Mixed Race Studies

Documenting the UK’s Black and Mixed Race Gingers

Vice
2105-08-24

Natasha Culzac

Francis Johnson by Michelle Marshall

How would you describe a typical redhead? Do you think of Julianne Moore: light skinned and beautiful, with rust-coloured hair and a flush of crimson through her porcelain cheeks? Or do you think of Ed Sheeran?

Either way, it’s likely the redhead in your mind is white. Red hair is mainly considered the preserve of northern Europe, a Celtic-Germanic trait. This is what resulted in London-based photographer Michelle Marshall’s quest to capture as many Afro Caribbean redheads as possible as part of her project, MC1R.

MC1R, or Melanocortin 1 receptor if you’re feeling fancy, is the gene responsible for red hair. Mutations in it can cause various degrees of pigmentation. It’ll either work “properly”, causing your hair to get darker, or it will become dysfunctional, not activate and then fail to turn red pigment to brown, causing a build up of red pigment and thus, red hair…

…Dr George Busby from the Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics agrees. He says that the red hair and freckles is the likely result of the historical interactions between Europeans and Africans in the formation of the Caribbean populations – most notably with Brits, as the Spanish and Portuguese went to South America.

George states: “This might also explain why you occasionally see red hair on a black Caribbean person who has two black parents. By chance alone, it might be that they are both carrying a European mutation which has come together in their child.”

Most of Michelle’s subjects have been in the UK, though she’s had a lot of interest in the US and some in mainland Europe. “I’ve got the whole of London on this,” she laughs, when describing her army of spotters…

Read the entire article here.

A Tale of Two Dinners

The Moth: True Stories Told Live
Added: 2015-05-12
Recorded: 1999-04-19

Bliss Broyard

A daughter discovers her father’s painstakingly kept secret.

Listen to the episode here.

My Whiteness And My Blackness Are Not Reconcilable.

RaceBaitR
2015-08-25

Amber Rambharose, Associate Editor
xoJane

Almost any given object can be split in half with each half making up 50% of whole.

I can only think of one exception.

When someone asks if I am half black or half white, I don’t want to give the comfortable response they are looking for. Any answer would imply that my Whiteness and Blackness are equal. Any answer would feel like a betrayal.

It’s a stupid question…

Read the entire article here.

Black Indians Formed the First American Rainbow Coalition

The New York Times
1991-03-17

To the Editor:

“Census Finds Many Claiming New Identity: Indian” (front-page, March 5) discusses whites who now assert their Indian blood, but fails to mention African-Americans who can claim longer and more legitimate ties to America’s Indian heritage. Many in the New York area are pursuing their biracial heritage through such organizations as the National Alliance of Native Americans and radio stations such as WLIB.

The African-native American connection came to light in 1503, when Gov. Nicolas de Ovando of Hispaniola complained to King Ferdinand that African slaves “fled among the Indians . . . and never could be captured.” His words announced our first rainbow coalition. Today almost every African-American family — from Frederick Douglass, Langston Hughes and Alex Haley to Alice Walker, Jesse Jackson and L. L. Cool J — has an Indian branch in its family tree. The statistics are much lower for white Americans…

…William L. Katz
New York
March 6, 1991

The writer, a scholar in residence at N.Y.U., is the author of “Black Indians: A Hidden Heritage” (1986).

Read the entire letter here.

Between black and white Exploring the “Biracial” Experience

Race and Society
Volume 1, Issue 2, 1998
pages 197–212
DOI: 10.1016/S1090-9524(99)80044-8

Kerry A. Rockquemore

Public debate surrounding the 2000 Census has focused on the addition of a multi-racial category. Advocates of this change assume that persons of mixed-race parentage identify as “biracial” or “mixed” and will continue to do so if given the opportunity on government documents. The assumption that most individuals with one Black and one White parent identify as biracial implies that “biracial” identity has a singular meaning. This paper challenges that assumption by asking two questions: (1) what does “biracial” mean to individuals within this population and (2) what social factors may lead to differences in the way these individuals interpret their racial identity. Data from in-depth interviews is used to draw a descriptive map of the multiple ways individuals understand and respond to their biracial-ness. A conceptual model is presented which explores how physical appearance and socio-economic status affect access to different types of social networks and the way that race is socially constructed and experienced within those networks.

Read or purchase the article here.

How Much Black Does It Take to be Considered a Black Woman?

My Black Matters
2015-12-27

Zoe Hobson

Growing up, I heard “what are you” more times then I can keep track of. Out of innocence my natural response started as “American of course”, and quickly turned into a forced smile and a reluctant “I’m mixed”.I never understood why white people were so perplexed with my light skin and kinky curls, I wasn’t a zoo animal, nor was I a gap model that needed constant attention. I was just a child. With the constant stares, and people stopping my white mother, and asking her if I was adopted, I knew from a young age I was different.

Don’t get me wrong, being a biracial woman is a beautiful gift I have received and I would never change who I am with the chance, but the challenges grew as I got older. I think sophomore year of High School is when it got bad. High school became extremely segregated, cliques distinguished themselves by race, what they liked to do, and it stopped being about play dates and the proximity kids lived from each other. We were becoming our own people, forming our own ideas about who we were and who we wanted to become…

Read the entire article here.

Sage Steele Opens Up About Being A Biracial Woman In Sports Media

The Huffington Post
2015-01-21

Justin Block, Associate Sports Editor

Juliet Spies-Gans, Editorial Fellow, HuffPost

Joe Scarnici via Getty Images Sage Steele speaks onstage at the 2013 espnW: Women + Sports Summit at St. Regis Monarch Beach Resort on Oct. 9, 2013, in Dana Point, California.

The ESPN host talks sexism, racism, NBA Saturday Primetime on ABC and that infamous moment with Bill Simmons

Picture the scene: It’s a sweaty, crowded NFL locker room a handful of miles from the heart of Baltimore, a little over a decade ago. There’s a scrum of reporters, trying to inch closer and closer to the prize interview: Ray Lewis. And as the voices shout over one another, urging the linebacker to look every which way, one journalist’s tone differentiates itself from the rest.

It’s the voice of Sage Steele, and as the only woman amid the horde of media members, the octave of her voice allows her to be the one to grab and hold onto Lewis’ attention.

Today, the 43-year-old Steele is known as both the face and the voice of ABC and ESPN’s NBA Countdown. Come Saturday, she’ll be speaking to millions of us through our TV sets, as the host of the new NBA Saturday Night on ABC package. And come June, she’ll ring in the NBA Finals as emcee of the biggest show of the season, working with names like Jalen Rose and Doug Collins to introduce and analyze the league’s marquee event.

But it hasn’t always been like this for Steele. A self-described army brat bullied throughout high school for her biracial background, Steele has dealt with a unique blend of discrimination in her time. One day she’s too white, the next she’s too black. Her curly, un-styled hair is considered either an asset or a detriment, depending on the week. And even as she has received rave reviews for her work with ESPN, she’s anticipating the day when her increasingly grey locks age her out of her job in a way that simply wouldn’t happen to a man.

In a word, she’s surrounded on all sides by -isms. Ageism, sexism, racism — you name it, Steele has felt it. But today, in her 21st year in the biz, the longtime journalist is able to reflect on her time on studio sets and in locker rooms, and decipher where and when those constant currents of isms, don’ts and can’ts have made her stronger, sharper and more apt for the job.

Steele recently spoke with The Huffington Post about everything from the discrimination she’s faced to her relationship with Stuart Scott, from the importance of having thick skin to that GIF of her and Bill Simmons. She’s spent the last two decades in the trenches — those grimy, Gatorade-stained locker rooms of Indianapolis and Baltimore — and now she’s explaining how she was able to stay on her feet through it all, remaining humble, hungry and happy, no matter what…

Read the entire interview here.

Mixed-race children are not ambassadors for anti-racism

Parent24 (News24)
South Africa
2016-01-21

Aneshree Naidoo

Why it’s unfair to lay the responsibility to prove that “love conquers all” on their little shoulders.

The events of the past few weeks have spurred a shift in South Africa, from tight smiles and blank faces at work and dinner tables, to voices now being raised very loudly against racism, and – as is inevitable and still somehow shocking – for it.

One particular act of anti-racism has me quite concerned though.

I have in the past few weeks seen pictures of interracial couples and their mixed-race children, or white families and adopted black children, circulated as ‘proof’ that love conquers all. That some sort of interracial utopia exists when we love and have sex across the colour line and birth biracial children.

It’s a dangerously naive sentiment, and places responsibility on tiny shoulders that do not ask for such, nor need it thrust it upon them…

Read the entire article here.

‘Daily Show’ host Trevor Noah to be a keynote speaker at Dem retreat

Politico
2016-01-22

Lauren French

“Daily Show” host Trevor Noah will be a keynote speaker at the House Democratic Caucus issues retreat next week, sources familiar with the event said.

Noah will join President Barack Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and environmentalist and Democratic donor Tom Steyer in headlining events throughout the three-day policy retreat in Baltimore.

Read the entire article here.

Another Win for a Player Getting in Touch With Her Japanese Roots

The New York Times
2016-01-21

Ben Rothenberg

Naomi Osaka signed autographs after her 6-4, 6-4 victory over 18th-seeded Elina Svitolina at the Australian Open on Thursday. Credit Issei Kato/Reuters

MELBOURNE, Australia — Naomi Osaka (大坂 なおみ) liked to think she had a universal appeal to the crowd that watched her 6-4, 6-4 win over 18th-seeded Elina Svitolina at the Australian Open on Thursday afternoon.

“Maybe it’s because they can’t really pinpoint what I am,” said Osaka, who will play the two-time champion Victoria Azarenka in the third round. “So it’s like anybody can cheer for me.”

Osaka, 18, is coached in the United States by her Haitian-born father, Leonard Francois. She spends little time in her mother’s homeland of Japan, the country she represents in tennis, but received strong support from Japanese fans as she pulled off the upset on Show Court 2.

“I always think that they’re surprised that I’m Japanese,” she said. “So like the fact that there was like Japanese flags and stuff, it was like really touching.”…

Read the entire article here.