The Beiging of America, Personal Narratives about Being Mixed Race in the Twenty-First Century

Posted in Anthologies, Autobiography, Books, Media Archive, United States on 2017-07-05 13:23Z by Steven

The Beiging of America, Personal Narratives about Being Mixed Race in the Twenty-First Century

2Leaf Press
June 2017
eBook ISBN: 978-1-940939-55-1

Edited by:

Cathy J. Schlund-Vials, Professor of English and Asian and Asian American Studies
University of Connecticut

Sean Frederick Forbes, Poet and Professor

Tara Betts, Author and Professor

The Beiging of America, Personal Narratives about Being Mixed Race in the Twenty-First Century, takes on “race matters” and considers them through the firsthand accounts of mixed race people in the United States. Edited by mixed race scholars Cathy J. Schlund-Vials, Sean Frederick Forbes and Tara Betts, this collection consists of 39 poets, writers, teachers, professors, artists and activists, whose personal narratives articulate the complexities of interracial life. Discrimination, instilling pride in family settings, sorting out the terms and names that people call themselves and their relatives, tackling colorism within communities of color, and childhood recollections fill these pages with compelling stories that speak to lived experiences, mapping a new ethnic terrain that transcends racial and cultural division.The Beiging of America was prompted by cultural critic/scholar Hua Hsu, who contemplated the changing face and race of U.S. demographics in his 2009 The Atlantic article provocatively titled “The End of White America.” In it, Hsu acknowledged “steadily ascending rates of interracial marriage” that undergirded assertions about the “beiging of America.”

As one flips through the pages of The Beiging of America, one discovers contributors’ shared exasperation with the inevitable and preposterous question – “What are you?” – simply because they do not fit neatly into any one racial category. This in itself is a reflection of how the black-white paradigm in America continues to obfuscate and distort rigid constructs and systemic racism, reminding readers that race – even in a post-racial imaginary – still matters. The Beiging of America is an absorbing and thought-provoking collection of stories that explore racial identity, alienation, with people often forced to choose between races and cultures in their search for self-identity. While underscoring the complexity of the mixed race experience, these unadorned voices offer a genuine, poignant, enlightening and empowering message to all readers.

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Re:Membering (our memories our stories)

Posted in Arts, Asian Diaspora, Audio, Media Archive, United States on 2014-08-18 15:51Z by Steven

Re:Membering (our memories our stories)

Hapa Happy Hour: A lively discussion and celebration of the mixed heritage experience.
2014-08-04

Hosts:

Rena Heinrich
Hiwa Bourne
Lisa Liang

The ladies talk about Lisa’s succesful one woman show: Alien CItizen: An Earth Odyssey! Recorded last year (July 2013).

Download the episode here.

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Re:Connecting (episode 27)

Posted in Asian Diaspora, Audio, Media Archive, United States, Women on 2012-08-24 01:39Z by Steven

Re:Connecting (episode 27)

Hapa Happy Hour: A lively discussion and celebration of the mixed heritage experience.
2012-08-19

Hosts:

Rena Heinrich
Hiwa Bourne
Lisa Liang

Published, graduated and Mom’d.  The three ladies of Hapa Happy Hour return to discuss the micros in their lives in the hopes of connecting with yours.

Download the episode (00:31:17, 35.8 MB) here.

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