Mixed Race Studies

Scholarly perspectives on the mixed race experience.

Mixed race hegemony, I argue, is the assertion by neoliberals, ethnocentric nationalists, and by some mixed race people themselves that biracial and multiracial individuals and families will lead to the end of a race-conscious and racially-discriminatory society in the United States. In other words ethnic nationalists believe that multiracial people dilute the resources of people of color and strides that have been made as a result of civil rights while neoliberals articulate an ideology of multiraciality as the next logical stage in a “colorblind” or “post-racial” society. On both sides hegemonic ideologies are used to control the way that people of color and whites understand and respond to the growing population that identifies with being of multiple ethnic backgrounds.

Andrew J. Jolivétte, “Obama and the Biracial Factor: an Introduction,” in Obama and the Biracial Factor: The Battle for a New American Majority, edited by Andrew J. Jolivétte (Bristol: The Policy Press, 2012), 4.

Obstructing the right of black humans and white humans to form families is a central feature of American racism…

Posted in Excerpts/Quotes on 2013-11-13 02:41Z by Steven

The problem here isn’t that we think Richard Cohen gags at the sight of an interracial couple and their children. The problem is that Richard Cohen thinks being repulsed isn’t actually racist, but “conventional” or “culturally conservative.” Obstructing the right of black humans and white humans to form families is a central feature of American racism. If retching at the thought of that right being exercised isn’t racism, then there is no racism.

Ta-Nehisi Coates, “Richard Cohen in Context,” The Atlantic, (November 12, 2013). http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/11/richard-cohen-in-context/281426/.