Mixed Race Studies

Scholarly perspectives on the mixed race experience.

I was taken aback by her verbal slap and had a visceral reaction to it. I punctured the sudden pregnant pause in the room with an assertive, visibly annoyed and equally voluminous, “Yeah, that’s right.” I shot a glance at Gilbert’s brown-skinned daughter across the room, who was smiling an uncomfortable smile of embarrassment. I replied to her smile with a classic rolling of my eyes, which she appeared to enjoy and gestured to me that it was the appropriate response to the offensive remark. Though it was difficult, out of respect for my host, I succeeded in controlling my anger. But I was seething as I exited the room with the racial insult still stuck in my craw. Passing by the food table, I picked up a massive beef rib and moments later found myself absent-mindedly gnawing on it—sitting at a table under the canopy, chatting with my host, who was unaware that anything awkward had just occurred. After making customary small talk, I excused myself, wished Gilbert a happy birthday, and headed for the cultural comfort of my Brazilian friends, in whose multiracial culture of origin, or so they tell me, this incident would probably never have occurred—because most people in Brazil consider themselves mixed-race. As I crossed the street, still seeing only the ignorant woman’s face in my crosshairs, I muttered quietly to myself: “It never ends. It just never f— ends!”

This incident was just the most recent in a lifetime of similar disquieting experiences—actually, many lifetimes of such experiences—in the history of my family, always posing the same question: “Why? Why do they say these things to us?” This deeply personal and perennial question has in large part prompted my interest in the construction of ethnoracial identity within situational contexts. Why have so many of our African American neighbors routinely treated us with such disdain? This vexing question once inspired me to write the following poem entitled, Who Am I? during my early teenage years—circa 1963.

Samuel M. Lemon, “The construction of ethnoracial identity within situational contexts: A study of triracial family histories” (PhD diss., University of Pennsylvania, 2007, ProQuest AAT 3270863): 3-4. http://search.proquest.com/docview/304838296.

American Mixed Race: The Culture of Microdiversity

Posted in Anthologies, Arts, Books, Identity Development/Psychology, Media Archive, Philosophy, Politics/Public Policy, United States on 2009-10-13 20:00Z by Steven

American Mixed Race: The Culture of Microdiversity

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
March 1995
420 pages
6 1/4 x 9 1/4
Cloth ISBN: 0-8476-8012-6 / 978-0-8476-8012-2
Paper ISBN: 0-8476-8013-4 / 978-0-8476-8013-9

Edited by Naomi Zack, Professor of Philosophy
University of Oregon

This exciting multidisciplinary collection brings together twenty-two original essays by scholars on the cutting edge of racial theory, who address both the American concept of race and the specific problems experienced by those who do not fit neatly into the boxes society requires them to check.

List of Contributors
Linda Alcoff, Debra A. Barrath, Jennifer Clancy, Susan Clements, F. James Davis, Abby L. Ferber, Carlos A. Fernandez, Freda Scott Giles, David Theo Goldberg, Susan R. Graham, Helena Jia Hershel. M. Annette Jaimes, Cecile Ann Lawrence, Zena Moore, Maria P.P. Root, Laurie Shrage, Stephen Satris, Carol Roh Spaulding, Mariella Squire-Hakey, Teresa Kay Williams, Bruentta R. Wolfman, and Naomi Zack.

Table of Contents

Introduction – Naomi Zack
Autobiography
- Five Arrows – Susan Clements
- Color Fades Over Time – Brunetta R. Wolfman
- Racelessness – Cecile Ann Lawrence
- Check the Box That Best Describes You – Zena Moore
- What Are They? – Stephen Satris
Art
- From Melodrama to the Movies – Freda Scott Giles
- The Theater of Identity – Teresa Kay Williams
- The Go-Between People – Carol Roh Spaulding
Social Science
- The Hawaiian Alternative to the One-Drop Rule – F. James Davis
- Some Kind of Indian – M. Annette Jaimes
- Exploring the Social Construction of Race – Abby L. Ferber
- Therapeutic Perspectives on Biracial Identity Formation and Internalized Oppression – Helena Jia Hershel
Public Policy
- Grassroots Advocacy – Susan R. Graham
- Testimony of the Association of Multi Ethnic Americans – Carlos A. Fernàndez
- Multiracial Identity Assertion in the Sociopolitical Context of Primary Education – Jennifer Clancy
- Yankee Imperialism and Imperialist Nostalgia – Mariella Squire-Hakey
Identity Theory
- The Multiracial Contribution to the Psychological Browning of America – Maria P. P. Root
- Made in the USA – David Theo Goldberg
- Mestizo Identity – Linda Alcoff
- Race and Racism – Debra A. Barrath
- Ethnic Transgressions: Confessions of an Assimilated Jew – Laurie Shrage
- Life After Race – Naomi Zack

Tags: Abby L. Ferber, Bruentta R. Wolfman, Carlos A. Fernandez, Carol Roh Spaulding, Cecile Ann Lawrence, David Theo Goldberg, Debra A. Barrath, F. James Davis, Freda Scott Giles, Helena Jia Hershel. M. Annette Jaimes, Jennifer Clancy, Laurie Shrage, Linda Alcoff, Maria P. P. Root, Mariella Squire-Hakey, Naomi Zack, Rowman & Littlefield, Stephen Satris, Susan Clements, Susan R. Graham, Teresa Kay Williams, Zena Moore

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American Mixed Race: The Culture of Microdiversity

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