Mixed Race Studies

Differences give mixed-heritage students a common bond

The Los Angeles Times
2013-05-27

Larry Gordon

Increasing numbers of college campus clubs give voice to those who don’t fit into the traditional perceptions of race.

No matter what their ancestry or their skin color, many members of UCLA’s Mixed Student Union say they have repeatedly been asked the same question by classmates and strangers curious about an ambiguous racial appearance: “What are you?”
And that shared experience, they say, helps to bond the otherwise extremely diverse group, which is devoted to the rising numbers of students who are biracial and from mixed ethnic heritages.

Jenifer Logia, 20, a UCLA sophomore who is one of the Mixed Student Union’s directors, said much of campus life is defined by distinct ethnic, religious or social groupings. But none comfortably fits someone like her — from a family that blends Nicaraguan, Filipino and Guamanian heritages…

Read the entire article here.

Latino racial choices: the effects of skin colour and discrimination on Latinos’ and Latinas’ racial self-identifications

Ethnic and Racial Studies
Volume 31, Issue 5, 2008
pages 899-934
DOI: 10.1080/01419870701568858

Tanya Golash-Boza, Associate Professor of Sociology
University of California, Merced

William Darity, Jr., Arts & Sciences Professor of Public Policy, African and African American Studies, and Economics
Duke University

Are predictions that Hispanics will make up 25 per cent of the US population in 2050 reliable? The authors of this paper argue that these and other predictions are problematic insofar as they do not account for the volatile nature of Latino racial and ethnic identifications. In this light, the authors propose a theoretical framework that can be used to predict Latinos’ and Latinas’ racial choices. This framework is tested using two distinct datasets – the 1989 Latino National Political Survey and the 2002 National Survey of Latinos. The results from the analyses of both of these surveys lend credence to the authors’ claims that Latinas’ and Latinos’ skin colour and experiences of discrimination affect whether people from Latin America and their descendants who live in the US will choose to identify racially as black, white or Latina/o.

Read or purchase the article here.

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.

First Person: ‘We’ve made diversity our official civic religion in Leicester’

This is Leicestershire
Leicester Mercury
2013-03-27

Ben Ravilious

I was delighted to learn the city mayor has given the green light to Leicester’s City of Culture bid. However, I already have nagging doubts about the direction this might be taking.

It’s the flogging of the word “diversity” that concerns me. We’ve made diversity our official civic religion in Leicester but I think we should place more emphasis on the ways in which we mix to give us the best chance of winning.

Let’s be clear, my wife is of a different race, religion and nationality to me, we have two mixed-race daughters and my life is far richer as a result.

I also think it’s essential to continue the battle for equality so everyone in Leicester can all feel equally represented and respected.

But diversity alone is just a statistic and having diversity doesn’t necessarily mean harmony or cultural significance. It’s what we do with it that counts…

Read the entire article here.

Census 2011: Leicester ‘most ethnically diverse’ in region

BBC News
2012-12-11

Leicester is one of the most diverse cities in the UK and the largest in the East Midlands, the latest census shows.

Information from the 2011 survey shows there are 329,000 people living in the city, 24,000 more than in Nottingham, while 250,000 live in Derby. [See Leicester details here.]

Half of Leicester’s population describe themselves as white British, compared with 80% nationally and 63.9% in 2001.

Deputy Mayor of Leicester Rory Palmer said they viewed its diversity as a major strength.

The details emerged in the latest round of information released from the 2011 census taken in March.
 
Leicester was widely tipped to be the first city with a minority white population but just missed out on the landmark with 50.6% describing themselves as white.

But it does have one of the lowest rates of residents who identify themselves as white British, at 45%, and the highest proportion of British Indians, at 28.3%…

Mr. Palmer, deputy city mayor, said: “What it means is that we have a very diverse population and we view this as a great strength and something the city can be very proud of.

“We saw the Queen and the royal family kick off their Diamond Jubilee in March this year here in Leicester, probably because Leicester is a very real reflection of modern, vibrant, multi-cultural Britain.”

While Nottingham’s population remains smaller than Leicester’s at 305,680 – 38,692 more than in 2001 – it does have a higher than average mixed race community.

About 6% are mixed ethnicity, with 4% white and black Caribbean…

Read the entire article here.

Amalgamation, North and South

Sacramento Daily Union
Volume 24, Number 3619 (1862-11-03)
page 4, column 2
Source: California Digital Newspaper Collection

Driven from every other position by the force of argument or the force of facts, the advocates of a doomed system flourish before the eyes of the ignorant the bugbear of amalgamation. Amalgamation, they urge, is the natural result of entertaining sentiments hostile to slavery. The Marysville Express returns to the charge, quoting that eminent statistician, Voorhees of Indiana, to show that in proportion to the negro population of the North there is at the present time a frightful excess of quadroons, mulattoes and octoroons in the free States over the slave States. “Voorhees proved,” says the Express, “by reference to these unerring statistics [these of the census], that in 1860 the number of mixed bloods was much greater in the free States than in 1850, in proportion to the unmixed black population–thus showing that as abolitionism has grown in the North, this evil of amalgamation has increased. Another remarkable but disgusting fact accounts for the larger proportion of mixed bloods in our section, and that is, the by no means uncommon cohabitation of negro men with white women in the strong Abolition communities. This the census also shows. The same census returns show that such an occurrence is exceedingly rare in the slave States—a very few instances being reported. These are facts that cannot be denied. In addition to such authority, we have proof furnished by the papers and correspondents from the East, that the amalgamation theories of the Abolitionists are rapidly becoming practicalized. Marriage and cohabitation have become so common in New York and Boston as scarcely to attract attention, except as the astounding fact occasionally breaks upon one, that there are whole blocks and rows of houses with ‘every tenement occupied by families the head of each of which is, the one black and the other white!’ That there are also mixed bloods in the slave States is a fact, and a deplorable one. But the evil can never become so corrupting where the two races occupy the relative positions that slavery fixes.”

We have seen no census returns in which the number of quadroons, mulattoes and octoroons in the Northern States has been given, with a division according to the shade of complexion. Those having African blood in their veins are generally, if not always, returned in the census as “colored persons.” Perhaps Voorhees had access to statistics that have not yet reached the public in the form of an authorized publication. But, however that may be, an increase of the mixed breeds in the North cannot be more justly attributed to the growth of  “Abolitionism” than to the growth of the railroad interest or the progress of common schools. The Express, to establish the preposition, must first show that none but Abolitionists in the North practice amalgamation, and then prove that there is no amalgamation in the South, where abolitionism is held in abhorrence. Now, in regard to the Northern cities, it is quite true that in what ore sometimes called the “infected districts” of New York, Boston and Philadelphia, whites and blacks are sometimes found living together in loathsome habitations; but these districts are the “nurseries of Democracy.” Amid all the changes of opinion that have come over the respectable portion of the community, those sections of the great cities in which practical amalgamation may be observed, invariably give large majorities for the ticket labeled “Democratic.” What then? Does it follow that Democracy leads to amalgamation? Yet that inference is quite as legitimate as the one drawn by the Express. When the Express asserts that “Marriage and cohabitation (of the two races) have become so common in New York and Boston as scarcely to attract attention, except as the astounding fact occasionally breaks upon one that there are whole blocks and rows of houses with every tenement occupied by families the head of each of which is, one black and the other white,” it either willfully misrepresents the state of the case or else it has been egregiously gulled. Nowhere in the United States is the prejudice against the negro race more general and intense than it is in the city of New York. The simple appearance of a black man and white woman, arm in arm, on Broadway, would provoke a riotous demonstration. It is only in the by ways of the metropolis, and among the very dregs of society, that a case of amalgamation can be found; and.in every case, rum and vice, not hostility to slavery, explain the association.

The Express admits the existence of amalgamate in the South. Logically, then, if the mixture of the races be such a disgusting evil, the Express should condemn the institution of slavery, which brings the races into such intimate association. “But the evil can never become so corrupting where the two races occupy the relative positions that slavery fixes.” Why not? In the language of a recent candidate for office in this State, “the blood of the chivalry flows through the veins of a half million slaves on Southern plantations.” Does the fact of men holding and selling as chattels those who share their own lifeblood, palliate or darken the offense of amalgamation? Among men of right feeling and intelligence there can be but one answer. Mongrelism pervades the South, and the emancipation policy of the Administration, instead of stimulating the evil, will rather tend to check its extension by arousing that prejudice of race which is the true safeguard of Caucasian purity. The prevailing sentiment of the North is well interpreted by Orestes A. Brownson, as “anti-slavery, but anti-negro.”

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.

Latino Racial Reporting in the US: To Be or Not To Be

Sociology Compass
Volume 7, Issue 5 (May 2013)
pages 390-403
DOI: 10.1111/soc4.12032

Clara E. Rodríguez, Professor of Sociology
Fordham University

Michael H. Miyawaki
Fordham University

Grigoris Argeros, Assistant Professor of Sociology
Mississippi State University

This review focuses on how Latinos report their race. This is an area that has recently experienced a major surge of interest in both government and academic circles. This review of the literature examines how and why Latinos report their race on the census, in surveys and in more qualitative studies. It reviews the vibrant and growing scholarly literature relevant to the questions of the placement—by self or others—of Latinos along the US color line, what determines it and how the Census has coped and is coping with it. We begin with a brief review of the history of Latino classification in the census and then discuss the factors influencing racial reporting. These include national origin and skin color, acculturation and generational status, socioeconomic status, perceived discrimination and identification with others who have experienced actual discrimination, location, and question format. We end with a discussion of the implications of the recent 2010 Alternative Questionnaire Experiment conducted by the census, and conclude with suggestions for future research.

Read or purchase the article here.

Changing Race: Latinos, the Census and the History of Ethnicity

New York University Press
July 2000
283 pages
Paperback ISBN: 9780814775479

Clara E. Rodríguez, Professor of Sociology
Fordham University

Latinos are the fastest growing population group in the United States. Through their language and popular music Latinos are making their mark on American culture as never before. As the United States becomes Latinized, how will Latinos fit into America’s divided racial landscape and how will they define their own racial and ethnic identity?

Through strikingly original historical analysis, extensive personal interviews and a careful examination of census data, Clara E. Rodriguez shows that Latino identity is surprisingly fluid, situation-dependent, and constantly changing. She illustrates how the way Latinos are defining themselves, and refusing to define themselves, represents a powerful challenge to America’s system of racial classification and American racism.

Are You Ready for the Census?

Sacramento Daily Union
Volume 19, Number 2862 (1860-05-29)
page 1, column 4
Source: California Digital Newspaper Collection

On the first of June, Friday next, the various Deputy Marshals in the different portions of the State will commence their labors in taking the census of the United States, which mast be completed by the first of November.   The Marshals are required by the Act of Congress to separate their districts into subdivisions containing not over 21,000 persons, unless inconvenient boundaries are made by so doing. Each Assistant must make a personal visit to each dwelling house and each family in his subdivision, make monthly returns to the U.S. Marshal, and within one month after the time specified for the completion of the enumeration, furnish the census returns to the County Clerk. For the purpose of giving information to the public, we publish the following list of questions which it will be necessary to answer. This list can be cut out and the answers prepared in anticipation of the call of the taker:

The age of each, sex and color, whether white, black or mulatto.

Profession, occupation or trade of each male person over fifteen years of age.

Value of real estate owned.

Place of birth, naming the state, Territory or country.

Married within the year.

Attend school within the year.

Persons over twenty years of age who cannot read or write.

Whether deaf and dumb, blind, insane or idiotic, pauper or convict.

Name of owner, agent or manager of the farm.

Number of improved acres.

Number of unimproved acres.

Cash value of farm.

Value of farming implements and machinery.

Live stock on hand June 1st, 1860, viz.: Number of horses, mules and asses, working oxen milch cows and other cattle, swine and sheep.

Value of live stock.

Value of animal slaughtered during the year.

Produce during the year ending June 1st, 1860, viz: Number bushels wheat, rye, Indian corn, oats, beans and peas, buckwheat, barley, Irish potatoes, sweet potatoes, pounds of wool and pounds of tobacco.

Value ore land products in dollars.

Gallons of wine, value of produce of market garden, pounds of butter, pounds of cheese, tons of hay, bushels of clover seed, pounds of hops, pounds of flax, bushels of flaxseed, pounds of maple sugar, gallons of molasses, pounds of honey and beeswax, value of home made manufactures.

Name of corporation, company or individual producing articles to the annual value of $500.

Name of business, manufacture or product.

Capital invested in real estate and personal estate in the business.

Raw material used, including fuel, viz : Quantities, kinds, value, kind of motive power, machinery, structure or resource.

Average number of hands employed, viz : Male, female, average monthly cost of male labor, average monthly cost of female labor. Annual product, viz: Quantities, kinds, values.

Name of every person who died during the year ending June 1st, 1860, whose usual place of abode was in the family, the age, sex and color, whether white, black or mulatto, married or widowed, places of birth, naming the State, Territory or country, the month in which the person died, profession, occupation or trade, disease or cause of death.

In connection with the subject of taking the census in this State; the San Francisco Herald says:

The compensation fixed by the Act is two cents for each person enumerated, ten cents a mile for necessary travel—to be ascertained by multiplying the square root of the number of dwelling houses in the division by the square root of the number of square miles—ten cents for each farm fully returned, fifteen cents for each establishment of protective industry, two percent, for social statistics, upon the amount allowed for the enumeration of population, and two cents for the name of each deceased person enumerated.  The United Stales Marshals are allowed to employ superintendent clerks, and such other clerks, with the consent of the Secretary of the Interior, as they may deem necessary. In regard to compensation for all these officers, the Act of Congress has been amended so far as it applies to California, Oregon, Utah, and New Mexico, and it may be increased according to the discretion of the Secretary of the Interior, Indeed he has already expressed the opinion that the remuneration is inadequate, and has given assurances that so far as the law applies to California the rates named above shall be quadrupled.

It is estimated that our population at this time exceeds 700,000, and it Would not surprise us if the census should exhibit a still larger number. With a representation in Congress under this enumeration, the influence of California will be so vastly increased we may no longer be compelled to listen to complaints of inattention and neglect. It may occur that we shall have an equal representation with Kentucky, Tennessee and Illinois.

It has been estimated that the census of 1860 will exhibit a total population in the United States of 81,500,000 souls, of whom 27,000,000 are whites. “To be apportioned on this population,” writes a statistician, “are two hundred and thirty-three representatives. Of this number, it is estimated, the Southern States will have eighty-two, being a decrease of seven; the Middle States of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Delaware will have fifty-nine, being a decrease of five; New England will have twenty-five, being a decrease of four; while the Western States will have sixty-seven. being an increase of fourteen.”