Mixed Race Studies

Melungeon (pronounced /məˈlʌndʒən/) is a term traditionally applied to one of a number of “tri-racial isolate” groups of the Southeastern United States, mainly in the Cumberland Gap area of central Appalachia: east Tennessee, southwest Virginia, and east Kentucky. Tri-racial describes populations thought to be of mixed (1) European, (2) sub-Saharan African, and (3) Native American ancestry.  Although there is no consensus on how many such groups exist, estimates range as high as 200.  Some self-identifying Melungeons dislike the term tri-racial isolate, believing that it has pejorative connotations. Until the late 20th century, some considered the term Melungeon to be pejorative…

Wikipedia

Speaking Up: Mixed Race Identity in Black Communities

Journal of Black Studies
Volume 39, Number 3 (January 2009)
pages 434-445
DOI: 10.1177/0021934706297875

Tru Leverette
University of North Florida, Jacksonville

Within Black communities, individuals of mixed Black/White parentage have faced diverse reactions, ranging from elevation to scorn. These reactions have often been based on the oppressions of history, the injustices of the present, and the hopes for a radically different future. This article traces the common historical responses, both positive and negative, within Black communities to mixed race identities, thereby elucidating contemporary reactions to race mixture within Black communities. In so doing, it argues that an historical understanding of these reactions as well as a recognition of the positions mixed race individuals occupy can challenge assumptions about race, difference, identity, and community—fostering new ground on which individuals can stand for common causes within heterogeneous communities.

Read or purchase the article here.

Mixing It Up: Early African American Settlements in Northwestern Ohio

Journal of Black Studies
Volume 39, Number 6 (July 2009)
pages 924-936
DOI: 10.1177/0021934707305432

Jill E. Rowe, Assistant professor, African American studies
Virginia Commonwealth University

Prior to the 19th century, African American settlers founded a number of productive communities in northwestern Ohio.  During this time period, there were a number of intermarriages and couplings between indigenous people, European explorers, ethnically diverse shipmates, and free and enslaved Africans in this section of the country.  Descendants of these unions were dubbed Melungeon, mulatto, or colored, depending on the discretion of oft-illiterate census takers. Though much is written about the hostilities free people of color faced in the South, descriptive documentation of their experiences in northwestern Ohio is scarce.  An examination of primary and secondary sources offers evidence of their agency as they struggled with structural barriers that led to disenfranchisement and descent into the racially identifiable category of African American.  White resistance to these diverse settlements and settlers challenges America’s collective memory of a racially tolerant North.

Read or purchase the article here.