Mixed Race Studies

The Pacific Sociological Association Annual Meeting 2010

81st Annual PSA Meeting
2010-04-08 through 2010-04-11
Marriott Oakland City Center
Oakland, California

Theme: Revitalizing the Sociological Imagination: Individual Troubles & Social Issues in a Turbulent World

Selected programs from the Preliminary Program Guide include:

Friday, 2010-04-09, 12:00-13:10 PDT (Local Time)

86) Roundtables

Table 3: Mixed Race & Identity: The Social Construction of Race
Organizers: Michael McKail & Joanna Norton, UCR [University of California, Riverside]
Krystale Littlejohn, Stanford Univ.: Interracial Dating & Endogamy among Mixed race Youth in the U.S.
Charlene Johnson, Univ. of New Mexico: “Brokers” of Culture: Hearing Children of Deaf Adults at the Interchange of Ethnic Identity

Saturday, 2010-04-10, 15:30-17:00 PDT (Local Time)

192) Multi-Racial & Multi-Ethnic Identity: Contemporary Trends in Research
Organizer: Shigueru Tshua, UCR & Reginald Daniel, UCSB
Adam Louis Horowitz, Stanford Univ.: Don’t Hate on the Halfies: Religious Identity Formation Among Children of Inter-Religious Couples
Shigueru, Tshua, UCR: The Stacked Bar Model of Ethnic Identity: Peruvian Nikkei’s Shifting Identities from Peru to California
Rebecca Romo, UCSB: Between Black & Brown: Blaxican Identity in the United States
Reginald Daniel, UCSB: Hypocritical Hybridity & the Critical Difference: Postraciality in the Age of Obama

Sunday, 2010-04-11, 11:15-11:45 PDT (Local Time)

220) Minority Experiences
Organizer: Aya Kimura Ida, CSU Sacramento
Sabeen Sandhu, Santa Clara Univ.: Migration & Medical Degrees: U.S. Born Foreign Medical Graduates
Sarah Schlabach, UCLA: Family, Race & Gender: What Does It Mean To Be Multiracial?
Aya Kimura Ida, CSU Sacramento: Coping with Discrimination: Role of Self-Esteem for African Americans, Caribbean Americans & European Americans

For more information, click here.

Census Chief Apologizes for ‘Negro’ Category

The New York Times
2010-03-26

Kate Phillips

When Robert Groves, the director of the Census Bureau, appeared on C-Span’s “Washington Journal” program Friday morning, he found himself having to defend the racial designations on the census form…

Read the entire article here.

Assessing Shifting Racial Boundaries: Racial Classification of Biracial Asian Children in the 2000 Census

Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
2009-12-07
77 pages

Sara Megan McDonough

Thesis submitted to the faculty of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Sociology.

This study examined the racial identification of biracial Asian children by their parents, in a sample (n=9,513) drawn from 2000 Public Use Microdata Series Census data (Integrated Public Use Microdata Series 2009). I used competing theories of Asian assimilation to examine how characteristics of the child, the Asian parent, the non-Asian parent, and the local Asian community influenced the likelihood of a child′s being identified as Asian, non-Asian, or biracial. Findings showed that child′s, both parents′, and community characteristics significantly influenced the child′s racial classification. While the effects of greater assimilation significantly increased the likelihood of an Asian classification for third-generation children, in contrast, it decreased the likelihood of an Asian identification for first- and second-generation children. Findings showed that children with a black parent were less likely than children with a white parent to be identified as Asian instead of non-Asian. However, inconsistent with past findings, children with a Hispanic parent were more likely than those with a white parent to be identified as Asian rather than non-Asian. Exploratory analyses concerning a biracial classification indicate significant relationships with factors previously found to increase the likelihood of an Asian identification, including the effects of greater Asian assimilation and size of the local Asian community. Moreover, the relationship between parent‟s and child′s gender on the child‟s racial classification may be more complicated than previously theorized, as I found evidence of “gender-matching” which meant that boys were more likely to be identified like their fathers, and girls more like their mothers.

Read the entire thesis here.

Contentious Legacies: Mixed-Race in the Age of Colorblindess and Beyond

University of Illinois, Urbana-Champiagn
Asian American Cultural Center
2010-03-30
12:00 CDT (Local Time)

Tessa Winklemann

This presentation is about Mixed Race issues, the 2010 Census, and the history of the construction of race and the census in the United States.

For more information, click 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.

In multiracial America, the census puts us in a box

Washington Post
2010-03-21

Susan Straight, Professor of Creative Writing
University of California, Riverside

I received the census form in the mail last week, and I was ready. A vaguely admonitory letter from the Census Bureau had arrived the week before, urging me to fill out the form because the results would be used to “help each community get its fair share of government funds for highways, schools, health facilities, and many other programs you and your neighbors need.” It ended with a warning: “Without a complete, accurate census, your community may not receive its fair share.”

That’s a lot of fairness and sharing and community going on. But as my three daughters and I talked about the form — and in particular its racial and ethnic categories — we started wondering: How does the census really define our community, and how would that affect whatever our fair share would be?

The first time I got to check a census box for a child, it was 1990. I had an 8-month-old daughter with curly, brown-black hair, cinnamon-dark eyes and almond-colored skin. Her father is a mix of African, Irish and Native American; I am white; and since we could check only one box, the only option available for her was “Other,” as if she were from a different planet…

Read the entire article here.

Susan Straight’s new novel, “Take One Candle, Light a Room,” about a mixed-race family, will be published in October.

A Clearer Picture of Multiracial Substance Use: Rates and Correlates of Alcohol and Tobacco Use in Multiracial Adolescents and Adults

Race and Social Problems
Volume 2, Number 1 (March 2010)
Published online: 2010-03-12
18 pages
Print ISSN: 1867-1748, Online ISSN: 1867-1756 (Online)
DOI: 10.1007/s12552-010-9023-1

George G. Chavez
Rutgers University

Diana T. Sanchez, Assistant Professor of Social Psychology
Rutgers University

Existing studies indicate that multiracial adolescents face greater substance use rates than monoracial adolescents. However, it is unclear whether the risk identified in adolescence persists into adulthood. The current study uses data from the 2001 California Health Interview Survey to analyze the alcohol and tobacco use of multiracial adolescents and adults compared to European American, African American, Native American, Asian/Pacific Islander American, and Latino American individuals. Results generally support the hypothesis that multiracial adolescents and adults face higher rates of substance use than African American and Asian/Pacific Islander American individuals, though this pattern of results was reversed in comparison with Native Americans and European Americans, and less consistent compared to Latino Americans. We further establish and discuss the correlates of drinking and smoking behavior for mixed-race individuals—comparing them to other racial groups. We review the limitations of our design and the implications for future research on multiracial substance use.

Read the entire article here.

Race Card: Corinne Bailey Rae and Zadie Smith Navigate Race and Art

Bitch Magazine
2010-01-21

Nadra Kareem

Works by two mixed-race Brits—musician Corinne Bailey Rae and writer Zadie Smith—have recently been profiled in the New York Times. Both women navigate their collective white and Caribbean ancestry by embracing hybridity instead of relegating themselves to one group. Their doing so challenges entrenched American notions of race that say that multiracial people must choose one ethnicity or another, not all.

The English-Jamaican Smith, who rose to fame upon the publication of her 2000 bestselling book White Teeth, regards Zora Neale Hurston and Barack Obama as her sister and brother in arms. In her new book of essays, Changing My Mind, Smith praises Hurston for making “‘black woman-ness’ appear a real, tangible quality, an essence I can almost believe I share, however improbably, with millions of complex individuals.”…

…For singer Corinne Bailey Rae, whose mother is white and father is from the West Indian island of St. Kitts, being mixed-race had a direct impact on her music. Now, 30, Bailey Rae gravitated towards grunge in her teens…

Read the entire article here.

Phillip Handy – Race and gender in the family

Rutgers University Undergraduate Research Spotlight
2009-07-26

Phillip Handy
Rutgers University

Phillip Handy discusses his research, which looks into the question of how mother-daughter and father-son relationships impact a mixed-race child’s racial identity.

Phillip is advised by Dr. Diana Sanchez, Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at Rutgers University.

‘A Yellow-Ass Nigga’?: Hip Hop and the ‘Mixed-Race’ Experience

Intermix
Academic Papers
February 2010

Dr. Kevin Searle

Hip Hop has always engaged with the politics of ‘race’ and racism. From the Black Panther Party-inspired Marxism of acts such as The Coup and Immortal Technique, to the Nation of Islam-influenced stance of Public Enemy and Ice Cube, to the black feminism of Ursula Rucker and MeShell Ndgeocello, socially conscious emcees have approached the issues from a number of angles. In the context of this engagement with the politics of ‘race’ and racism, the topics of ‘mixed race’ and interracial relationships have often featured.

This article explores some of the lyrics about the ‘mixed-race’ experience in Hip Hop. It does not aim to provide an exhaustive list of songs which have engaged with issues of ‘mixed-race,’ but to serve as an introduction. The article is borne out of my longstanding interest in Hip Hop, and much of the research involved me consulting my ever-growing record collection, and songs which have come to my attention over the years.

Hip Hop provides the soundtrack to the lives of many ‘mixed-race’ youth and adults. The genre is perhaps more relevant to the ‘mixed-race’ experience than any other form of music. Charlie Owen (2001: 138) has noted how ‘mixed-race’ people constitute a relatively young population. This population has been at its largest, at a time when Hip Hop has taken its greatest share of record sales. However, as many emcees have pointed out, in rhymes which engage with such themes as the division of labour on slave-plantations in the American South, this does not in anyway mean that ‘mixed race’ people somehow constitute a ‘new racial group.’

The present article is structured into four main sections. The first engages with songs about the ‘mixed-race’ experience, the second looks at lyrics about interracial relationships, the third about colour/shade and the final part focuses on tracks about women and colour. It is perhaps worth noting that a number of artists, from different musical genres, have commented on all of these themes, prior to the dawn of Hip Hop in the 1970s.3 In his book On Racial Frontiers…, Gregory Stephens (1999: 170) argues that Bob Marley was, ‘a master of employing double-voiced lyrics,’ and Marley’s line: ‘I’m a rainbow too,’ on the track Sun is Shining constitutes a comment on the artists’ ‘biraciality.’ Nina Simone described a woman who was the product of interracial rape in her song Four Women. The blues artist, Big Bill Broonzy drew upon the African-American expression: If you’re white, you’re all right, If you’re brown stick around, if you’re black, get back’, in the song Black, Brown and White. And, socially conscious soul singer, Curtis Mayfield, admonished ‘high yellow girls’ in We the People who are Darker than Blue, additionally, as Mike Rugel (2007) shows, the theme of women and colour has also been present in a number of blues songs…

Read the entire article here.