Mixed Race Studies

Race doesn’t fit in a checkbox

Arkansas Times
Little Rock, Arkansas
2013-05-02

Gene Lyons

Lamentably, the Boston Marathon bombing re-opened some of the most poisonous arguments in American life. Specifically, are the Tsarnaev brothers “white”? It’s a meaningless question.

Some hotheads couldn’t wait to declare all Muslims suspect. Certain thinkers on the left (David Sirota, Salon) argued against collective guilt while oddly lamenting that “white male privilege means white men are not collectively denigrated” for the crimes of Caucasian psycho killers.

Should they be?

Anyway, I’d previously treated the theme of ethnicity as destiny in a column about which racial ID boxes President Obama should have checked on his 2010 census form.

Everybody knows Obama’s mother was a white woman from Kansas, his father an exchange student from Kenya. But there’s no box labeled “African-American.” So the president checked “black.” He could also have checked “white,” but chose not to.

This decision disappointed a unique student group at the University of Maryland, although most understood it. Recently profiled in the New York Times, the Multiracial and Biracial Student Association could with equal accuracy be called “Students Whose Mothers Were Asked Insulting Questions by Busybodies at the Supermarket.”…

…But I’m getting ahead of myself. The Maryland group strikes me as entirely benign. Asked which boxes she checks, vice-president Michelle Lopez-Mullins, age 20, says “It depends on the day, and it depends on the options.”…

…Anyway, back to President Obama, who’s written books about his mixed inheritance. It appears to me that along with his great intelligence, Obama’s mixed background helped make him an intellectual counterpuncher — watchful, laconic, and leery of zealotry, a born mediator.

Like a man behind a mask, Obama watches people watch him.

Checking the “black” box on the census form, however, was the politically canny choice. Americans aren’t far from the days when absurd categories like “mulatto,” “quadroon,” and “octoroon” could determine people’s fate. Sadly, had he checked the “white” box too, many voters would have resented it.

My own choices were simpler. Raised to think of myself as Irish before American — all eight of my great-grandparents emigrated during the late 19th century, hunkering down in ethnic enclaves within walking distance of salt water — I was taught that there was a proper “Irish” opinion on every imaginable topic…

Read the entire article here.

So, why are we so loyal to a president who is not loyal to us?

The Guardian
2013-05-05

Gary Younge, Feature Writer and Columnist

Kevin Johnson was pilloried for suggesting Obama has not been good for African Americans. But his question was a good one

Back when affirmative action was white, educational institutions were created for African Americans who were barred from admission elsewhere. Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) became the breeding grounds for the “talented tenth” – the elite class groomed to lead black America. Towards the end of the last century HBCUs had produced 75% of black PhDs, 85% of black doctors and 80% of black federal judges. Among the most prestigious was Morehouse, in Atlanta, which counts Martin Luther King, Samuel Jackson and Spike Lee among its alumni.

Later this month, Barack Obama will deliver the keynote address at Morehouse’s graduation ceremony. Another invited speaker was Morehouse alumnus Kevin Johnson, a prominent Philadelphia pastor. Then Johnson, an ardent Obama supporter during both presidential runs, wrote an article criticising the president for failing to appoint enough black cabinet members and to address the needs of African Americans in general. “Obama has not moved African-American leadership forward but backwards,” he wrote. “We are not in the driver’s seat – or even in the car … Why are we so loyal to a president who is not loyal to us?”

Shortly afterwards his speaker’s slot was removed. Instead of addressing the students alone, the day before Obama, he will now be one of a three-person panel curated “to reflect a broader and more inclusive range of viewpoints”…

Read the entire article here.

The Atlantic Wins Two National Magazine Awards

The Atlantic
Press Releases
2013-05-02

For media inquiries, please contact: Natalie Raabe at  (202) 266-7533.

Washington, D.C. and New York, N.Y. (May 2, 2013)—The Atlantic won two National Magazine Awards, it was announced tonight by the American Society of Magazine Editors (ASME). Atlantic senior editor Ta-Nehisi Coates won in the Essays and Criticism category and TheAtlantic.com was selected best Web site.

“I’m so happy for Ta-Nehisi and the entire team at The Atlantic. It’s wonderful to be recognized by our peers for excellence in one of our oldest journalistic forms, the essay, and one of our newest–the work we do every day on TheAtlantic.com,” said M. Scott Havens, president of The Atlantic.

Coates was honored in the Essays and Criticism category for “Fear of a Black President,” published in the September 2012 issue. Marshaling history, original reporting, memoir, and a fierce but understated moral passion in advance of the 2012 election, Coates outlines the predicament constraining President Obama: wary of coming across as a politically untenable Angry Black Man, he must always strive—as many professional African Americans must—to appear “twice as good.”…

Read the entire press release here.

In a first, black voter turnout rate passes whites

Associated Press
2013-04-29

Hope Yen

WASHINGTON (AP) — America’s blacks voted at a higher rate than other minority groups in 2012 and by most measures surpassed the white turnout for the first time, reflecting a deeply polarized presidential election in which blacks strongly supported Barack Obama while many whites stayed home.

Had people voted last November at the same rates they did in 2004, when black turnout was below its current historic levels, Republican Mitt Romney would have won narrowly, according to an analysis conducted for The Associated Press.

Census data and exit polling show that whites and blacks will remain the two largest racial groups of eligible voters for the next decade. Last year’s heavy black turnout came despite concerns about the effect of new voter-identification laws on minority voting, outweighed by the desire to re-elect the first black president.

William H. Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution, analyzed the 2012 elections for the AP using census data on eligible voters and turnout, along with November’s exit polling. He estimated total votes for Obama and Romney under a scenario where 2012 turnout rates for all racial groups matched those in 2004. Overall, 2012 voter turnout was roughly 58 percent, down from 62 percent in 2008 and 60 percent in 2004.

The analysis also used population projections to estimate the shares of eligible voters by race group through 2030. The numbers are supplemented with material from the Pew Research Center and George Mason University associate professor Michael McDonald, a leader in the field of voter turnout who separately reviewed aggregate turnout levels across states, as well as AP interviews with the Census Bureau and other experts. The bureau is scheduled to release data on voter turnout in May.

Overall, the findings represent a tipping point for blacks, who for much of America’s history were disenfranchised and then effectively barred from voting until passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965.

But the numbers also offer a cautionary note to both Democrats and Republicans after Obama won in November with a historically low percentage of white supporters. While Latinos are now the biggest driver of U.S. population growth, they still trail whites and blacks in turnout and electoral share, because many of the Hispanics in the country are children or noncitizens…

Read the entire article here.

Black pols stymied in Obama era

Politico
2013-04-29

Jonathan Martin, Senior Political Reporter

More than five years after Barack Obama won the Iowa caucuses and demolished the notion that white voters wouldn’t support a black presidential candidate, progress for other African-American politicians remains elusive. Even as the country elected and reelected Obama, making it seem increasingly unremarkable to have a black family in the White House, African-Americans are scarce and bordering on extinct in the U.S. Senate and governorships.

The president is indeed exceptional — but in the wrong sense of the phrase as it applies to other black politicians.

Consider what has taken place, or not taken place, since Obama broke the presidential color barrier in 2008: There has not been one African-American elected to the Senate — the only blacks in the chamber were appointed to fill vacant seats; the country’s sole African-American governor, who was originally elected before Obama captured the presidency, won reelection but may leave the ranks of black governors empty when he leaves after 2013; and a cadre of promising, next-generation black politicians have either lost races (Washington Mayor Adrian Fenty, Reps. Kendrick Meek of Florida and Artur Davis of Alabama) or seen their careers extinguished because of scandal (former Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr.).

The situation is particularly embarrassing for Democrats, to whom black voters give the vast majority of their support. Until Sen. Mo Cowan (D-Mass.) was appointed in February, the only African-American in the Senate was a Republican — Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina And it’s not lost on high-profile Democrats that the GOP now enjoys more ethnic diversity among its statewide leaders than the party whose president is both an illustration and a beneficiary of America’s changing face.

“We’re not there yet,” conceded Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.). “That’s why when people ask me whether the election of President Obama is the fulfillment of Dr. King’s dream, I say, ‘No, it’s just a down payment. There’s still a lot of work to do.’”…

Read the entire article here.

Selective Amnesia and Racial Transcendence in News Coverage of President Obama’s Inauguration

Quarterly Journal of Speech
Volume 98, Issue 2, 2012
pages 178-202
DOI: 10.1080/00335630.2012.663499

Kristen Hoerl, Associate Professor of Communication Studies
Butler University,  Indianapolis, Indiana

The mainstream press frequently characterized the election of President Barack Obama the first African American US President as the realization of Martin Luther King’s dream, thus crafting a postracial narrative of national transcendence. I argue that this routine characterization of Obama’s election functions as a site for the production of selective amnesia, a form of remembrance that routinely negates and silences those who would contest hegemonic narratives of national progress and unity.

Read or purchase the article here.

Ralina Joseph discusses her book Transcending Blackness: From the New Millennium Mulatta to the Exceptional Multiracial

Weekday with Steve Scher
KUOW.org 94.9 FM
Seattle News & Information
2013-04-15

Steve Scher, Host

Also this hour: Everett Herald reporter and columnist Jerry Cornfield catches us up on what’s happening this week in Olympia. Then, University of Washington Communication professor Ralina Joseph discusses her book Transcending Blackness: From the New Millennium Mulatta to the Exceptional Multiracial.

The interview with Dr. Joseph begins at 00:13:30 and ends at 00:40:39.

When asked about what transcending blackness means, she replied, “I chose this phrase because I think it’s a really disturbing one; the notion that blackness is something that needs to be transcended, that needs to be gotten over. It is inevitably a lack, a slight, a mark as opposed to a positive, wonderful entity.”

Download/Listen to the interview here.

Backing Barack Because He’s Black: Racially Motivated Voting in the 2008 Election

Social Science Quarterly
Volume 92, Issue 2, June 2011
pages 423–446
DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-6237.2011.00776.x

Ray Block Jr., Assistant Professor of Political Science/Public Administration
University of Wisconsin, La Crosse

Read or purchase the article here.

The Myths of Transcending Race and Post-Racialism

EthicsDaily.com
2008-11-11

Wendell Griffen, Visiting Professor of Law
William H. Bowen School of Law
University of Arkansas, Little Rock

Rather than speaking about a color-blind or “post-racial” society, the pundits and other observers of the Obama election should hope that it marks a society committed to “post-racism.”

Barack Obama understands and accepts his racial identity, as any reader of his books will know. Yet, his writings also demonstrate that Obama does not consider his racial identity something to be transcended. He is a black man in a multi-racial world, and is as comfortable with his biracial identity as his blood type. Neither factor defines Obama’s character, intellect, political skills or world view. The idea that Obama “transcends” his racial identity is as absurd as stating that Obama “transcends” being left-handed.

What the talk about Obama “transcending race” and that his election signals the start of a “post-racial era” actually demonstrates is our poor understanding about the impact of cultural incapacity and racism, be it conscious or unconscious, on even supposedly informed analysis and reflection about human conduct. The truth is that racial minority group members are not prevented from success because of their race. Racial identity does not make a person more or less thoughtful, articulate, gracious, civil, and competent. However, people have historically used racial identity to reward some people with unmerited advantages, while penalizing others with unmerited disadvantages, in the ongoing competition for power, wealth and influence in the United States.

Obama’s election marks the first time in U.S. history when racial identity has not worked that way. However, we should not distort its meaning by declaring that Obama somehow “transcended race,” was a “post-racial candidate,” or that his election has birthed a “post-racial era.” As long as we think that racial identity must be “transcended,” rather than considered merely an incident of humanity, race will continue to be a social construct used for issuing unmerited rewards and penalties to people we consider culturally different…

Read the entire article here.

Opinion: Why Future Politicians Must Embrace Our Composite Nation

The Next America: How Demography Shapes the National Agenda
National Journal
2012-11-14

Benjamin Todd Jealous, President and CEO
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)

America is becoming browner—and the ability to harness the changing electorate has become the gold standard for any aspiring politician.

As Republican nominee Mitt Romney thanked his supporters last week in the early hours of Wednesday morning, he was speaking to a mostly white nationwide audience–nearly nine out of 10, according to exit polling from Edison Research. Over in Chicago, President Obama was preparing to give his victory speech to a multiracial coalition that offered a glimpse of what America may look like in the coming years: 56 percent white, 24 percent black, 14 percent Latino, 4 percent Asian, and 2 percent other races.

This election confirmed a trend that many have suspected but some have chosen to ignore at their peril. Obama won a second term because he maintained or increased his share of racial and ethnic minority votes in swing states, particularly the black vote. The NAACP recently commissioned a swing-state poll of black voters that shows how both parties can connect with this rising electorate…

…In an 1869 speech called “Our Composite Nationality,” Frederick Douglass wrote that America’s unique geography and government destined us to be “the perfect national illustration of the unity and dignity of the human family that the world has ever seen.” Since then, our great national experiment has thrived when we chose to embrace our diverse talents and perspectives, and it has failed when we chose to build walls between each other…

Read the entire opinion piece here.