Mixed Race Studies

Doctor Who’s Pearl Mackie: ‘When I was little there weren’t many people like me on TV’

The Guardian
2017-04-09

Sarah Hughes

Pearl Mackie: ‘This is by far the biggest thing I have ever done, which is amazing.’ Pearl wears top £26 urbanoutfitters.com. Make-up by Linda Johansson at One Represents using YSL Beauty. Hair by Bianca Simone Scott using Mizani. Fashion assistant Bemi Shaw. Photograph: Andrew Woffinden for the Observer

Meet Doctor Who’s new companion, Pearl Mackie. She tells Sarah Hughes why it’s so important to have diverse actors on TV, and how her friends are making sure her feet stay on the ground

The moment when Pearl Mackie understood just how big her new role as Doctor Who’s latest companion was came early in filming. “There was a scene in episode three that was so awesome – in the sense that I was awestruck by the scale of the set – that it was really humbling. I stood there looking at it, thinking, ‘Oh. Wow. This is a very big show.’ When you see it from the inside, that’s when you realise how massive it is.”

She’s not wrong — Doctor Who is, as 29-year-old Mackie puts it, “properly, globally huge”. The most successful science fiction series in television history, this tale of a history-haunted time lord and his adventures across the universe with various sidekicks has progressed far beyond its days as children’s tea-time entertainment. In 2013 the 50th anniversary special broke viewing records around the world after being aired in 94 countries simultaneously while the current Doctor, Peter Capaldi, began his stint by undertaking a rock star-style world tour with then companion Jenna Coleman, taking in Cardiff, London, Seoul, Sydney, New York, Mexico City and Rio de Janeiro. At each stop they were greeted by queues of fans, many of them in costume. There were Weeping Angels and Daleks, Cybermen and companions, and a whole host of Doctors, from every stage of this very British institution’s lengthy career…

…She spent much of her own childhood searching for a similar jolt of recognition. “When Alicia Keys came out that was a big thing for me because she was mixed race as well,” she says. “There were a lot of people I liked on screen, like Judi Dench, she’s wicked, but that’s very different to having someone where you think, ‘She looks like me, maybe I could do that.’”…

Read the entire article here.

Making inclusion “moments” happen

Civil Service Blog
Government of the United Kingdom
2017-03-31

Hayley Trezel, Head of Transformation
Parole Board for England and Wales

Hayley Trezel compares her experience of working in the Civil Service with that of BAME colleagues.

To quote a phrase from a team of colleagues I respect and admire: “Moments don’t just happen.” I appreciate the truth of this when considering my own journey and ‘moment’ of clarity on the race agenda.

I am a 32-year-old working mum, having worked at the Parole Board for the past 8 years. I am a woman of colour, though I still shy away from referring to myself as black. I was brought up to be very proud of my mixed-race heritage. I have been asked on numerous occasions, “where are you from?”,  and I take pleasure in explaining my heritage and seeing the surprise on people’s faces…

Read the entire article here.

As Get Out shows, love isn’t all you need in interracial relationships

The Guardian
2017-03-27

Iman Amrani

‘In Get Out, Peele successfully challenges the way the parents and their friends pride themselves on not being racist, while also objectifying the young man both physically and sexually.’ Photograph: Justin Lubin/Universal Pictures

Jordan Peele’s film has provoked discussion of issues about race and relationships that often remain too sensitive or uncomfortable to explore

This year marks the 50th anniversary of the 1967 US supreme court decision in the Loving v Virginia case which declared any state law banning interracial marriages as unconstitutional. Jeff Nichols’s recent film, Loving, tells the story of the interracial couple at the heart of the case, which set a precedent for the “freedom to marry”, paving the way also for the legalisation of same-sex marriage.

Loving isn’t the only recent film featuring an interracial relationship. A United Kingdom is based on the true story of an African prince who arrived in London in 1947 to train as a lawyer, then met and fell in love with a white, British woman. The film tells the tale of love overcoming adversity, but I wonder whether these films are missing something.

I can understand how, at the moment, with the backdrop of rising intolerance in Europe and the United States, it’s tempting to curl up in front of a triumphant story of love conquering all, but I grew up in an interracial household and I know that it’s not as simple as that…

Read the entire article here.

Anti-Miscegenation Laws

Chapter in The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Gender and Sexuality Studies
Online ISBN: 9781118663219
Published Online: 2016-04-21
5 pages
DOI: 10.1002/9781118663219.wbegss617

Sally L. Kitch, Regents’ Professor, Women and Gender Studies
Arizona State University

Anti-miscegenation (racial mixing) laws have been enacted around the world throughout history. In mainland British colonies and the United States such laws regulated marriages between persons of different races, primarily between blacks and whites, from 1634 to 1967, when the Supreme Court declared them an unconstitutional mechanism for maintaining white supremacy in Loving v. Virginia. That decision exposed the faulty legal reasoning that exempted interracial marriages from the usual protections provided to marriage and citizenship on the grounds that miscegenation was illicit. British New World island colonies did not enact anti-miscegenation laws, but they did regulate the rights of mixed-race progeny. Often overlooked in discussions of these and other anti-miscegenation laws and policies are their inherent gender biases and their protection of white male prerogatives as a keystone of the doctrine of white supremacy.

Read or purchase the chapter here.

Game Of Thrones’ Nathalie Emmanuel is almost unrecognisable without her curls in punk shoot as she claims a ‘lack of diversity’ on TV damaged her self-esteem as a child

The Daily Mail
2017-03-16

Becky Freeth

Edgy: Nathalie Emmanuel showed off an edgier side in the new shoot for Hunger magazine, as she spoke about the lack of diversity she saw when she grew up

She’s landed a bigtime role on one of the most-watched cult TV shows in recent times.

But Game Of Thrones’ Nathalie Emmanuel is most thankful for roles that promote diversity, because the lack thereof on TV during her own childhood directly affected her self-esteem.

Looking unrecognisable in a shoot for Hunger magazine, the former Hollyoaks actress explains how her mixed heritage was previously underrepresented…

Read the entire article here.

The Mixed Race Athlete’s ECG: Not So Black And White

Journal of the American College of Cardiology
Volume 69, Issue 11, Supplement
2017-03-21
pages 1416
DOI: 10.1016/S0735-1097(17)34805-2

Aneil Malhotra, Prashant Rao, Harshil Dhutia, Sabiha Gati, Tee Joo Yeo, Rajit Khosla, Vivek Prasad, Michael Papadakis, Sanjay Sharma
St. George’s University of London, London, United Kingdom

Non Invasive Imaging (Echocardiography, Nuclear, PET, MR and CT)

• Background: The past 2 decades has seen a huge rise in the number of mixed race athletes with one white and one black parent. In fact this is the largest growing ethnic group in both the USA and UK. Little is known on the mixed race athlete’s EKG. This is the first study to analyse the EKGs of mixed race athletes (MAs) and compare them to white (WAs) and black (BAs) athletes.
• Methods: The EKGs of 300 MAs professional soccer players were compared to 1,000 BA and 1,000 WA soccer players all of whom underwent mandatory preparticipation screening with EKG. All MAs had one white and one black parent. EKG characteristics were analysed independently by 2 cardiologists.
• Results: The mean age of all athletes was 16.7 years. 95% were male. MAs had a higher prevalence of bradycardia (67%) vs. both WAs (44%) and BAs (46%; table 1). MAs had more left ventricular hypertrophy (30%) vs. BAs (17%). MAs revealed more atrial enlargement and left axis deviation than WAs, but not BAs. T wave inversion (TWI) was 4 times more common in MAs (8%) than WAs (2.3%) though less common than BAs (10.9%).
• Conclusions: MAs demonstrate EKG changes similar to black athletes in terms of atrial enlargement and axis deviation which are borderline variants according to the refined criteria for EKG interpretation in athletes. MAs demonstrated a higher prevalence of TWI in all territories vs. WAs, though less than BAs. Mixed race athletes do indeed exhibit a “mixed” pattern of EKG characteristics though these tend to be more similar to black athletes’ EKG than white athletes.

Read the entire poster here.

‘My mum always told me I was white, like her. Now I know the truth’

The Guardian
2017-03-18

Georgina Lawton

Georgina Lawton: ‘Even though I would look in the mirror and see a brown, dark-eyed girl, I couldn’t identify as black.’

As a child in a white Anglo-Irish family, Georgina Lawton’s curiosity about her dark skin colour was constantly brushed aside. Only when her father died did the truth surface

You might not think it to look at me, but my upbringing was a very Anglo-Irish affair. I grew up on the outskirts of London with my blue-eyed younger brother, British father and Irish mother. Many happy weeks of the school holidays were spent in Ireland and I was educated at a Catholic school in Surrey. We ate roast beef and yorkshire puddings on Sundays, and Thin Lizzy, Van Morrison and the Clash formed the soundtrack to our lazy weekends.

The only peculiar aspect to all this was the defining aspect of my identity. Because, although I look mixed-race, or black, my whole family is white. And until the man I called Dad died two years ago, I did not know the truth about my existence. Now, age 24, I’m starting to uncover where I come from…

Read the entire article here.

First Professor of Race and Education appointed at Leeds Beckett

Leeds Beckett University
Leeds, United Kingdom
2017-03-14

Carrie Braithwaite, Press Officer

Leeds Beckett University has appointed the UK’s first Professor of Race and Education, Shirley Anne Tate.

Professor Tate is a world-leading researcher in the areas of institutional racism and black identity. She will join Leeds Beckett’s Carnegie School of Education on Monday 3 April from the University of Leeds, where she is currently Associate Professor, giving a boost to Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) data, which shows that there were only 25 Black female Professors in the UK in the academic year 2015/16.

Professor Tate has written widely on topics including the body, ‘mixed race’, beauty, and the cultures of skin. The focus of her research is Black diaspora politics and she will begin a new international research project this summer, looking into what needs to be done to tackle racialisation across the UK, Sweden, South Africa and Brazil and how National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs) play a vital role in national approaches to countering racism…

Read the entire article here.

Chi-chi’s classic tale of real talent

The Independent
2016-11-14

Julia Molony

Irish-Nigerian double bass player Chi-chi Nwanoku has been breaking down barriers all her life. She tells our reporter about her remarkable childhood and career

The home of classical musician Chi-chi Nwanoku offers a glimpse into the mind of a person driven to the greatest heights of excellence in their field.

For one thing, it is immaculate. “I’m fastidious,” she admits, miming obsessive wiping of kitchen surfaces. She is also, “a very literal person. If someone says ‘play that staccato’, you won’t hear it played shorter.” Then, of course, there is her double bass in the front room – the oversized instrument, “a man’s instrument” as she was told when she started out, seeming cartoon-ish here, despite the tall ceilings of her elegant Victorian semi-detached house.

After you have taken in Nwanoku’s jaunty, jewel-coloured afro, and the surprise of her bright turquoise eyes, the most striking thing about her is her energy. She is, she says, only five feet tall. But she is a woman clearly driven by a relentless, indefatigable energy…

…She was born in Fulham, London, the eldest daughter of an Irish nurse and Nigerian medical student. Mixed race couples were an anomaly at the time and her parents faced enormous prejudice, both from society and closer to home, within their extended family. They were economic migrants to the capital of the British Empire at a time when landlords routinely posted signs reading “no blacks, no Irish, no dogs.” But her parents’ love flourished and endured for 50 years until they died. It was through witnessing her parents’ bond, that Chi-chi’s own iconoclasm was formed….

Read the entire article here.

Africa Utopia: Chi Chi Nwanoku discusses the Chineke! orchestra

The Evening Standard
London, United Kingdom
2016-09-02

The founder of Britain’s first BME orchestra sat down with [Features Writer] David Ellis to talk classical music, prejudice in the industry and the Southbank Festival

Watch the interview here.