Mixed Race Studies

Santita Jackson Show (WVON AM, Chicago) with Rainier Spencer

The Santita Jackson Show
WVON 1690 AM
Chicago, Illinois
2011-02-16, 15:05Z (09:05 CST, 10:05 EST, 07:05 PST)

Santita Jackson, Host

Rainier Spencer, Director and Professor of Afro-American Studies; Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies
University of Nevada, Las Vegas

The topic of discussion will be the so-called “one-drop rule.”  Listen to the interview here (39.6MB, 00:43:21).

Dr. Spencer is the author of the new book, Reproducing Race: The Paradox of Generation Mix (2011) in where he argues cogently, and forcefully, that the deconstruction of race promised by the American Multiracial Identity Movement will remain an illusion of wishful thinking unless we truly address the racist baggage that serves tenaciously to conserve the present racial order.

Selected bibliography:

• “Racism and the Multiracial Label,” commentary in the “Room for Debate: The ‘Two or More Races’ Dilemma” section, The New York Times, February 12, 2011.
• “Mixed-Race Chic,” The Chronicle Review, May 19, 2009.
• Challenging Multiracial ldentity. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 2006.
• Spurious Issues: Race and Multiracial Identity Politics in the United States, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1999.

Listen to the interview here (39.6MB, 00:43:21).

Black Indians, Pompey Fixico w/ historian & author Dr. Katz

The Gist of Freedom
BlogTalk Radio
2013-05-16

Leslie Gist, Host

Join The Gist of Freedom as we welcome Pompey Fixico and William L. Katz.  Pompey Fixico ancestors fought US slave-catchers and military units for 42 years in Florida.

Mr. Katz and Mr.Fixico will discuss the three Seminole wars, their goals courage and achievements as seen through his ancestors.

The legacy of  Wild Cat and John Horse will also be discussed as it relates to how they brilliantly led the Seminoles!

Mr. Katz’s book Black Indians has three chapters on this unknown American story. Their current leader, William Dub Warrior, has said:

“Black Indians is not only one of the  most  thoroughly researched and accurate book on  the subject, it is he best written account I have  come across.”

William “Dub” Warrior, Chief of the John Horse Band, Texas and Old Mexico Seminoles

Listen to the episode here. Download the episode here.

For some, Cheerios commercial crossed a line by depicting mixed-race family as normal

The Daily Circuit
MPR News
Minnesota Public Radio
2013-06-11

You might not think a cereal commercial would serve as a vehicle for a heartfelt conversation about race, but that seems to be what’s happening — both around the country and on The Daily Circuit.

Not all of that conversation is respectful. Some of the reactions to the current Cheerios commercial were so ugly, the company asked YouTube to turn off its comments function.

What made some watchers angry was the racial mix of the family depicted by the commercial…

…. But in some parts of the country, especially in rural America, such images still take some getting used to.

“The presence of these couples is opening up a new conversation that hasn’t been there,” said Jenifer Bratter, professor of sociology at Rice University. “In a space where there is almost no racial diversity, where it’s dominated by one group, it’s hard to really gauge what people think about race.

“It’s that act of forming a family that I think is really still a powerful moment for people to deal with their own racial attitudes.” …

… “We know that one of the most charged couplings is white women and black men, for many reasons,” said Marcia Alesan Dawkins, a professor at the University of Southern California. “There’s a history of lynching black men for their perceived threats against white women. … A lot of people said in the comments, ‘It’s only white women who can have white babies, so if they start having babies or keep having babies with African-Americans and Asian-Americans, etc., etc., what’s going to happen as white people become not the majority race in the United States?'”

In a different context, Dawkins said, the race of the little girl in the commercial would not have attracted attention…

Read the entire story here. Listen to the story here.

Coming Out As Black, When You Were Hispanic

Tell Me More
National Public Radio
2013-06-06

Celeste Headlee, Guest Host

High school senior Elaine Vilorio wrote that she started seriously contemplating her blackness when she stopped straightening her hair.
Elaine Vilorio

Teen Elaine Vilorio spent years trying to make sense of her racial identity. She describes herself as Hispanic, but other people see her as black. Vilorio speaks to guest host Celeste Headlee about her recent HuffPost Teen blog, ‘Coming Out As Black.’

This is Tell Me More from NPR News. I’m Celeste Headlee. Michel Martin is away. Coming up, a celebrity chef shares some tasty summertime recipes and juicy stories about his clients. But first, we’ll turn to the issue of race and identity. The question of, what am I, is one that a lot of teens ask themselves and the answer can be quite complicated for multiracial kids.

It’s something that Elaine Vilorio has thought a lot about. She’s a high school senior, originally from the Dominican Republic. Over the course of her life, people assumed she was black and that bothered her. But two years ago, after she stopped chemically straightening her hair, the change in her appearance made her rethink her roots. She wrote about that in a Huffington Post piece titled “Coming Out as Black,” and Elaine Vilorio is now here to tell us more. Welcome to the program, first of all.

ELAINE VILORIO: Thank you, I’m happy to be here.

HEADLEE: First of all, let me ask you, why did you phrase it that way, coming out as black?

VILORIO: Well, people have always asked me, you know, like you said, you know, if I was black consistently, and I’ve always denied that. So I thought that was a very fitting way, a very dramatic way to say that I finally have admitted, you know, this Afro identity, so to speak, when it’s always been there. Coming out, I finally can say it out loud, and I can finally explain to people, yes, I have African roots in me and that’s okay.

HEADLEE: Well, when you talk about racial identity, it’s something you’ve written about quite a bit as well.

VILORIO: Yes.

HEADLEE: What is racial identity for you? Is it about the way you see yourself or how others see you?

VILORIO: I mean, it’s a combination of both. I think people perceive me and they separate Afro-descendancy from, you know, the Hispanic identity. Hispanic identity doesn’t really take into account that African racial root. You know, I see myself as a predominantly black Hispanic. And then other people, you know, they just see a mixed person, just mixed. Blackness isn’t really, you know, acknowledged…

Read the transcript here.  Listen to the interview here.  Download the interview here.

Half-Caste as Seen Through the Eyes of James Southard

Mixed Race Radio
Blog Talk Radio
2013-06-05, 16:00Z (12:00 EDT)

Tiffany Rae Reid, Host

James Southard has always been drawn to the creation of authentic stories that are visually and emotionally compelling. His love of music and photography eventually led him to the video business as an Associate Producer working for Quincy Jones’ cable network (NUE-TV) in 2000. Since then, Mr. Southard has worked with clients such as Discovery Channel, HGTV, TV- Guide Channel, as well as several universities and non-profit organizations.

While James is proud of the time he spent as a youth working for his father in a grocery store and as a white-water rafting guide in his early 20s where spent three years working with emotionally challenged youth, James made a mark in his high school when he and his friend, Darrel Satcher started the first black students club.

On Today’s episode of Mixed Race Radio, we will discuss James’ love of Hip Hop and some of the experiences that have shaped him and his ideas of race as a social, rather than a biological, construct since he became a Hip Hop DJ in 1992. James will talk with us about some of his interesting experiences dealing with racism as a man who self-identifies as mixed and how he navigates the concept of race with his family and a community that sometimes feels he…

For more information, click here.

The Joys and Challenges of Becoming a Transracial Family Through Adoption

Your Adoption Coach with Kelly Ellison
2013-04-20

Kelly Ellison, Host

If you are considering adopting a child of a different culture or race than your family, or you are already a transracial family formed through adoption, don’t miss this show. Our host this week is Amanda Grant, President of USAdopt, and an adoptive mother in a transracial family, who is joined by guest Tiffany Rae Reid, expert in a racial identity development and host of Mixed Race Radio. Contemplating the adoption of any child takes courage and honesty. The adoption of a child of a different cultural or racial heritage adds another layer of both complexity and celebrations. Learn the realities of transracial adoption, how to prepare your family for the change in its composition, what to do to support the healthy development of your child’s identity and what resources are available to support your child and your family in every aspect of living as a transracial family.

Listen to the episode here.  Download the episode here.

Local Artists Collaborate on Asian Heritage Art Exhibits at DePaul

Vocalo Morning Amp
Vocalo 90.7 FM
Chicago, Illinois
2013-05-16

Brian Babylon and Molly Adams, Hosts

The exhibit War Baby/Love Child at the DePaul Art Museum highlights the work of mixed race artists who share Asian heritage in their identities. Curator Laura Kina and artist Mequitta Ahuja joined AMp hosts Brian Babylon and Molly Adams in the studio this morning and discussed their personal family lineage, the stereotype stamped on mixed children whose roots came from Asian countries where the United States was involved in, and how kinship is formed among “war babies” through artistic expression and exhibits.

Download the story here.

Slaves In The Family with Edward Ball

Research at the National Archives and Beyond
BlogTalk Radio
Thursday, 2013-05-16, 21:00-22:00 EDT, (Friday, 2013-05-17, 01:00-02:00Z)

Bernice Bennett, Host

Edward Ball, Lecturer in English
Yale University

If you knew that you were a descendant of a slave- owner, would you tell anyone?

If you had an opportunity to apologize to descendants of those enslaved by your family, would you?

Edward Ball is a writer of narrative nonfiction and the author of five books, including The Inventor and the Tycoon (Doubleday, 2013), about the birth of moving pictures. The book tells the story of Edward Muybridge, the pioneering 19-century photographer (and admitted murderer), and Leland Stanford, the Western railroad baron, whose partnership, in California during the 1870s, gave rise to the visual media.

Edward Ball’s first book, Slaves in the Family (1998), told the story of his family’s history as slave-owners in South Carolina, and of the families they once enslaved. Slaves in the Family won the National Book Award for nonfiction, was a New York Times bestseller, was translated into five languages, and was featured on Oprah.

Edward Ball was born in Savannah, raised in Louisiana and South Carolina, and graduated from Brown University in 1982. He worked for ten years as freelance journalist in New York, writing about art and film, and becoming a columnist for The Village Voice.

His other books, all nonfiction, include The Sweet Hell Inside (2001), the story of an African-American family that rose from the ashes of the Civil War to build lives in music and in art during the Jazz Age; Peninsula of Lies (2004), the story of English writer Gordon Hall, who underwent one of the first sex reassignments—in the South during the 1960s—creating an outrage; and The Genetic Strand, about the process of using DNA to investigate family history.

Edward Ball lives in Connecticut and teaches at Yale University.

The Gil Gross Program with Marcia Dawkins

The Gil Gross Program
Talk 910, KKSF AM
San Francisco, California
Monday, 2013-05-13

Gil Gross, Host

Gil speaks with Marcia Dawkins, author of “Clearly Invisible; Racial passing and the Color of Cultural Identity“, about the growth of our mulit-racial nation.

Download the audio here.

Checking More Than One Box: A Growing Multiracial Nation

All Things Considered
National Public Radio
2013-05-12

Arun Rath, Host

[Note from Steven F. Riley: My wife and I live in the White Oak neighborhood of Silver Spring, Maryland, USA.]

Larry Bright holds his 3-year-old son’s hand while the boy steps through a leafy playground in Silver Spring, Md., and practices counting his numbers in English.

At the top of the slide, the boy begins counting in his other language: Vietnamese.

Bright, the boy’s father, is African-American; his mother, Thien Kim Lam, is Vietnamese. The couple has two children.

“They are a perfect mix between the two of us,” Lam tells Arun Rath, host of weekends on All Things Considered.

Bright and Lam’s son and 7-year-old daughter are multiracial, just two of thousands born in what’s been called a multiracial baby boom. Today, 15 percent of marriages are interracial and inter-ethnic…

…Evolving Perspectives

Multiracial people identifying as just one race is part of a long trend. University of Southern California professor Marcia Alesan Dawkins’ father was one such man: part black and part white.

“He has lived his life as an African-American man. He lived through segregation, he lived through civil rights,” Dawkins says. “And though he acknowledges these other aspects of his identity, he sees the world from the perspective of a black man. That’s how he chooses to identify.”

But just one generation makes all the difference for Dawkins herself, who claims black, white and Latino heritage. Dawkins and her sister see the world a little differently, she says.

“I don’t think it’s better or worse, but I think it’s a credit to the progress in both ways that people can choose to identify just as one, or choose to identify as two or more,” Dawkins says.

Despite the trend, Dawkins says it is important to remember that it is still less than 3 percent of the population that identifies as multiracial. The overwhelming majority of Americans identify as having one race only.

“That’s not a bad thing, but we have to be really careful how we read and interpret and spin these census results,” she says.

Read the entire story here. Listen to the story here.  Download the audio here.