Mixed Race Studies

African American Exceptionalism and the Truth Behind the Rage over Zoe Saldaña Playing Nina Simone

Upliftt: Latinos in Film, TV and Theater
2015-11-09

William Garcia

In a recent article from the Huffington Post, Zoe Saldaña talks about the Nina Simone biopic that has been controversial all over the Black blogospheres. Saldaña said: “the people behind the project weren’t my cup of tea.” She also said, “the director was fine but there was a lot of mismanagement.”

On June 11th 2015, during an InStyle magazine interview, Zoe Saldaña said: “I think I was right for the part, and I know a lot of people will agree, but then again I don’t think Elizabeth Taylor was right for Cleopatra either.” Those comments may seem, in a sense, post-racial, especially after defending African-American actor, Michael B. Jordan, for playing the Human Torch in the Fantastic Four Film.

The Black Movement in the United States has only paid a particular attention to blackness—leaving out Afro-Latinos as “not being really black.” Being Black in the U.S is equated with being African-American in a time where there is a continuous migration from Africa, the Caribbean and Afro-Latin America. The Black Movement in the U.S invisibilizes Afro-Latinos amongst other Afro-descendants in a time when all Black Lives Should Matter. Many African-Americans in the U.S created a controversy over Zoe Saldaña playing Nina Simone. There were several articles published infuriated with her allegedly “playing a blackface” and being a self-loathing Dominican–although most of these articles also forget she is half Puerto Rican. During a Hip-Hollywood.com interview, Zoe Saldaña clearly states she identifies as a Black woman, but that comment was omitted from many conversations…

Read the entire article here.

Medicalizing Racism

Contexts
Fall 2014, Volume 13, Number 4
pages 24-29
DOI: 10.1177/1536504214558213

James M. Thomas, Assistant Professor of Sociology
Department of Sociology and Anthropology
University of Mississippi

Cassandra Conlin

Sociologist James M. Thomas (JT) examines how public and scientific accounts of racism draw upon medical and psychological models, and how this contributes to our understandings of racism as a medical, rather than social, problem.

In June of 2013, Riley Cooper, a wide receiver for the NFL’s Philadelphia Eagles, was caught on video at a Kenny Chesney concert shouting, “I will jump that fence and fight every nigger in here, bro!” After a massive public uproar about the scene, Cooper, who is white, released a statement announcing that he would speak with “a variety of professionals” in order to ”help me better understand how I could have done something that was so offensive, and how I can start the healing process for everyone.” His team excused Cooper from activities so that he could get expert help to “understand how his words hurt so many.”

It was hardly the first time a high-profile figure sought professional counseling after being associated with an act of public racism. In 2006, while performing at a West Hollywood comedy club, Michael Richards, best known as Kramer from the hit television series Seinfeld, lashed out at hecklers, referring to them as “niggers.” Afterward, Richards’ publicist quickly issued a statement announcing that his client would seek psychiatric help. Paula Deen, Mel Gibson, and John Rocker also pledged publicly to seek treatment for their racism—reflecting a growing tendency to frame racist acts as a mental health issue.

Cassandra Conlin

How did racism come to be seen as psychopathological, and how might that understanding influence efforts to combat racism? With that question in mind, I examined mainstream print media, and conference proceedings, presidential addresses, and debates within the American Psychiatric Association from the period immediately following World War II through the present. I also analyzed public speeches by civil rights activists from the late 1950s through the early 1970s

Over time, this research shows, experts expressed growing concern about the psychopathological consequences of racism on victims, and the effects of being racist—a mental health discourse that is transforming our understanding of the nature and causes of racism. In this medicalized model, new protocols focus on treating those who suffer from the condition of racism. It is an understanding that reflects the “new racism” of the post-civil rights era…

Read (for free for a limited time) the article here.

Who’s telling who to STFU at American universities? Observations on teaching at a HWCU.

Historiann: History and sexual politics, 1492 to the present
2015-11-21

Ann M. Little, Associate Professor of History
Colorado State University

Ah, yes: freedom of speech. What some really mean when they evoke it is, “my right to have my say and not have you talk back,” like all of those crybabies who have cancelled their appearances at commencement ceremonies in the last few years because not every student and faculty member greeted their future appearance on campus with hugs and cocoa and slankets.

If you really believe in liberty of speech, then stop telling others to STFU. In my view, the people who are being criticized most vigorously for speaking up lately at Yale and the University of Missouri are all too often quiet about their experiences, silent on campus, and eager not to draw attention to themselves, and it’s these students whose voices we need to listen to the most.

Too many people have zero imagination about what it is to be African American or Latin@ on a historically white college or university (HWCU) campus. But everyone who has ever attended or taught or worked at a HWCU knows that African Americans on HWCUs are viewed with suspicion just for being there, let alone when they try to unlock their own damn bikes or organize a protest about their marginalization…

Read the entire article here.

Taye Diggs’ brave defense of his half-white son

The New York Post
2015-11-19

David Kaufman

Actor and singer Taye Diggs might be black, but he wants folks to understand that his son, Walker, isn’t — at least not entirely. That’s the message he’s been shopping around as part of a tour to promote his new children’s book, “Mixed Me.”

The tome is both inspired by and intended for kids like 6-year-old Walker, whose mother — Diggs’ former wife, Idina Menzel — is Caucasian. As Diggs sees it, Walker isn’t black, he’s biracial. And both whites and blacks seem equally invested in denying it.

A similar situation befell President Obama — whose mother was white and who decided early in his career to opt in to blackness at the expense of his white half.

Diggs’ decision to embrace his son’s biracial identity is brave — particularly for an African-American. For while America’s “one-drop” rule may have been established by white segregationists, it’s often been embraced by blacks themselves.

Stung by racism and seeking political potency (and safety) in numbers, blacks want to keep as many folks in their fold as possible — all black, half-black or whatever. How else to explain why black leaders were some of the most vocal opponents of the introduction of a “multi-racial” category in the 2000 US Census?

Then there’s the common black contention that all African-Americans are of “mixed” ancestry as a result of miscegenation during slavery. That might be true, but Diggs is speaking of his son being “biracial” — not “multi-racial”; his book focuses on kids whose parents are of two entirely different races, not mixes of many.

For whites, meanwhile, “one drop” helps them do what they’ve always done best — protect their privilege by any means necessary. To them, it’s not so much about who is Caucasian, but rather making it clear who isn’t. This is where “one-drop” comes in — to shut their biracial brethren out of the cultural, historical and economic benefits of whiteness…

Read the entire article here.

Check Both! Afro-Latin@s and the Census

NACLA: Reporting on the Americas Since 1967
2010

Miriam Jiménez Román

Earlier in 2010 a series of public service announcements circulated on the Internet in anticipation of the U.S. Census. The three short videos, produced and disseminated by the afrolatin@ forum, a New York–based educational nonprofit, urged Latin@s to identify both racially and ethnically, to “Check Both” on the census form. Targeting Black Latin@s, the campaign sought to challenge the prevailing notion of Latin@s as uniquely exempt from standard racial categories. By claiming both national origins and Black identity, Afro-Latin@s assert the continuing significance of race, both within Latin@ communities and in the broader society. At the very least, being counted on the census as Black and Latin@ brings attention to a social group that has long been invisible and subject to ongoing social and political marginalization…

…Latin@s may well be the only social group in the world who so emphatically insist on their ethnoracial mixture. But even as mestizo, or mixed identity—expressed variably as raza, “rainbow people,” or “mutts”—is a commonplace collective designation, Latin@s are also understood to be “of any race.” This apparent contradiction can be traced to the convergence of two seemingly distinct racial formations. On the one hand, the national ideologies of our countries of origin emphasize racial mixture and equate it with racial democracy—even as whiteness continues to be privileged, and indigenous and African ancestry are viewed as something to be overcome or ignored. On the other hand, in the United States Latin@s have been allocated an ambiguous racial middle ground that invisibilizes those too dark to conform to the mestizo ideal, while simultaneously distancing them from other communities of color, particularly African Americans…

Read the entire article here.

Once unknown, story of WWII Latino Tuskegee Airman uncovered

Fox News Latino
2015-11-20

Bryan Llenas, National Correspondent

Among the legendary Tuskegee Airmen, America’s first African-American military air squadron which heroically fought in World War II, was a little known about Hispanic pilot named Esteban Hotesse.

Born in Moca, Dominican Republic, but a New Yorker since he was 4 years old, Hotesse served with the Tuskegee Airmen for more than three years before he died during a military exercise on July 8th, 1945. He was just 26.

As a black Dominican, Hotesse was a part of a squadron credited for single-handedly tearing down the military’s segregation policies, while helping to change America’s perception of African-Americans during the Jim Crow era.

Enlisted on February 21, 1942 Hotesse was part of the 619 squadron of the 447 bombardment group known as the Tuskegee Airmen. Though his squadron never flew in combat, he took part in the battle for civil rights at home…

Read the entire article here.

Correcting the conversation about race

OUPblog: Oxford University Press’s Academic Insights for the Thinking World
2015-11-20

Carlos Hoyt

On 6 November 2015, the New York Times featured a poignant five-minute documentary called “A Conversation About Growing Up Black,” produced by Joe Brewster and Perri Peltz. Brewster and Peltz present Rakesh, Miles, Malek, Marvin, Shaquille, Bisa, Jumoke, Maddox, and Myles. The youngest are 10 and the eldest is 25 years old. These nine individuals are very different from one another (hair, height, weight, skin color, voice, manner of speech, body language… all those things that combine to make each of us unique). As with all human beings, each of them is his own universe of individuality and each occupies several universes of other individuals known as family, friends, teammates, school mates, colleagues, and the like.

But we never learn much about the individuality of these individuals: where they live; where they go to school or work; what their worldviews might be on faith, politics, or the environment; what are their talents, their challenges; what they love, and what they dislike. Instead we are introduced to them as racialized human beings, adversely racialized nominally black males to be specific, who by dint of this social relegation are subject to suspicion, discrimination, degradation, and brutality.

We encounter them as living, breathing targets of racism.

We are graced with their eloquent and compelling meditations on racism, their narratives of being misrepresented, misunderstood and mistreated, and their heroic resolve to successfully navigate the mine-infested landscape of the racist country in which they live – for themselves and for their loving, protective, and worried parents.

It is a heartbreaking five-minutes of film.

And it will change nothing…

Read the entire article here.

When You’re Biracial, There’s No ‘Choice’ in the Matter of Your Blackness

The Root
2015-11-19

Charles D. Ellison, Contributing Editor

It’s safe to wager that when well-meaning black actor Taye Diggs took a recent dip into controversy over his biracial son’s identity, there was no less than white former Mrs. Taye Diggs putting on the pressure in the background: “Hey, I’m here. White mom. Don’t forget about me.” And who knows? Taut playpen discussions might have taken an interesting turn. Somewhat understandably, but too publicly and too clumsily, Diggs obliged, and met the ire of many African Americans head on. While Diggs gets some nod for courage, he did rip back a rather mean layer of onion in the process.

But the mistake Diggs made here is not so much the demand that his son stand firm on his biracialness. It’s that he trivializes that kind of existence as a simple mark-the-box choice. Contrary to the warped and misguided conjecture that biracial sons and daughters somehow have more control over their racial selfness than black people do, it’s really a lot more complex than that.

Don’t get me wrong: Diggs loves his son. And he should demand respect and love for the mother from the start. No surprise, even, if it was also Diggs’ conclusion that his boy’s complete embrace of the biracial construct could somehow shield him from the beastly assaults of routine racism.

It won’t…

Read the entire article here.

Taye Diggs, Embrace Blackness In Mixed Families: They’re Not Mutually Exclusive

Global Grind
2015-10-18

Jada Gomez, Managing Editor

Taye Diggs is set to release a second children’s book, Mixed Me, to teach young biracial children how to embrace their multicultural, multi-hued identities. But before it hits shelves, it needs a few edits… from a multiracial person.

In an interview with The Grio, the actor shared that he wants his son, Walker Nathaniel Diggs, to be identified as mixed and not Black. The most troubling part of the admission is that he “fears” people will see his son as Black. With the best of intentions I’m sure, his remarks were more fixated on Walker’s outer shell, and what other people will think about his son, than instilling a sense of identity at Walker’s core.

As a millennial of mixed heritage, I learned quite early that my skin color and “otherness” would raise questions about who I am, and what I should “identify” with, throughout my life. The first major hit came in preschool, when my Latino father showed up to parent-teacher night with my African-American mother. Usually, my mom would handle picking me up from school, so my classmates – and most importantly, their parents – had never met Juan Gomez before. The night was as normal as any four-year-old’s night, as we watched Sesame Street while our parents met with teachers. All in all, pretty harmless…

Read the entire article here.

Interview with Filmmaker Adu Lalouschek

Rooted In Magazine
2015-10-13

Annina Chirade

Adu Lalouschek is a 21-year-old filmmaker from London and recent graduate of the London College of Communication [University of the Arts]. Whilst studying Film and Television at University, Adu met fellow course mate Alex Wondergem, “I first remember meeting Alex when he was drumming on his lap in a seminar, he saw me and he said ‘Hey brother, where are you from?’”. It was then that they both found they were of mixed-Ghanaian descent, but they began their initial creative partnership as musicians; Alex played the drums whilst Adu was on the guitar. This soon transitioned into a film partnership that would see them co-directing and co-producing, “Our first film was a narrative film based on the Tottenham Riots which we made in 2012. But, my real passion came when we started making our documentaries in West Africa and I could see how our films were part of the changing landscape.”

Alex spent the majority of his life in Accra, whereas Adu grew up in London. They have two distinct visions which they are able to combine to create engaging work. In their second year of study, they came up with the idea for the In the Life series, where they portray interesting personal stories in Ghana. Their first in the series was Scrap Metal Men (2014), in which they followed two scrap workers in Agblogboshie – formerly the world’s largest e-waste dump. The second, Ga Fishermen (2015) documents the fast-disappearing traditions of the Ga fisherman in Accra; it premiered at BAFTA student screening and was shown at Chale Wote 2015. The third, and most recent, is Warrior’s Gym (2015) in which they capture the personal triumph of one of Ghana’s strongest men – Warrior. Both Ga Fishermen and Warrior’s Gym will be available to view at 1:54 from the 15th to 18th of October.

Aside from his films with Alex, Adu has also taken recent trips to Roses, Spain and Nsukka, Nigeria; there he spent time photographing and filming subjects. In this interview he will sharing snapshots from his travels, and films with Alex.

Annina: How does your heritage inform the stories and work you choose to do?

Adu: I’m Ghanaian and also Austrian, but first and foremost, I’m a Londoner. Alex and I are both mixed-race, and it’s obvious from our appearance when we walk around Ghana, that we’re not fully Ghanaian – we acknowledge that. Our main focus was to not make poverty-chic documentaries. We wanted to make documentaries in Accra, Ghana and not allow people to view Africa as a homogeneous place. We approached it in different ways. In our first documentary Scrap Metal Men, we didn’t have any talking head shots because we thought that was really cliché. We always made sure we filmed from a lower angle, because we didn’t want to be looking down on our subjects. By incorporating different techniques we found a way to place our feet in the documentary world – it was experimental in that sense. Our voice came through precisely because we didn’t want to dictate to the viewer. We showed some text to give context at the beginning and the end of the documentary, but we really let the viewer inform themselves through the narrative and the characters that we portrayed…

Read the entire article here.