews with women and men who are or have been in intimate interracial relationships.

The interviews I draw on for this article are part of a wider psycho-social research project on transculturation in intimate African and non-African relationships, involving a series of conversations with 20 African and non-African women and men over a period of 2 years. There were several dominant themes in the narratives of my interlocutors, one of which was the responses of family, friends, and observers to their “mixed race” marriages, relationships, and children. I decided in the early stages of the research that I would try to let the data direct theoretical exploration, and this article is one outcome of this process (see also Stopford, 2004, 2006a, 2006b)…

Read the entire article here.

Mothering Children of African Descent: Hopes, Fears and Strategies of White Birth Mothers

The Journal of Pan African Studies
Volume 2, Number 1 (November 2007)
pages 62-76

Annie Stopford, Ph.D., Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist and Adjunct Research Fellow
University of Western Sydney, Sydney, Australia

Introduction

It is often acknowledged that African identities are “complex, contested and contingent,” and that these negotiations and contestations are conducted in many locations around the globe (Ahluwalia and Zegeye 113). However, there has been little discussion thus far about the role of non-African parents of mixed African-Western children in these processes. In many parts of the world where the African Diaspora has spread, there are increasing numbers of children being born to African and non-African parents, particularly (but not only) African fathers and non-African mothers of diverse ethnicities. Non-African parents may play a significant role in facilitating, supporting, or obstructing their children’s positive identifications and associations with Africa and “Africanness,” especially if and when the marriage or relationship breaks down and the child or children reside with the non-African parent.

In this article, I use extracts from interviews with white Australian birth mothers of African Australian children to explore how they negotiate some of the complexities, challenges, and rewards of mothering children of African descent. I argue that the contributions of non-African mothers of African-other children add an important dimension to discussions about the complexities of postcolonial and Africana hybrid identities. The article begins with a description of empirical data sources, some information about the field of research, and an exploration of the theoretical underpinnings of the discussion. This is followed by a discussion of some issues described by research participants, with an emphasis on narratives about lived experience and intersubjective dynamics. The article concludes with a brief reflection on the implications of these narratives.

…The Research Field

Despite the plethora of recent literature about interracial and postcolonial subjectivities, there has been little in-depth discussion thus far about mothering children of mixed cultural, ethnic, and racial descent. The focus of discussion in mixed race and hybridity studies tends to be on the children of couples of mixed cultures and races, rather than the parents themselves, and the damage done by racist and essentialist discourse to the children of those people who cross “the color line,” especially black/white relationships.

There have, however, been some studies of mixed race and culture families that focus on the parents and their responses to their children (Phoenix and Owens 158-177; Dalmage 1-32). There has also been some feminist and critical race research and discussion specifically about or by white mothers of African descent children in Western locations, and white mothers of African descent children living in Africa, with a particular emphasis on the way white mothers resist racism and try to foster positive identifications with blackness (Reddy 43-64; Lazarre 21-51; Twine 729-746, 878-907; Adomako Ampofo In My Mother’s House). Because fighting racism and fostering Africana identities are of course inextricably linked, I see this research as continuing the work of the aforementioned writers.

Read the entire article here.