Mixed Race Studies

Mixing it Up

Salon
2001-03-08

Suzy Hansen

Alabama just legalized black-white marriage. An expert talks about why it took so long and the American obsession with racial purity.

In November 2000, after a statewide vote in a special election, Alabama became the last state to overturn a law that was an ugly reminder of America’s past, a ban on interracial marriage. The one-time home of George Wallace and Martin Luther King Jr. had held onto the provision for 33 years after the Supreme Court declared anti-miscegenation laws unconstitutional. Yet as the election revealed — 40 percent of Alabamans voted to keep the ban — many people still see the necessity for a law that prohibits blacks and whites from mixing blood.

Werner Sollors, a professor of Afro-American studies at Harvard, was born in Germany and came to the United States in 1978. He has been studying and writing about the history of American interracial relationships since 1986. Sollors is the editor of the recently published “Interracialism: Black-White Intermarriage in American History, Literature, and Law,” a fascinating survey of legal decisions, literary criticism and essays by writers and scholars including Langston Hughes, W.E.B. Du Bois and Randall Kennedy. Salon spoke with Sollors by phone from his office in Cambridge about the mixed-race origins — and multiracial future — of the nation.

What took Alabama so long to overturn its anti-miscegenation law?

In the years after the Civil War, most of the Southern states made miscegenation bans part of their constitutions. And part of the constitutional provision was that no legislation should ever change them. These were not just ordinary laws that you could modify with a simple majority; they called for very complicated processes and very large majorities to be overturned.

In 1967, the Supreme Court invalidated these anti-miscegenation provisions with the Loving vs. Virginia case, and the Southern states began to adjust. But not right away. In the first 10 or 15 years, there wasn’t a lot of activism or popular support for having the laws changed — no politician wanted to be caught trying to remove those statutes. I think Mississippi did it in 1987 or 1988 — 20 years after the Loving vs. Virginia case…

…What’s been going on with racial categories in the census is also interesting.

The census had two rules. One is the 1997 rule that permitted everyone to mark more than one box in the 2000 census. Then came the 2000 evaluation procedure, which allowed the census to classify anyone who marked more than one box as part of the “people of color” category — if there was a white and color mix indicated.

Essentially, it’s one thing to say that a person can fall into multiple racial categories, but what happens to all the people in the old categories? It can have some disastrous consequences now because in some states, apparently many white Americans found it fashionable to indicate that they were Native American. In some counties where Native Americans were a minority they may now end up as a majority. There are lots of headaches with counting and civil rights and voting rights and districting that are going to come in the next two years as a result of this census decision…

Read the entire interview here.

AAS 550: Asian Americans of Mixed Heritages

San Francisco State University
Spring 2012

Wei Ming Dariotis, Associate Professor of Asian American Studies

This is an interactive, dynamic course taught in a seminar style with an expectation of active student participation. Group work and interaction are emphasized in order to provide students with real life problem solving opportunities. Creative and analytical approaches are both emphasized through Reading Response Essays, a Midterm Group Play, Research Portfolio and related Presentation, and Final Class Project (creating a Hapa Children’s Book). Topics covered in this course may include a selection of the following:

• The history of anti-miscegenation in the US, particularly as such laws relate to the Asian Pacific American experience; stereotypes of APIs [Asian-Pacific Islanders] of mixed heritage
• the history of US and European war and colonialism in relation to APIs of mixed heritage
• the “war bride” phenomenon
• TransRacial/transnational adoption; Hapas in Hawai’i
• Double Minority Hapas
• Queer Hapas
• Hapa Bodies (body image and health issues)
• Hapa Creative/Cultural expression
• Mixed Heritage activism and social and political organizations

This course explores the Historical, Cross-Cultural and Global Contexts relevant to Asian Pacific Americans of mixed heritage. AAS 550 is designed to present students with cross cultural and historical perspectives which will permit students to empathize with Asians Pacifics of mixed heritage, across a wide variety of historical circumstances and personal experiences. The inherently multiethnic nature of the subject matter allows students to develop an appreciation of an emerging sub-dominant group (APIs of mixed heritage or Hapas) and recognition of the fundamental unity of humankind…

For more information, click here.

Confounding Identity: Exploring the Life and Discourse of Lucy E. Parsons

Berks Conference for Women Historians
2011
29 pages

Michelle Diane Wright, Assistant Professor of History
Community College of Baltimore County

Despite the vast research conducted on radical activist history of late nineteenth century Chicago, there is very little that examines political and social ideologies that diverged from the westernized male archetype of the era. Furthermore, the contrived disciplinary divide that separates scholarly study into artificial and static compartments such as labor history, anarchist history, women’s studies or others, oversimplifies the contributions of individuals that straddle all categories of endeavor. Lucy Parsons, a woman of color, was born in Waco, Texas in 1853 but moved to Chicago in 1873 and became a pivotal figure in the labor and anarchist movements well into the early twentieth century causing the Chicago Police Department to label her “more dangerous than a thousand rioters.” Frequently overshadowed by the eminence of her husband Albert Parsons—labeled by many a Haymarket martyr—Lucy Parsons was a significant agitator in her own right and navigated a path for herself far outside the realm of the predominant thinking of other revolutionaries at that time. This paper examines the life and discourse of Lucy Parsons in an effort to contend with seemingly contradictory disciplines and perspectives in order to synthesize a holistic approach to a woman who confounds the strict identities that many have forced on her. Lucy Parsons’ impact upon concepts of injustice, governmental repression and labor inequalities come from a paradigm often marginalized and misinterpreted not only because it wasn’t derived from a source that was European or male, but also because her views came from a mind unconcerned with convention in relation to accepted societal standards. I am conducting research on the contributions of Lucy Parsons in order to write an accurate, comprehensive biography that also dissects marginalized perspectives of widely accepted historical accounts. In turn, I endeavor to provide a fuller and more holistic consideration of a historic period many assume is already understood.

Black By Default?

Lucy Parsons was born in Waco, Texas, in 1853 but moved to Chicago in 1873 where she lived until her death in 1942. She was a pivotal figure in several radical movements well into the early twentieth century causing the Chicago Police Department to label her “more dangerous than a thousand rioters.” Scholars, including biographer Carolyn Ashbaugh, have categorized Parsons solely African American although she never embraced the designation herself. Lucy Parsons publicly claimed to possess Mexican and Native American extraction. As was often the case of nineteenth century social mores, ill-informed Whites with social agendas centered on White supremacy designed racial categories employing superficial visual characteristics such as skin color, facial features and hair texture. In order to maintain White preeminence racial descriptions were dichotomous labels of White or Black, generally resulting in individuals possessing one drop of any non-European blood being deemed Black by default.

Further confounding public perception, Lucy Parsons was essentially, but not legally, married to a White man. Her husband, moreover, was one of the four men hanged following the Haymarket Massacre that occurred in Chicago in 1886, a fact that often overshadows the significant contributions of Lucy Parsons. Contrived labels such as of miscegenation or amalgamation clouded the legacy of Lucy Parsons as mainstream newspapers and other contemporaries publicly relegated her solely to the category of Black for no other reason than to discredit her efforts as well as those of her husband.

This essay analyzes the life and rhetoric of radical leftist agitator Lucy Parsons with the intention of providing a healthier understanding of the complicated world of racial identity politics during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. While wider society—and even her death certificate—labeled her “Negro,” she was conversely accustomed to the concoction of nineteenth century Texas’ more complicated caste system that took into account all possible ethnic equations. Coming from a birthplace where she might have considered herself anything from Mestizo to Mulatto or any other of the dozens of categories utilized at the time, she was not culturally prepared for wider society’s monoracial designation of Black, and therefore scoffed at its validity.

In hindsight, onlookers often accuse Lucy Parsons of negating her African heritage for a seemingly more desirable ethnic identity. There is a sense, especially within the modern African American community, that a person of color self-labeling anything other than exclusively Black is virtually treasonous and committing a form of identity denial and self-hate. Criticism of notable individuals such as Barack Obama, Tiger Woods and others exemplify this sentiment of betrayal. In actuality, Lucy Parsons seemed to be holistically embracing her complete ethnic heritage, not merely a fraction of it. Therefore, the question must ultimately be posed as to how the legacy of those early externally defined racial and ethnic designations can provide a better consideration of multiracial designations in contemporary times…

Read the entire paper here.

Who will benefit from AR-TPD “cost-savings”?

Two or More: Mixed thoughts about the Census NAC
2013-03-24

Eric Hamako

Eric Hamako is one of 32 members of the Census Bureau’s National Advisory Committee (NAC) on Race, Ethnic, and Other Populations, 2012-2014. This blog is intended to 1) share updates and Eric’s perspectives on the NAC, 2) gather community perspectives, and 3) promote discussion about the Census Bureau as it relates to Multiracial people, the Two Or More Races (TOMR) population, and social justice.

Reflecting on the second NAC in-person meeting and a few brief discussions about the use of Administrative Records and Third Party Data (AR-TPD), I was reminded of an old saying, which I’ll paraphrase:

“There’s never been a time-saving device that’s created a minute of leisure.”**

My interpretation of that saying is this: Lots of technological advancements are advertised as doing menial work, so that we have more time for relaxing or doing more meaningful work.  But that’s rarely what actually happens.  For example, at my job, I have a computer and it’s frustratingly slow sometimes.  In those moments, I think, “Gah!  If only I had a faster computer, I could be done with this work faster!”  And that’s true.  But if I had a faster computer and finished my work faster, what would happen?  Would my boss say, “You finished that right quick, guess you’re done for the day!”

Probably not…

Read the entire article here.

Race, Religion Collide in 2012 Campaign

The Associated Press
2012-05-05

Jesse Washington, National Writer, Race and Ethnicity

Rachel Zoll, National Religion Writer

How unthinkable it was, not so long ago, that a presidential election would pit a candidate fathered by an African against another condemned as un-Christian.

And yet, here it is: Barack Obama vs. Mitt Romney, an African-American and a white Mormon, representatives of two groups and that have endured oppression to carve out a place in the United States. How much progress has America made against bigotry? By November, we should have some idea.

Perhaps mindful of the lingering power of prejudice, both men soft-pedal their status as racial or religious pioneers. But these things “will be factors whether they’re explicitly stated or not, because both Obama and Romney are minorities,” said Nancy Wadsworth, co-editor of the anthology “Faith and Race in American Political Life.” Mormons are 1.7 percent of the U.S. population, according to the Pew Research Center; African-Americans are 12.6 percent

“Americans like to obsess about ways that people are different,” said Wadsworth, a political science professor at the University of Denver. Voters of all types say that a candidate’s race or religious beliefs should not be cause for bias, “but Americans are really conflicted about this, and they talk out of both sides of their mouth.”…

Read the entire article here.

CNN’s Soledad O’Brien on Her Entrepreneurial TV Future

Bloomberg Businessweek
2013-03-07

Soledad O’Brien as told to Diane Brady

I never really hesitated about going to Starting Point [which premiered on Jan. 2, 2012]. I thought there was an opportunity to get beyond the platitudes of “Yes, Medicare! No, Medicare!” and actually look at the Congressional Budget Office report. When I left American Morning in 2007, I’d focused on doing documentaries. But I thought Starting Point was a great opportunity to be involved in the zeitgeist.

The show was able to grow, but it takes time. I don’t know that an aggressive interview style was not good for our morning show, which is what some people said. It takes time to build an audience. When Jeff Zucker [CNN’s new president, above] started last month, he had a different vision. He was coming in to make changes across the board that, frankly, CNN really needs. Part of that vision was that I wouldn’t be on the morning show. Once I knew what he wanted, I focused on how I could do what I enjoy most.

We struck an unusual deal. I’ll get to leave CNN with my catalog and documentaries. We were able to create a brand at CNN—Black in America—that I now own. I can take that brand and extend it in any way I want. You have Netflix and all these channels that are looking for interesting and different ways to tell stories. To have ownership of Black in America and Latino in America is hugely important…

Read the entire article here.

Forecast of Miscegenation

Los Angeles Herald
1906-07-24
page 6, column 3
Source: Library of Congress: Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers

In the course of a sermon delivered last Sunday before n local negro audience. Bishop Hamilton of the Methodist church said: “It might create a sensation if I should say a union of the races of this world Is possible. The papers would take it up In the morning if I should tell you the blacks and whites will eventually merge into one people. This I know: all discriminations must come to an end and it is not a question which nation shall reign in this world.”

Bishop Hamilton has an unquestionable right to his views on the subject of miscegenation and likewise to the personal demonstration of them if he sees fit. It is not the purpose of The Herald to reopen an issue that was supposed to have been buried with the abolition party nearly half a century ago. Every one to his or her liking in regard to the old question whether a negro Is “a man and a brother,” and, inferentially, whether a negress is a woman and a sister.

It is the effort of such preachment to a negro congregation as Bishop Hamilton is credited with that The Herald especially criticizes. The bishop practically tells hundreds of negroes to their faces, and through them he tells the whole negro race In the United States, that miscegenation is foreordained by the almighty. Note what the bishop says following the above quotation: “It won’t matter whether a man Is white or black, if he is a son of God, he shall become an individual part of that people which shall eventually own this earth.”

The effect of such preaching to negroes cannot be otherwise than pernicious. Its tendency is to fill the negro mind with notions of social equality, going the full length to amalgamation of the white and black races. And with these notions well rooted, is it not logical to suppose that such present negro crimes as are reported almost daily, would be multiplied indefinitely?

Not one white American in a thousand will indorse the miscegenation doctrine, substantially, which Bishop Hamilton is preaching to the negroes.

Can the “one-drop rule” tell us anything about racial discrimination? New evidence from the multiple race question on the 2000 Census

Labour Economics
Volume 16, Issue 4 (August 2009)
pages 451-460
DOI: 10.1016/j.labeco.2009.01.003

Robert W. Fairlie, Professor of Economics
University of California, Santa Cruz

The inclusion of multiple race information for the first time in the 2000 Census allows for a novel test for the presence of labor discrimination using the “one-drop rule.” Identifying discrimination is straightforward and essentially relies on the discontinuous nature of the one-drop rule, which treats biracial blacks similarly as monoracial blacks. If biracial blacks have levels of unmeasurable and measurable human capital that lie between the levels of monoracial blacks and whites then, absent discrimination, their wages should also lie between the wages of the two groups. Estimates from the Census indicate that biracial blacks have levels of education that lie almost perfectly between monoracial blacks and whites. In contrast, however, biracial blacks have wages that are roughly similar to monoracial blacks after controlling for education and potential work experience. Estimates from the 1980 Census also do not indicate that the parental characteristics and educational outcomes of biracial children differ from what would be expected by having both black and white parents. Several additional factors that potentially affect the human capital of biracial adults are explored. These findings provide some suggestive evidence on the “one drop rule” and the presence of discrimination in the labor market and provide new estimates of wages and educational levels of biracial blacks.

Read the entire article here.

In Their Parents’ Voices: Reflections on Raising Transracial Adoptees

Columbia University Press
October 2007
240 pages
Cloth ISBN: 978-0-231-14136-9
Paper ISBN: 978-0-231-14137-6

Rita J. Simon, University Professor Emerita
Department of Justice, Law and Society
American University, Washington, D.C.

Rhonda M. Roorda

Rita J. Simon and Rhonda M. Roorda’s In Their Own Voices: Transracial Adoptees Tell Their Stories shared the experiences of twenty-four black and biracial children who had been adopted into white families in the late 1960s and 70s. The book has since become a standard resource for families and practitioners, and now, in this sequel, we hear from the parents of these remarkable families and learn what it was like for them to raise children across racial and cultural lines.

These candid interviews shed light on the issues these parents encountered, what part race played during thirty plus years of parenting, what they learned about themselves, and whether they would recommend transracial adoption to others. Combining trenchant historical and political data with absorbing firsthand accounts, Simon and Roorda once more bring an academic and human dimension to the literature on transracial adoption.

In Their Own Voices: Transracial Adoptees Tell Their Stories

Columbia University Press
April 2000
480 pages
Paper ISBN: 978-0-231-11829-3

Rita J. Simon, University Professor Emerita
Department of Justice, Law and Society
American University, Washington, D.C.

Rhonda M. Roorda

 
Nearly forty years after researchers first sought to determine the effects, if any, on children adopted by families whose racial or ethnic background differed from their own, the debate over transracial adoption continues. In this collection of interviews conducted with black and biracial young adults who were adopted by white parents, the authors present the personal stories of two dozen individuals who hail from a wide range of religious, economic, political, and professional backgrounds. How does the experience affect their racial and social identities, their choice of friends and marital partners, and their lifestyles? In addition to interviews, the book includes overviews of both the history and current legal status of transracial adoption.