Mixed Race Studies

‘I’m mixed-race, is Cambridge University right for me?’

BBC News
2019-01-22

Anoushka Mutanda Dougherty has been offered a place at Cambridge University, but she’s mixed-race and from a state school – and only 3% of students who started at Cambridge in 2017 were black, or mixed-race with black heritage. So is it the best place for her? At this point, she’s not sure.

Cambridge is the second-oldest university in the English-speaking world. Cambridge is the fourth-oldest surviving university in the world. Cambridge has produced, so far, 90 Nobel prize winners – and Cambridge, this educational powerhouse, just might not be where I want to go. At least, that’s how I feel right now, a week after finding out that I got a place…

Read the entire article here.

American Routes: Racial Palimpsests and the Transformation of Race

Oxford University Press
2017-04-18
296 pages
6-1/8 x 9-1/4 inches
Hardcover ISBN: 9780190624750

Angel Adams Parham, Associate Professor of Sociology
Loyola University, New Orleans, Louisiana

Reviews and Awards

• Co-winner, 2018 Allan Sharlin Memorial Award, Social Science History Association
• Honorable Mention, Thomas and Znaniecki Book Award, International Migration Section, American Sociological Association
• Co-winner, Barrington Moore Book Award in Comparative and Historical Sociology, American Sociological Association

Overview

• The first comparative sociological study of nineteenth century white and free black immigrants to the US
• Challenges the reliance of immigration scholarship on the historical experiences of European immigrants
• Combines archival research, interviews, oral histories, and participant observation to trace the experience of white and black refugees and their descendants in Louisiana over two hundred years

American Routes provides a comparative and historical analysis of the migration and integration of white and free black refugees from nineteenth century St. Domingue/Haiti to Louisiana and follows the progress of their descendants over the course of two hundred years. The refugees reinforced Louisiana’s tri-racial system and pushed back the progress of Anglo-American racialization by several decades. But over the course of the nineteenth century, the ascendance of the Anglo-American racial system began to eclipse Louisiana’s tri-racial Latin/Caribbean system. The result was a racial palimpsest that transformed everyday life in southern Louisiana. White refugees and their descendants in Creole Louisiana succumbed to pressure to adopt a strict definition of whiteness as purity that conformed to standards of the Anglo-American racial system. Those of color, however, held on to the logic of the tri-racial system which allowed them to inhabit an intermediary racial group that provided a buffer against the worst effects of Jim Crow segregation. The St. Domingue/Haiti migration case foreshadows the experiences of present-day immigrants of color from Latin-America and the Caribbean, many of whom chafe against the strictures of the binary U.S. racial system and resist by refusing to be categorized as either black or white. The St. Domingue/Haiti case study is the first of its kind to compare the long-term integration experiences of white and free black nineteenth century immigrants to the U.S. In this sense, it fills a significant gap in studies of race and migration which have long relied on the historical experience of European immigrants as the standard to which all other immigrants are compared.

Table of Contents

• List of Charts and Figures
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: Racial Systems and the Racial Palimpsest
• Chapter 2: St. Domingue as Training Ground: Color, Class, and Social Life Before Louisiana
• Chapter 3: White St. Domingue Refugees and White Creoles in Nineteenth Century Louisiana
• Chapter 4: St. Domingue Refugees and Creoles of Color
• Chapter 5: Twenty-first Century Remnants of a White Creole Past
• Chapter 6: Into the Twenty-First Century: Creoles of Color Finding Their Way
• Chapter 7: Conclusions: Racial Palimpsests and the Transformation of U.S. American Regions
• Appendix
• Notes
• References
• Index

‘Hidden Figures’ NASA mathematician Katherine Johnson to release autobiography next year

The Los Angeles Times
2018-12-20

Michael Schaub

This combination photo shows, Katherine Johnson in the press room at the Oscars in Los Angeles on Feb. 26, 2017, left, and her book “Reaching For the Moon: The Autobiography of NASA Mathematician Katherine Johnson.” ((Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP, left, and Atheneum Books for Young Readers))

Katherine Johnson, the pioneering NASA mathematician and computer scientist whose work was integral to the Apollo 11 mission to the moon, will release an autobiography for young readers next year.

The 100-year-old Johnson, who was portrayed by Taraji P. Henson in the hit 2016 movie “Hidden Figures,” will tell her life story in “Reaching for the Moon,” a book for middle-grade readers, publisher Atheneum Books for Young Readers announced in a news release.

Johnson, a West Virginia native, was hired by the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, the predecessor to NASA, in 1953. She worked as a “human computer,” or a mathematician who could perform complicated calculations manually…

Read the entire article here.

Inside Kamala Harris’s relationship with an Indian-American community eager to claim her

McClatchy: DC Bureau
2018-12-18

Katie Glueck, Senior Political Correspondent

Indian-American publications write about her regularly. Her first name means “lotus” in Sanskrit. She takes pride in grinding her own Indian spices. And she has been known to reference slogans that were used by Indian independence fighters like her grandfather.

If Kamala Devi Harris runs for president, the Democratic senator is poised to be championed by Indian-Americans, a constituency with significant representation in the donor community, growing numbers of political activists and candidates—and a sizable presence in states that will play key roles in the Democratic primary, from California to Texas.

“She will change the game if she runs for president,” said Anurag Varma, a Democratic donor who frequently supports Indian-American candidates and “absolutely” would back Harris. “She will create a new game if she becomes president.”…

Harris, of California, is the daughter of Shyamala Gopalan Harris, who was born in India, and Donald Harris, born in Jamaica. The senator identifies as both African-American and South Asian-American, according to her Senate website, which notes that she is the country’s first South Asian-American senator— a background that opens doors with a diverse set of voters….

Read the entire article here.

This edition: Moiya McTier, Mekita Rivas and Tanya Hernandez

Shades of U.S.
CUNY TV
The City University of New York
Original tape date: 2018-10-19
First aired: 2019-01-17

From a cabin in the woods without running water to astronomy Ph.D. candidate, Moiya McTier uses her platform to advocate for women of color in the sciences. Then, growing up Filipina and Mexican in Nebraska could be confusing, but Mekita Rivas finds her style as a fashion journalist. And last, Hell’s Kitchen-bred Tanya Hernández knows discrimination first hand, so she builds a legal career fighting it.

Guest List

• Tanya Hernández Professor of Law, Fordham University [and author of Multiracials and Civil Rights: Mixed-Race Stories of Discrimination]
• Moiya McTier PhD Candidate, Columbia University
• Mekita Rivas Freelance Writer

Watch the entire episode (00:26:46) here.

More cities add Barack Obama’s name to landmarks, highways

USA TODAY
2019-01-13

Chris Woodyard, Los Angeles Bureau Chief

LOS ANGELES – Barack Obama hasn’t been the president for nearly two years, but his fame is still spreading – at least when it comes to naming things after him.

The nation’s first African-American president need not go far around the country these days to find something that carries his name. There’s Barack Obama Way in New Albany Township, Indiana, and Barack Obama Boulevard in Pahokee, Florida. There’s a long list of schools now named for him, like Barack Obama Academy for Academic & Civic Development in Plainfield, New Jersey, and Barack Obama Elementary School in Richmond, Virginia.

Obama even has animal species named after him, like placida barackobamai, a sea slug…

Read the entire article here.

Cookeville Vietnam veteran meets Vietnamese-American son after 50 years, hosts family reunion

The Nashville Tennessean
2019-01-14

Yihyun Jeong, Veterans and Military Affairs Reporter

Hugh Nguyen as a boy in Vietnam, teased for being “Amerasian,” a child born during wartime from an Asian mother and an American solider. (Photo: Family handout)

His life was hell because he looked different than the other boys that played in the streets of Saigon.

His light skin, light hair and light eyes.The father he never knew.

These were all reasons that made Hugh Nguyen the target of bullies who mocked him for being an “Amerasian,” — though they used more deragatory terms — a child conceived in wartime by a Vietnamese mother and an American military father fighting abroad.

Not fully belonging to America or Vietnam, these kids were commonly dismissed as “children of the dust,” leftovers of an unpopular war. They were left discarded by both governments and left to be taunted by schoolmates who teased them for their features that resembled the face of the enemy.

Most never knew their fathers.

Roy Patterson, as an 18-year-old American soldier stationed at the base in Nha Trang during the Vietnam War. (Photo: Family handout)

“They disliked us tremendously,” Nguyen said in an interview with USA TODAY NETWORK – Tennessee. “We were treated like garbage. We were talked down to and looked down on.”…

Read the entire article here.

E is for Evelyn

Adulting Whilst…
2019-01-05

Fiona Timba

E is for Evelyn, Evelyn Dove.

Evelyn Dove was born in London on 11 January 1902 and was the first black woman to sing on BBC radio. Although often referred to as the British Josephine Baker, Evelyn Dove replaced Josephine Baker in 1932 as the star attraction at the Casino de Paris and in a career that spanned over five decades she was a star of jazz and cabaret, embraced by the world.

Evelyn had West African and English heritage, her father being a barrister originally from Sierra Leone. It is reported that she had a privileged upbringing, attending private school before going on to study at the Royal Academy of Music and in 1925 she became the first black woman to sing on BBC radio in 1925 at the age of just 24! Evelyn toured Europe performing with many of the great American jazz performers of the time before replacing Josephine Baker at the Casino de Paris. Coming from a privileged middle-class family, and with a parent of African heritage, you can only imagine the reaction her parents had to Evelyn donning Josephine’s revealing costume…

Read the entire article here.

What it’s like to be Black and Argentine

BBC News
2018-12-31

Reporter: Celestina Olulode
Produced by Hannah Green and Hannah Gelbart for the BBC News at Ten.

Black people have had a huge influence on Argentina’s history, but now they make up only one percent of the population of Buenos Aires.

Afro-Argentines, whose families descended from the slave trade, often feel like they’ve been written out of history and are mistaken for foreigners in their own country.

Watch the story here.

Mixed Race, Half Enough?

Medium
2019-01-15

Kristen Simmons

Photo by Thomas Hafeneth on Unsplash

Hi.

I’m Kristen. I’m a mixed-race author who writes books with mixed-race characters. Yes, I know my last name is Simmons and doesn’t sound very Japanese. Yes, I know Kristen doesn’t either. Yes, I even know that while many people have called me everything from “tan” to “exotic,” I don’t look “very Japanese.”

But guess what? I am.

All my life, this has been something I’ve encountered. People would ask my father when I was alone with him in public if I was really his daughter because we didn’t look alike. (For the record, he’s Caucasian.) Then, when I first started telling people I was Japanese, the questions turned to, “But not completely Japanese, right?” Because to them, I wasn’t…

Read the entire article here.