Mixed Race Studies

ROR CHASING COLOR: EP 07 | “Multiracial/Mulatto 2.0”

Revolution of Race
Chasing Color
2017-04-11

Dr. Blair Proctor, Expert Host and Ph.D. Doctorate in Sociology

Pamela Lawrence, Moderator, Founder & Creative Director

The 5th Episode for Chasing Color features a ‘taboo’ discussion about the term ‘mulatto’ versus multi-racial & bi-racial.

Dr. Blair Proctor discusses the term ‘mulatto’ the definition and how this term became a racial slur. In addition, Dr. Blair Proctor breaks-down the social issues that lies with the term multi-racial and how this term doesn’t eliminate systemic racism.

Many topics are discussed to flesh out this particular episode such as Taye Diggs, Meghan Markle currently dating Prince Harry including the One-Drop Rule, trans-racial Rachel Dolezal etc.

Nothing is off limits with this hefty controversial discussion that sought to define this term bi-racial and how it stack up against racism and the system of racism in America.

Listen to the episode (01:13:52) here.

All Mixed Up: What Do We Call People Of Multiple Backgrounds?

Code Switch: Race And Identity, Remixed
National Public Radio
2016-08-25

Leah Donnella

In a country where the share of multiracial children has multiplied tenfold in the past 50 years, it’s a good time to take stock of our shared vocabulary when it comes to describing Americans like me. Jeannie Phan for NPR

It’s the summer of 1998 and I’m at the mall with my mom and my sister Anna, who has just turned 5. I’m 7. Anna and I are cranky from being too hot, then too cold, then too bored. We keep touching things we are not supposed to touch, and by the time Mom drags us to the register, the cashier seems a little on edge.

“They’re mixed, aren’t they?” she says. “I can tell by the hair.”

Mom doesn’t smile, and Mom always smiles. “I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about,” she says.

Later, in the kitchen, there is a conversation…

…‘Multiracial’ or ‘mixed’?

In light of Hall’s paper, “multiracial” was adopted by several advocacy groups springing up around the country, some of which felt the term neutralized the uncomfortable connotations of a competing term in use at that point: “mixed.”

In English, people have been using the word “mixed” to describe racial identity for at least 200 years, like this 1864 British study claiming that “no mixed races can subsist in humanity,” or this 1812 “Monthly Retrospect of Politics” that tallies the number of slaves — “either Africans or of a mixed race” — in a particular neighborhood.

Steven Riley, the curator of a multiracial research website, cites the year 1661 as the first “mixed-race milestone” in North America, when the Maryland colony forbade “racial admixture” between English women and Negro slaves.

But while “mixed” had an established pedigree by the mid-20th century, it wasn’t uncontroversial. To many, “mixed” invited associations like “mixed up,” “mixed company” and “mixed signals,” all of which reinforced existing stereotypes of “mixed” people as confused, untrustworthy or defective. It also had ties to animal breeding — “mixed” dogs and horses were the foil to pure-breeds and thoroughbreds.

Mixed “evokes identity crisis” to some, says Teresa Willams-León, author of The Sum of Our Parts: Mixed Heritage Asian Americans and a professor of Asian American Studies at California State University. “It becomes the antithesis to pure.”…

Read the entire article here.

We Live Here rerun: Being biracial in America

St. Louis Public Radio
90.7 KWMU, KWMU-2, KWMU-3: News That Matters.
Saint Louis, Missouri
2016-03-07

Shula Neuman, Executive Editor

We originally aired this podcast on what its like to be multi-racial about six months ago. The project was the brainchild of Emanuele Berry, one of the founding producers of We Live Here, and it’s still one of our favorite episodes — not just because we miss Emanuele (who is on a Fulbright in Macau, China), but also because the stories and interactions in this podcast are poignant and thought provoking.

Since this originally aired, the question of what it means to be called biracial, or multi-racial came up in the news. Actor Taye Diggs released a book late in 2015 called Mixed Me. It’s a children’s book (his second) that was apparently inspired by his 6-year-old son…

Listen to the story here.

J.R. Reynolds: Say it loud: He’s black and I’m proud

Battle Creek Enquirer
Battle Creek, Michigan
2015-12-07

J.R. Reynolds, Community Columnist

J.R. Reynolds

Until my 2-year-old son is old enough to self-identify racially, I’ve declared him black. I’m raising him African American. Socially and legally. This, despite him being half white. Why? It’s in his best interest. But it’s not without serious, sometimes deadly challenges.

Being black in America has a bad rap. This, according to media, history books, government policy and even statistics. We’re the collective punching bag of mainstream society.

It’s open season on black youth. It’s OK to shoot first and ask questions later. We’re guilty until proven innocent. We’re viewed as a physical threat if we raise our voices in anger. Or throw up our hands to surrender. There’s more…

…So why would a black father like me enthusiastically claim “African American” for his toddler —a moniker that’s historically stigmatized by so many? After all, my son’s mom is white so alternatives exist. Among them: “biracial,” “multiracial” and “other.”…

Read the entire article here.

The Dougla View: The Taye Diggs Mixed Son Controversy

Just Analise: Exploring and Embracing Authenticity in Life, Culture + Business
2015-12-06

Analise Kandasammy

In case you missed it, about a month ago, African-American actor, Taye Diggs caused an uproar all over cyberspace when during an interview he explained how he would hate for his son to be confused about his racial identity, since people would consider him black and not black and white. That omission would deny his son his mother’s racial identity, Diggs argued.

To which I say…

Read the entire article here.

Kansas City Artist Shane Evans, Co-Author Taye Diggs Demystify Mixed-Race Families In New Book

KCUR 89.3
Kansas City, Missouri
2015-12-04

Laura Ziegler, Special Correspondent

Shane Evans at KCUR studios to talk about illustrating new children’s book (Laura Ziegler KCUR)

Kansas City artist Shane Evans was raised by a mother and father whose racial and cultural backgrounds were different from one another. But to Evans they were just mom and dad. He’s also raising a mixed-race daughter.

That’s why Evans was eager to collaborate with his friend, actor Taye Diggs, on a children’s book that takes on the complex issues of growing up in a mixed-race household. Diggs has a six-year-old son with actress and singer Idina Menzel, who is white.

The book, Mixed Me, came out in October. Evans is the illustrator…

Listen to the interview (00:30:46) here.

The controversy has stirred up fresh debate about the divisive issue of biracial self-identification—a divisiveness I, and many other mixed-race people, have experienced firsthand. Personally, as a biracial American, I prefer to be identified as such. But my Establishment colleague, Ijeoma Oluo, who is also biracial, prefers to identify as black.

Neither of us are wrong.

Jessica Sutherland, “Taye Diggs Isn’t Wrong (Or Right) About His Son’s Biracial Identity,” The Establishment, November 20, 2015. http://www.theestablishment.co/2015/11/20/taye-diggs-isnt-wrong-about-his-biracial-identity-and-neither-are-you/.

Taye Diggs Isn’t Wrong (Or Right) About His Son’s Biracial Identity

The Establishment
2015-11-20

Jessica Sutherland, Marketing Director

In October, Taye Diggs released Mixed Me! as a followup to his first children’s book, 2011’s Chocolate Me! While Chocolate Me! was inspired by Diggs’ experiences as a black child in a predominantly white neighborhood, Mixed Me! focuses on the hope he has for his biracial son.

While doing press for the book this month, Diggs (aka my most famous Twitter follower, and probably yours too) enraged a lot of people by choosing to describe his 6-year-old son Walker as biracial, rather than black, in order to acknowledge both of his parents’ cultures (Walker’s mother is the actress/singer Idina Menzel, who is of Ashkenazi Jewish descent)…

…The controversy has stirred up fresh debate about the divisive issue of biracial self-identification—a divisiveness I, and many other mixed-race people, have experienced firsthand. Personally, as a biracial American, I prefer to be identified as such. But my Establishment colleague, Ijeoma Oluo, who is also biracial, prefers to identify as black.

Neither of us are wrong…

Read the entire article here.

When society sees my mixed race children as merely “a lighter shade of black”, it does them a disservice

The Independent
2015-11-24

Dawn Jarvis

My daughter says to me, “Nobody has ever said to me ‘Do you feel white?”

I am a divorced black woman with two mixed race children. Do I want my mixed race children to identify with me as a black woman, or their white father – or both?

The actor Taye Diggs caused a media storm in an interview last week on the website Grio by saying that he teaching his mixed race son to identify with the races of both his parents and he would like him to be identified as mixed and not black. He has been accused of self-hate and being ashamed of being black, which he has refuted in a recent Instagram post.

I shared an article about this on my Twitter feed and got a mixed response which surprised me. Most were positive but, one gave me cause to pause it: “I reckon he should identify with the human race given that’s what he is part of.”

While agreeing that race is a social construct and we are all indeed part of the human race, I didn’t think that response showed any understanding of where Taye was coming from…

Read the entire article here.

Maybe you don’t say you’re black if you’re biracial. But it’s how you’re seen

The Guardian
2015-11-22

Zach Stafford, Contributing Writer
Chicago, Illinois

No matter how I identify or how I feel, it’s my skin color that determines how I’ll be treated

Like every young black man I know, I remember the moment when my parents sat me down for “the talk” about the very real danger that comes from being young, black and male in the US. My mother and step-father sat me down one day when I was about 15 years old and told me that that now that I was getting older, I needed to be careful…

Read the entire article here.