Mixed Race Studies

Racing to Theory or Retheorizing Race? Understanding the Struggle to Build a Multiracial Identity Theory

Journal of Social Issues
2009
Volume 65, Number 1
pp. 13–34

Kerry Ann Rockquemore, Associate Professor
University of Illinois at Chicago

David L. Brunsma, Professor of Sociology
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

Daniel J. Delgado
University of Missouri-Columbia

Empirical research on the growing multiracial population in the United States has focused largely on the documentation of racial identification, analysis of psychological adjustment, and understanding the broader political consequences of mixed-race identification. Efforts toward theory construction on multiracial identity development, however, have been largely disconnected from empirical data, mired in disciplinary debates, and bound by historically specific assumptions about race and racial group membership. This study provides a critical overview of multiracial identity development theories, examines the links between theory and research, explores the challenges to multiracial identity theory construction, and proposes considerations for future directions in theorizing racial identity development among the mixed-race population.

Read the entire article for free here.

Re-Mix: Rethinking the use of ‘Hapa’ in Mixedrace Asian/Pacific Islander American Community Organizing

McNair Journal
Fall 2005

Angela S. Taniguchi, McNair Scholar
Washington State University

Linda Heidenreich, Chair and Associate Professor
Department of Women’s Studies
Washington State University

The term Hapa is Hawaiian in origin and roughly means ‘half’. Recently, many mixedrace Asian/Pacific Islanders on the mainland began identifying with and using the term Hapa to create organizations specific to their needs.  Largely recognized as a “California phenomenon,” the number of Asian-descent multiracials identifying as Hapa is ever increasing.  Here I investigate the use of the term Hapa historically, as well as its current use in California.  I then discuss the potential political implications of Mixedrace Asian/Pacific Islanders coalescing under the term.

Read the entire article here.

Dr. Maria P. P. Root Guest on Mixed Chicks Chat

Mixed Chicks Chat (The only live weekly show about being racially and culturally mixed. Also, founders of the Mixed Roots Film & Literary Festival) Hosted by Fanshen Cox, Heidi W. Durrow
Website: TalkShoe™ (Keywords: Mixed Chicks)
Episode: #113 – Maria P. P. Root, Ph.D.
Wednesday, 2009-08-07, 21:00Z (17:00 EDT, 14:00 PDT)

Maria P. P. Root, Ph.D.

Maria P. P. Root, Ph.D., born in Manila, Philippines, grew up in Los Angeles, California. She graduated from the University of California at Riverside in 1977 with degrees in Psychology and Sociology. She subsequently attended Claremont University in Claremont, California receiving her Masters degree in Cognitive Psychology in 1979. She completed her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology at the University of Washington in Seattle in 1983 with an emphasis in minority mental health. Dr. Root resides in Seattle, Washington where she is an independent scholar and clinical psychologist. She has been in practice for over 20 years. Her general practice focuses on adult and adolescent treatment therapy, which includes working with families and couples. Dr. Root’s working areas of knowledge are broad with emphasis on culturally competent practice, life transition issues, trauma, ethnic and racial identity, workplace stress and harassment, and disordered eating. In the early 1980s, she established a group treatment program for bulimia that grew out of her dissertation work. Subsequently, she trained other professionals to recognize and treat people with a range of disordered eating symptoms. She continues to treat people with eating disorders. Dr. Root’s practice also includes formal psychological evaluation. She works as a consultant to several law enforcement departments. She also works as an expert witness in forensic settings performing evaluations and offering expert testimony in matters that require cultural competence and/or knowledge of racism or ethnocentrism. Dr. Root is a trainer, educator, and public speaker on the topics of multiracial families, multiracial identity, cultural competence, trauma, work place harassment, and disordered eating. She has provided lectures and training in New Zealand, England, the Netherlands, Canada, and the United States for major universities, professional organizations, grassroots community groups, and student organizations. Dr. Root’s publications cover the areas of trauma, cultural assessment, multiracial identity, feminist therapy, and eating disorders. One of the leading authorities in the field of racial and ethnic identity, Dr. Root published the first contemporary volume on mixed race people, Racially Mixed People in America (1992). Including this book, she has edited two award-winning books on multiracial people and produced the foundational Bill of Rights for Racially Mixed People. The U.S. Census referred to these texts in their deliberations that resulted in an historic  “check more than one” format to the race question for the 2000 census. Dr. Root is past-President of the Washington State Psychological Association and the recipient of national and international awards from professional and community organizations. She is also a clay artist, and maintains a website about her work at Primitiva Pottery and Tile.

Listen to the episode here. Download the episode here.

When Race Matters: Racially Stigmatized Others and Perceiving Race as a Biological Construction Affect Biracial People’s Daily Well-Being

Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin
Volume 35, Number 9 (September 2009)
pages 1154-1164
DOI: 10.1177/0146167209337628

Diana T. Sanchez, Associate Professor of Psychology
Rutgers University

Julie A. Garcia, Associate Professor of Psychology
California Polytechnic State University

Stigmatized group members experience greater well-being in the presence of similar others, which may be driven by the perception that similar others value their shared stigmatized identities (i.e., high public regard). Using experience sampling methodology, this hypothesis is tested with biracial people (29 Asian/White, 23 Black/ White, and 26 Latino/White biracial participants). This study proposes that the greater percentage of stigmatized similar others in one’s daily context would predict greater daily well-being for biracial people through higher public regard, but only if biracial people believe that race has biological meaning. These findings add to a growing, but limited, literature on biracial individuals.  These findings are situated within the broader literature on stigma and similar others, as well as new theories regarding the consequences of believing race has biological meaning.

Read or purchae the article here.  Read the pre-published draft here.

‘Canadian’ and ‘Being Indian’: Subject Positions and Discourses Used in South Asian-Canadian Women’s Talk about Ethnic Identity

Culture & Psychology
Volume 15, Number 2 (2009)
pages 255-283
DOI: 10.1177/1354067X09102893

Rebecca L. Malhi
University of Calgary, Canada, rmalhi@ucalgary.ca

Susan D. Boon
University of Calgary, Canada, sdboon@ucalgary.ca

Timothy B. Rogers
University of Calgary, Canada

Ethnic identity descriptions can be viewed as ‘subject positions’ (Davies and Harré, 1990) that are dynamically adopted and discarded for pragmatic purposes through the medium of socialinteraction.  Inthe present paper, we use positioning theory to explore the multiple ways our participants—South Asian-Canadian women—positioned themselves and others in conversations about their ethnic identity.  A discourse analysis of participants’ talk revealed a tendency to privilege a ‘hybrid’ Canadian/South Asian identity over a unicultural one.  Moreover, in the rare instances when participants positioned themselves with a unicultural identity, subtle social pressure from conversational partners seemed to induce them to reposition themselves (or others) with a hybrid identity. We conclude by giving possible reasons for such a preference and by discussing the ways in which the current study corroborates and expands on the extant literature.

Read or purchase the article here.

White but Not Quite: Tones and Overtones of Whiteness in Brazil

Small Axe: A Caribbean Journal of Criticism
Volume 13, Number 2 (July 2009)
pages 39-56
DOI: 10.1215/02705346-2009-005

Patricia de Santana Pinho
State Univiersity of New York, Albany

This article analyzes anecdotes, jokes, standards of beauty, color categories, and media representations of “mixed-race” individuals to assess the junctions and disjunctions of whiteness and blackness in Brazil.  While the multiple and contradictory meanings of “racial” mixture stimulates a preference for whiteness, thus reducing the access to power by those deemed black, it simultaneously fuels a rejection for “pure” forms of whiteness as witnessed in the country’s celebration of morenidade (brownness).  Not all forms of miscegenation are valued in Brazil’s myth of racial democracy, and some “types of mixture” are clearly preferred in detriment of others. I argue that anti-black racism in Brazil is expressed not only against dark-skinned individuals, but it also operates in the devaluing of physical traits “deemed black” even in those who have lighter skin complexion, thus creating “degrees of whiteness.”  One’s “measure of whiteness,” therefore, is not defined only by skin color, but requires a much wider economy of signs where, together with other bodily features, hair texture is almost as important as epidermal tone. In any given context, the definition of whiteness is also, necessarily, shaped by the contours of gender and class affiliation.

Read or purchase the article here.

Speaking Up: Mixed Race Identity in Black Communities

Journal of Black Studies
Volume 39, Number 3 (January 2009)
pages 434-445
DOI: 10.1177/0021934706297875

Tru Leverette
University of North Florida, Jacksonville

Within Black communities, individuals of mixed Black/White parentage have faced diverse reactions, ranging from elevation to scorn. These reactions have often been based on the oppressions of history, the injustices of the present, and the hopes for a radically different future. This article traces the common historical responses, both positive and negative, within Black communities to mixed race identities, thereby elucidating contemporary reactions to race mixture within Black communities. In so doing, it argues that an historical understanding of these reactions as well as a recognition of the positions mixed race individuals occupy can challenge assumptions about race, difference, identity, and community—fostering new ground on which individuals can stand for common causes within heterogeneous communities.

Read or purchase the article here.

It matters how and when you ask: self-reported race/ethnicity of incoming law students

Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology
Volume 15, Number 1 (January 2009)
pages 51-66

A. T. Panter
Department of Psychology
University of North Carolina

Charles E. Dayle
Department of Psychology
University of North Carolina

Walter R. Allen
Department of Psychology
University of North Carolina

Linda F. Wightman
Department of Psychology
University of North Carolina

Meera E. Deo
Department of Psychology
University of North Carolina

The high-stakes nature of law school testing and admissions puts a premium on the student data presented to admissions committees, such as essays, academic and work history, and student background characteristics including race/ethnicity. 4,472 law school-bound students self-identified their race/ethnicity using (a) a mutually exclusive “choose one” format during registration for the law school admissions test, and (b) an elaborated “check-all-that-apply” format as part of a national survey administered during the first weeks at their chosen law school. Student multiraciality that was masked by the first assessment was associated with self-reported ethnic identity, discrimination experience, intergroup contact, race-related attitudes, academic performance, and trait ratings, as compared to monoracial majority students. A different profile of findings was observed across these constructs when multiracial students were compared to monoracial majority students, to monoracial minority students, and within group. These correlates also predicted the likelihood of changing identification across the two assessment contexts. These findings support the continued study of specific combinations of multiracial groups, fluidity of multiracial identities, and context effects that influence race/ethnicity self-categorizations.