Mixed Race Studies

Louisiana Creoles: Cultural Recovery and Mixed-Race Native American Identity

Lexington Books an imprint of Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
December 2006
Cloth: 0-7391-1896-X / 978-0-7391-1896-2
Paper: 0-7391-1897-8 / 978-0-7391-1897-9

Andrew J. Jolivétte, Associate Professor of American Indian Studies
San Francisco State University

Foreword by Paula Gunn Allen

Louisiana Creoles examines the recent efforts of the Louisiana Creole Heritage Center to document and preserve the distinct ethnic heritage of this unique American population. Dr. Andrew Jolivétte uses sociological inquiry to analyze the factors that influence ethnic and racial identity formation and community construction among Creoles of Color living in and out of the state of Louisiana. By including the voices of contemporary Creole organizations, preservationists, and grassroots organizers, Jolivétte offers a comprehensive and insightful exploration of the ways in which history has impacted the ability of Creoles to self-define their own community in political, social, and legal contexts. This book raises important questions concerning the process of cultural formation and the politics of ethnic categories for multiracial communities in the United States. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina the themes found throughout Louisiana Creoles are especially relevant for students of sociology and those interested in identity issues.

Table of Contents

• Foreword: Paula Gunn Allen
• Introduction: Who Is White?
• The Reconfiguring of Creole-Indian Identity in Louisiana: Situating the Other in Social Discourse
• Including Native Identity in the Creole of Color Movement: Ethnic Renewal and Cultural Revival within a Black-Indian Population
• Migratory Movement: The Politics of Ethnic Community (Re)Construction Among Creoles of Color, 1920-1940
• Examining the Regional and Multi-Generational Context of Creole and American Indian Identity
• Conclusion: (Re)Imagining and (Re)Writing Racial Categories

Beyond Black: Biracial Identity in America (Second Edition)

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
December 2007
220 pages
Cloth ISBN: 0-7425-6054-6 / 978-0-7425-6054-3
Paper ISBN: 0-7425-6055-4 / 978-0-7425-6055-0

By Kerry Ann Rockquemore and David L. Brunsma
Foreword by Joe Feagin

Beyond Black is a groundbreaking study of the dynamic meaning of racial identity for multiracial people in post-Civil Rights America. Kerry Ann Rockquemore and David Brunsma document the wide range of racial identities that individuals with one Black and one White parent develop, and they provide a incisive sociological explanation of the choices facing those who are multiracial.

Stemming from the controversy of the 2000 Census and whether an additional “multiracial” category should be added to the survey, this second edition of Beyond Black uses both survey data and interviews of multiracial young adults to explore the contemporary dynamics of racial identity formation. The authors raise even larger social and political questions posed by expanding racial categorization on the U.S. Census.

About the Authors
Kerry Ann Rockquemore is associate professor of African American Studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and coauthor of Raising Biracial Children.

David L. Brunsma is associate professor of sociology at the University of Missouri-Columbia and coeditor of The Sociology of Katrina: Perspectives on a Modern Catastrophe.

Table of Contents

• List of Tables and Figures
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• Foreword: Joe Feagin
• Chapter 1: Who is Black? Flux and Change in American Racial Identity
• Chapter 2: Biracial Identity Research: Past and Present
• Chapter 3: What it Means to be Mixed-Race in Post-Civil Rights America
• Chapter 4 : Sociological Factors Influencing Biracial Identity
• Chapter 5: The Color Complex: Appearances and Multiracial Identity
• Chapter 6: Who is Black Today and Who Will be Black Tomorrow?
• Endnotes
• Appendices
• References
• Index

Is That Your Child? Mothers Talk about Rearing Biracial Children

Lexington Books, imprint of Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
November 2008
146pp
Cloth: 0-7391-2763-2 / 978-0-7391-2763-6 
Paper: 0-7391-2764-0 / 978-0-7391-2764-3 

By Marion Kilson and Florence Ladd

“Is That Your Child?” is a question that countless mothers of biracial children encounter whether they are African American or European American, rearing children today or a generation ago, living in the city or in the suburbs, are upper middle class or lower middle class. Social scientists Marion Kilson and Florence Ladd probe mothers’ responses to this query and other challenges that mothers of biracial children encounter.

Organized into four chapters, the book begins with Kilson and Ladd’s initial interview of one another, continues with an overview of the challenges and rewards of raising biracial children gleaned from their interviews with other mothers, presents profiles of mothers highlighting distinctive individual experiences of biracial parenting, and concludes with suggestions of positive biracial parenting strategies.

This book makes a unique contribution to the growing body of literature by and about biracial Americans. Although in the past twenty years biracial Americans like Rebecca Walker, June Cross, and James McBride have written of their person experiences and scholars like Kathleen Korgen, Maria Root, and Ruth Frankenberg have explored aspects of the biracial experience, none has focused on the experiences of a heterogeneous set of black and white mothers of different generations and socioeconomic circumstances as Kilson and Ladd do.

About the Authors
Marion Kilson is an anthropologist and the author of Claiming Place: Biracial Young Adults of the Post-Civil Rights Era (Bergin & Garvey 2000). Florence Ladd is a psychologist and won the Black Caucus of the American Library Association award for her novel, Sarah’s Psalm (Scribner 1997).

Table of Contents

• Foreword
• Chapter 1: The Back Story of Is That Your Child?
• Chapter 2: Challenges and Rewards for Mothers of Biracial Children
• Chapter 3: Profiles of Mothers of Biracial Children
• Chapter 4: Nurturing Biracial Children: Some Lessons Learned
• Appendix I: Interracial Marriages in the United States
• Appendix II: Some Sociological Attributes of Mothers
• Appendix III: Selected Multiracial Resources

Race and Mixed Race

Temple University Press
October 1993
232 pages
6×9
paper: EAN: 978-1-56639-265-5, ISBN: 1-56639-265-9
    
Naomi Zack, Professor of Philosophy
University of Oregon

In the first philosophical challenge to accepted racial classifications in the United States, Naomi Zack uses philosophical methods to criticize their logic. Tracing social and historical problems related to racial identity, she discusses why race is a matter of such importance in America and examines the treatment of mixed race in law, society, and literature.

Zack argues that black and white designations are themselves racist because the concept of race does not have an adequate scientific foundation.  The “one drop” rule, originally a rationalization for slavery, persists today even though there have never been “pure” races and most American blacks have “white” genes.

Exploring the existential problems of mixed race identity, she points out how the bi-racial system in this country generates a special racial alienation for many Americans. Ironically suggesting that we include “gray” in our racial vocabulary, Zack concludes that any racial identity is an expression of bad faith.

Table of Contents

Part I: The Existential Analysis
1. Introduction: Summary, Method, and Structure
2. The Ordinary Concept of Race
3. White Family Identity
4. Black Family Identity
5. Demography and the Identification of the Family
6. Mixed-Race Family Identity

Part II: The History of Mixed Race
7. Introduction to the History of Mixed Race
8. The Law on Black and White
9. Marooned!
10. The Harlem Renaissance: Cultural Suicide
11. Genocidal Images of Mixed Race
12. Mulattoes in Fiction
13. Alienation

Part III: The Philosophy of Anti-Race
14. Nobility versus Good Faith
15. Black, White, and Gray: Words, Words, Words

Notes
Select Bibliography
Index

Mixed Messages: Multiracial Identities in the “Color-Blind” Era

Lynne Rienner Publishers
2006
405 pages
Hardcover: ISBN: 978-1-58826-372-8
Paperback: ISBN: 978-1-58826-398-8

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

The experiences and voices of multiracial individuals are challenging current categories of race, profoundly altering the meaning of racial identity and in the process changing the cultural fabric of the nation. Exploring this new reality, the authors of Mixed Messages examine what we know about multiracial identities—and the implications of those identities for fundamental issues of justice and equality.

Read the entire introduction here.

Table of Contents

• Mixed Messages: Doing Race in the Color-Blind Era—David L. Brunsma
• SHIFTING COLOR LINES.
  • Defining Race: Comparative Perspectives—F. James Davis.
  • Black, Honorary White, White: The Future of Race in the United States?—Eduardo Bonilla-Silva and David G. Embrick.
  • Racial Justice in a Black/Nonblack Society—George Yancey.
  • Carving Out a Middle Ground: The Case of Hawai’i—Jeffrey Moniz and Paul Spickard.
  • New Racial Identities, Old Arguments: Continuing Biological Reification—Rainier Spencer.
  • Color Blindness: An Obstacle to Racial Justice?—Charles A. Gallagher.
  • Racism, Whitespace, and the Rise of the Neo-Mulattos—Hayward Derrick Horton.
• MANIPULATING MULTIRACIAL IDENTITIES.
  • Race, Multiraciality, and the Neoconservative Agenda—G. Reginald Daniel and Josef Manuel Castañeda-Liles.
  • White Separatists in the Color-Blind Era: Redefining Multiracial and White Identities—Abby L. Ferber.
  • Defining Racism to Achieve Goals: The Multiracial and Black Reparations Movements—Johanna E. Foster.
  • Selling Mixedness: Marketing with Multiracial Identities—Kimberly McClain DaCosta.
• SOCIALIZATION IN MULTIRACIAL FAMILIES.
  • It All Starts at Home: Racial Socialization in Multiracial Families—Kerry Ann Rockquemore,
    Tracey Laszloffy, and Julia Noveske.
  • Racial Logics and (Trans)Racial Identities: A View from Britain—France Winddance Twine.
  • Black and White: Family Opposition to Becoming Multiracial—Erica Chito Childs.
• DILEMMAS OF MULTIRACIAL IDENTITY.
  • Negotiating Racial Identity in Social Interactions—R. L’Heureux Lewis and Kanika Bell.
  • Black/White Friendships in a Color-Blind Society—Kathleen Korgen and Eileen O’Brien.
  • Black and Latino: Dominican Americans Negotiate Racial Worlds—Benjamin Bailey.
  • Finding a Home: Housing the Color Line—Heather Dalmage.
  • Confronting Racism in the Therapist’s Office—Kwame Owusu-Bempah.
  • Culture and Identity in Mixed-Race Women’s Lives—Debbie Storrs.

America Beyond Black and White: How Immigrants and Fusions Are Helping Us Overcome the Racial Divide

University of Michigan Press
2007
296 oages
6 x 9. 296 pgs. 1 table
Cloth: 978-0-472-11609-6
Paper: 978-0-472-03320-1
Ebook Formats: 978-0-472-02175-8

Ronald Fernandez, Professor of Sociology
Criminal Justice Department
Central Connecticut State University

For the first time in U.S. history, the black-white dichotomy that historically has defined race and ethnicity is being challenged, not by a small minority, but by the fastest-growing and arguably most vocal segment of the increasingly diverse American population—Mexicans, Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, Indians, Arabs, and many more—who are breaking down and recreating the very definitions of race.

Drawing on interviews with hundreds of Americans who don’t fit conventional black or white categories, the author invites us to empathize with these “doubles” and to understand why they represent our best chance to throw off the strictures of the black-white division.

The revolution is already under way, as newcomers and mixed-race fusions reject the prevailing Anglo-Protestant culture. Americans face two choices: understand why these individuals think as they do or face a future that continues to define us by what divides us rather than by what unites us.

Perspectives and Research on the Positive and Negative Implications of Having Multiple Racial Identities

Psychological Bulletin
Volume 131, Number 4 (June 2005)
pages 569–591
DOI: 10.1037/0033-2909.131.4.569

Margaret Shih, Professor in Management and Organizations
Anderson School of Management
University of California, Los Angeles

Diana T. Sanchez, Associate Professor of Social Psychology
Rutgers University

Much attention has been directed toward understanding the impact having a multiracial background has on psychological well-being and adjustment. Past psychological research has focused on the challenges multiracial individuals confront in defining a racial identity. The implication is that these challenges lead to outcomes that are psychologically detrimental. However, evidence to support this assertion is mixed.  The authors review qualitative and quantitative empirical research examining multiracial individuals’ identity development, depression, problem behaviors, peer relationships, school performance, and selfesteem, finding support for detrimental outcomes only in studies sampling clinical populations. Studies on nonclinical samples find that multiracial individuals tend to be just as well-adjusted as their monoracial peers on most psychological outcomes. Earlier assertions of maladjustment may have been due to reliance on qualitative research that sampled clinical populations. Other implications and futureresearch are discussed.

Tiger Woods has received much attention, not only for being the youngest person to win the prestigious Masters Golf Tournament, but also for being an individual of mixed-race ancestry. His father is Black, Native American, and Chinese, and his mother is Thai, Chinese, and White. Woods represents a growing trend in American society. Since the repeal in 1967 of miscegenation laws prohibiting racial mixing, the number of interracial marriages in the United States has increased dramatically (Kennedy, 2003; Root, 2001). Consequently, the number of individuals who can claim membership in multiple racial categories has also increased dramatically (Root, 1996). The population of multiracial children has multiplied from 500,000 in 1970 to more than 6.8 million in 2000 (Jones & Symens Smith, 2001).

This explosion in the number of individuals with multiracial backgrounds has raised the issue of understanding where these individuals fit into preexisting social categories. Nowhere is this difficulty more clearly illustrated than in the controversy over whether the 2000 Census should have included a multiracial category.  Until then, individuals of mixed ancestry had to choose between their component identities on the census form. However, multiracial groups have argued that picking just one identity forces multiracial individuals to deny other parts of themselves (Gaskins, 1999) and does not accurately reflect the nation’s true racial make-up (Holmes, 1997). On the other hand, prominent civil rights activists, such as Jesse Jackson and Kweisi Mfume, argued against the creation of a separate multiracial category in order to preserve minority numbers and maintain political influence (Rockquemore & Brunsma, 2002).

A federal task force was set up to investigate the political and social implications of creating a new racial classification (Holmes, 1997).  The task force asked questions such as, “If a multiracial category were included, would all people with different combinations of racial backgrounds, such as Black/Asian and Native American/White, be considered members of the same group?  Would there still be individuals with multiracial identities who would choose to identify by a single race?” This issue was finally resolved in 1997, when it was recommended that the category “multiracial” should not be included in census forms but that instead multiracial individuals could check off more than one racial category.

This controversy illustrates that having a multiracial identity challenges American society’s traditional notions and assumptions about race and racial categories (Johnson, 1992; Ramirez, 1996; Root, 1992; Spickard, 1992). Given the seeming difficulty American society has with trying to understand the notion of multiracial identity, psychologists have begun studying many of those questions considered by the U.S. Census Bureau Task Force, such as, how do multiracial individuals understand their racial identities? In addition, because multiracial families and multiracial individuals may pose a challenge to existing racial categories and the social systems upon which these categories rest, psychologists have become interested in understanding the consequence of coming from a multiracial background and in identifying the tremendous difficulties multiracial families and multiracial individuals encounter in navigating their social world (Gibbs, 1987, 1989; Root, 1992). For example, multiracial families contend with hardships such as a lack of social recognition (Nakashima, 1996), disapproval from extended family, exclusion from neighborhood and community (Kerwin & Ponterotto, 1995; Kerwin, Ponterotto, Jackson, & Harris, 1993), discrimination, and social isolation (Brown, 1995; Gaskins, 1999)…

Read the entire article here.

Multiracial Faces: How Categorization Affects Memory at the Boundaries of Race

Journal of Social Issues
Volume 65, Number 1 (March 2009)
pages 69-86
DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-4560.2008.01588.x

Kristin Pauker
Tufts University

Nalini Ambady
Tufts University

Monoracial and multiracial individuals are likely to have different conceptualizations of race and subsequently different approaches toward racial ambiguity.  In particular, monoracial individuals may be more likely to rely on categories when processing ambiguous faces, whereas multiracial individuals may tend to ignore such categorizations due to a reduced tendency to essentialize race.  We compared monoracial (White and Asian) and biracial (Asian/White) individuals’ memory patterns.  Specifically, we examined participants’ memory for White, Asian, and biracial faces labelled as either White or Asian.  Both White and Asian participants relied on the labels, remembering faces labeled as the in-group better than faces labeled as the out-group. Biracial participants relied less on the labels, exhibiting better recognition memory overall. Biracial participants’ memory performance was also highly correlated with a less essentialist view of human traits.  This cognitive flexibility may serve an adaptive function for biracial individuals and contribute to enhanced facial recognition.

Read or purchase the article here.

To Disclose or Not to Disclose Biracial Identity: The Effect of Biracial Disclosure on Perceiver Evaluations and Target Responses

Journal of Social Issues
Volume 65, Number 1 (March 2009)
pages 129-149
DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-4560.2008.01591.x

Diana T. Sanchez, Associate Professor of Psychology
Rutgers University

Courtney M. Bonam
Stanford University

Are biracial people perceived more negatively than their monoracial counterparts? Across two studies, we compared ratings of warmth, competence, and minority scholarship worthiness for biracial (Study 1: Black/White, Study 2: Asian/White), White, and minority (Study 1: Black, Study 2: Asian) college applicants.  Findings suggest that both biracial applicants were perceived as colder and sometimes less competent than both White and corresponding minority applicants.  Moreover, biracial people were also perceived as less qualified for minority scholarships than other racial minorities, which is partially explained by penalties to warmth and competence. Study 3 shows that disclosing one’s biracial identity makes biracial people vulnerable to negative feedback.  Taken together, these studies suggest that biracial people who disclose their biracial identity experience bias from perceivers and may be more vulnerable to that bias because of the personal nature of racial disclosure.  Findings are discussed considering the stereotype content model (Cuddy, Fiske, & Glick, 2007), cultural stereotypes about biracial people (Jackman, Wagner, & Johnson, 2001), and the costs of disclosing devalued identities.

Read or purchase the article here.

Plus ça Change? Multiraciality and the Dynamics of Race Relations in the United States

Journal of Social Issues
Volume 65, Number 1 (March 2009)
pages 205-219
DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-4560.2008.01595.x

Frank D. Bean, Chancellor’s Professor
School of Social Sciences
University of California, Irvine

Jennifer Lee, Associate Professor, Sociology
School of Social Sciences
University of California, Irvine

The issue of race has long cast a shadow on the founding mythology of the United States, but today some scholars argue race is declining in significance, as evidenced by the rise of interracial unions and the fact that the offspring of such unions can now officially acknowledge their mixed-race backgrounds. However, the sizeable growth of the Asian and Latino populations in the United States through immigration complicates the issue. Seemingly neither black nor white, the new immigrants are generating increased diversity and raising questions about whether today’s color line replicates the old Black–White demarcation.  The research results introduced in this article suggest the contemporary color line in the United States more reflects a Black/non-Black division than a White/non-White one.

Read or purchase the article here.