Mixed Race Studies

Endogenous Race in Brazil: Affirmative Action and the Construction of Racial Identity among Young Adults

Working Paper
2010-01-10

Andrew M. Francis, Professor of Economics
Emory University

Maria Tannuri-Pianto, Professor of Economics
University of Brasilia

Brazil is not only characterized by racial diversity but also by socioeconomic inequality. This complexity, plus the recent adoption of racial quotas by a handful of universities, makes Brazil an ideal place to study the construction of racial identity. In this paper, we examine applicants and students of the University of Brasilia, which established racial quotas in July 2004 reserving 20% of available admissions slots for students who self-identified as black. Using admissions data as well as a student survey conducted by the authors, we explore the determinants of racial identity, including socioeconomic status, parents’ race, academic performance, and quotas in admissions. We find that, holding skin tone constant, socioeconomic status and academic performance vary inversely with black identity. The evidence suggests that young adults in mixed race families are more likely to identify with their mother’s race than their father’s, and that this pattern relates to gender and father’s absence during childhood. We also find that quotas in university admissions increased the likelihood that applicants and students self-identified as non-white, and that this phenomenon was attributable, in part, to actual change in racial identity.

Read the entire paper here.

Think Outside of The Box: Understanding Multiracial Students

Wisconsin Academic Advising Association Conference
Appleton, Wisconsin
2009-09-18
18 pages
Handout: 4 pages

Angela Kellogg, Director of Academic Advising and Career Services
University of Wisconsin, Stevens Point

Overview
Agenda

• Introduction and interest in topic
• Multiracial trivia quiz
• Overview of session
• General multiracial information
• Study: methods and results
• Discussion
• Implications
• Conclusion and questions

Learning Outcomes
As a result of this presentation, participants will:

• Gain information about the findings of the study
• Develop a greater understanding of multiracial identity in the college context
• Increase awareness of critical incidents experienced by multiracial college students
• Consider the implications for serving multiracial students on their respective campuses

View the entire presentation here.  View the handout here.

Hello, My Race is:… Supporting the Identity of Biracial College Students

People of Color in Predominantly White Institutions
Ninth Annual Conference POCPWI
2004
5 pages

Natasha H. Chapman, Director for the TCU Leadership Center
Texas Christian College

An entire generation of biracial individuals is coming of age suggesting that colleges and universities will experience an increase in their multiracial student body. Student affairs professionals are faced with the challenge of addressing the needs of this emerging student
group. This presentation will describe this diverse population and educate student affairs professionals on their unique developmental views.

Read the entire paper here.

Dartmouth Junior wins Beinecke Scholarship

Dartmouth College Office of Public Affairs
Press Release
Media Contact: Kelly Sundberg Seaman
2010-05-18

Anise Vance, a member of the Dartmouth Class of 2011, has been named a Beinecke Scholar, one of 20 college juniors nationally. The award, which supports the “graduate education of young men and women of exceptional promise,” provides $4,000 prior to entering graduate school and an additional $30,000 while attending graduate school. He joins Gabrielle Ramaiah ’10 and Jodi Guinn ’09 as the third Dartmouth student tapped for the scholarship in the past three years.

Vance, of Weston, Mass., is majoring in geography. “This is a huge honor,” he says, “both for the validation of my aspirations, and the financial support.” On the other hand, he notes, “it raises expectations. The call from the award committee came while I was working in the library; I phoned my parents, and then went right back to work.”

Issues of social justice, in the United States and globally, engage Vance. He traces his drive to ask questions about who lives where — and what results from that mix of space and identity — to his childhood “growing up all over the place”: Vance attended school in Kenya, Botswana, and Egypt. Growing up, as he calls himself, “a mixed race child of an Iranian mother and an African American father,” he was aware that the perceptions of others were often linked to one’s environment. This understanding has formed the basis of his research thus far…

…My current research for my senior thesis as a Mellon Mays Fellow investigates the causes of and mechanisms by which residential segregation continues to plague urban centers and their populations,” he reports. “Using a variety of methods, including ethnographic research, census-data analysis and structural examination of lending and real estate practices, I hope to provide a comprehensive investigation of African American segregation in my father’s hometown of Hartford, Connecticut.”…

Read the entire press release here.

What Are You? Multi-racial and Bi-racial College Student Experiences [Session Handout]

Association of College Unions International Annual Conference
New York, New York
2010-03-01
13:00Z – 14:15Z
1 March 2010
11 pages

Megan E. Bell, Assistant Director
University Memorial Center
University of Colorado, Boulder

Seven million people checked more than one box to select their ethnicity in the 2000 census. As an increasing number of multiracial students enter campus, it is crucial to understand how identity development for these students is unique. This session will showcase student interviews on video, as well as include dialogue and a gallery exercise.

Read the entire handout here.

Biracial Student Voices: Experiences at predominatly white institutions

The Bulletin
Association of College Unions International
Volume 77, Issue 6 (November 2009)

Willie L. Banks Jr., Associate Dean of Student Life
Cleveland State University

Race is a complex issue for campuses to address. Often, universities tout their diversity by sharing statistics about the respective racial populations present within their study body, all boxes that can be neatly checked: African-American, Asian, Hispanic, etc. While “other” may be used as a catchall, rarely is a category for biracial or multiracial students included in this list. In the January 2002 issue of American Demographics, Alison Stein Wellner reported that 2.4 percent (approximately 6.8 million people) of the total U.S. population were living in households that included two or more races. In the Aug. 8, 2006 issue of Inside Higher Ed, Scott Jaschik indicated the biracial population was increasingly growing and attending institutions of higher education, requiring the need for research reflecting the experiences of these students on college campuses. Biracial students have been on campus for a number of years; however, their voice has not been adequately represented within the literature as Donna M. Talbot described in the 2008 book, “Biracial and Multiracial Students.”

April Jourdan commented in the 2006 Journal of Counseling and Development that the majority of research on minority populations on college campuses focused on monoracial ethnic categories (i.e., Asian, African American, or Hispanic) and not on the lives of biracial or multiracial individuals in higher education.

For many campuses, biracial individuals provide an interesting challenge and pose more questions than answers. Who comprises this population? What are this population’s needs? How can institutions provide resources and services to address those needs? Unfortunately, there is not one answer to these critical questions. Just as biracial individuals are complex and multilayered, so are their needs and experiences.

Earlier this year, a new study was conducted to examine the experiences of biracial students with one parent of African American heritage attending predominantly white institutions in the southern United States. The findings demonstrate some practical strategies that campus professionals can employ to improve the educational environment in which biracial students develop their identities.

Read the entire article here.

Strategies Multiracial College Women Use to Navigate Monoracial Systems

Education and Human Sciences, College of (CEHS) Open Access Theses and Dissertations from the College of Education and Human Sciences
University of Nebraska, Lincoln
May 2009
248 pages

Minisa Michiko Chapman-Huls
University of Nebraska – Lincoln

A Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of The Graduate College at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln In Partial Fulfillment of Requirements For the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy

An exploration of the college experiences of multiracial women uncovered the strategies they used to navigate the monoracial system of predominately white institutions. A purposeful sample of 18 women who were multiracial was chosen. Data was collected through semi-structured face-to-face interviews. Participants’ stories represented multiracial experiences at thirteen different undergraduate institutions. A participant’s precollege experiences, identity and the college’s peer culture impacted how she approached social situations in the highly homogenous and monoracial setting at college. Participants took on the roles of pacifist, non-conformist, and activist to successfully navigate college environments and social scenarios. The findings also support prior study on the identity development of multiracial college students. Childhood experiences shaped the racial identity of participants that was affirmed and challenged, but not changed by college factors and experiences. Significant factors to the identity development of participants at college were academic courses, faculty and peers. Implications of the findings and limitations of the study are discussed.

Table of Contents

CHAPTER 1: Introduction
Significance of research
Statement of the Problem
Purpose of the study
Definitions
Limitations and delimitations

CHAPTER 2: Review of Literature
Identity Development of Multiracial Individual
Psychological Studies of Impact of Multiracial Identity
Racial Categorization of Mixed-race Persons
Racial Attitudes towards multiracial Individuals
Experiences of Multiracial College Students
Summary

CHAPTER 3: Methods
Purpose
Characteristics of Qualitative Research
Research Design
Data Collection
Managing and Recording Data
Data Analysis Strategies
Ethical Considerations
Validity
Particiment Vignettes
Findings

CHAPTER 4: Foundations for Success: Development of Strategies to Successfully Naviage Monoracial Systems
Racial Identity and formation
Childhood Experiences
Summary

CHAPTER 5: The College Experience: Test of Strategy
Challenges to identity
Resources for support
Summary

CHAPTER 6: Strategies for Success
Playing the role of Pacifist
Playing the role of NonConformist
Playing the role of Activist
Summary

CHAPTER 7: Thoughts and Suggestions
Implications
Further Research
Conclusion

BIBLIOGRAPHY

APPENDICES
Appendix A: Participant Consent Form
Appendix B: E-Mail Invitation to Participants
Appendix C: Interview Protocol

Read the entire dissertation here.

Revising Race: How Biracial Students are Changing and Challenging Student Services

Journal of College Student Development
Volume 51, Number 2 (March/April 2010)
pages 115-134
E-ISSN: 1543-3382 Print ISSN: 0897-5264
DOI: 10.1353/csd.0.0122

Patricia E. Literte, Assistant professor of sociology
California State University, Fullerton

This research investigates the relationship between biracial college students and race-oriented student services (e.g., Office of Black Student Services). These services are organized around conventional understandings of race that assume there are five, discrete racial categories, namely, Black/African American, Latino/a, White, Asian American, and Native American. Drawing on interviews (n = 60) with students and administrators at two universities, this article examines the problems that arise when students’ racial identities are incongruent with universities’ views of race. This study can assist practitioners in the development of services on campuses that are characterized by increasingly fluid racial terrains in the post–Civil Rights era.

Read or purchase the article here.

Multiracial students speak out on campus

The Vermont Cynic
2010-03-15

Patrick Dowd

The question of racial identity isn’t always black and white. 

Multiracial students on campus  say that struggle for identity extends beyond stereotypes and name mispronunciations, according to the four student panelists who spoke on behalf of UVM’s multicultural students at Harris/Millis.

“Since I came to UVM, I’ve become confused about my racial identity,” senior Tania Khartabil said. “I don’t feel authentic anymore.”

The panelists all shared this feeling and expressed similar frustration in constantly being culturally labeled without acknowledgement of their mixed identity…

Read the entire article here.

Who am I?

Middlebury Magazine
Middlebury College, Middlebury, Vermont
Winter 2010

Kevin Charles Redmon, [class of 20]10

As Janet Mondlane Rodrigues [class of 20]12 grapples with her own complex racial identity, she implores others to take a look in the mirror, as well, and ask themselves this loaded question.

Early in Barack Obama’s presidential campaign, before clips of the Reverend Jeremiah Wright’s more polemical sermons looped endlessly on cable television and Obama was forced to publicly denounce his pastor, the neologism “postracial” was on a lot of lips. A hopeful word with an elusive definition, it seemed to have as much to do with Obama’s fair skin and poise as it did with any message he espoused. Indeed, postracial was more about what the junior senator didn’t say than what he did—here was a man of color who appeared to transcend his mother’s whiteness and father’s African heritage, an editor of the Harvard Law Review who could acknowledge the tribulations of being a black man in America without letting it consume him. In short, a man who had moved beyond race. The implication being, so should we.

Janet Mondlane Rodrigues ’12 hasn’t moved beyond race, and she’s determined not to let others move beyond it, either. Mozambican born and Brooklyn raised, she shoulders a complicated identity: Her maternal grandfather was a black African revolutionary, her maternal grandmother a tenacious, white Indiana girl. Her mother is a multiracial world musician; her father is white Portuguese. From this vantage point, Rodrigues sees an America and a campus still struggling to address racism and privilege. To her, talk of a post-racial era is a way of silencing an argument mid-sentence…

…In high school, Rodrigues was already probing what it meant to have a multiracial identity, particularly in a borough so heavily segregated. With her Latina friends, “I was known as the white girl, because of how I spoke.” Others mistook her for Dominican or Puerto Rican. “By the black community, I was seen as privileged because I didn’t have the hair; I didn’t have the totally dark skin; I could pretend like I didn’t have this black identity. But among whites, I didn’t have the privileges they had; I didn’t go to private school.” Indeed, race was as much about the deep chasms between socioeconomic classes as it was about skin color…

Read the entire article here.