Mixed Race Studies

“I’m the Best of Both Worlds” Factors Influencing the Racial Identities of Biracial Youth

Oregon State University
2008-06-11
140 pages

Christine LeAnn Mouzong

A Thesis submitted to  Oregon State University in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the degree of Master of Science

This study examined the social and contextual factors that lead to differences in the way biracial adolescents interpret their racial identity. Using 11 interviews with a sample of biracial youth between the ages of 14 and 17-years-old, this study also explores the strategies these individuals use to achieve social validation for their preferred racial self-understanding. Theoretically, the factors shaping identity construction and the strategies used to negotiate identity are studied through both a bioecological model and a symbolic interactionist framework.

The findings from this study provide new insights into adolescent biracial identity that involve issues ranging from cultural racism to the impact of video media on adolescent development. The main themes emerging from youth narratives suggest that four primary factors shape how biracial youth understand and reconcile their racial identities. First, community messages about race define the parameters of adolescents’ racial identity options. Secondly, social meanings attached to physical appearance play a pivotal role in how racial identities are understood by self and others. Thirdly, peer endorsements of color-based stereotypes, especially those derived from popular media images of Black entertainers, are crucial to how these adolescents frame their racial identity options. Lastly, racial socialization in the familial context provides an important, though often ambiguous, piece to biracial identity formation.

As well, four strategies surfaced in this study that biracial adolescents appear to use when negotiating identity claims in interactions with others. These strategies include compromise, evoking mixed parentage, emotion regulation, and using humor.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• Chapter 1: Introduction
  • Purpose of Study
  • Background
  • Historical Context
  • Research Questions
• Chapter 2: Literature and Theory Review
  • Symbolic Interaction
    • Self-concept and Identity
    • Individuals as Social Actors
  • Bioecological Perspective
    • Proximal Processes
    • Person Factors
    • Context
    • Time
    • Summary
  • Adolescent Identity Development
  • Race and Ethnicity
    • Race/Ethnic Identity Development
  • Multiracial Identity
    • The Multidimensional Model of Biracial Identity
    • Part-Black Youth
    • Part-Hispanic Youth
  • Factors that Influence Identity Options
    • Social Networks
    • Schools
    • Peers
    • Family Influences
    • Physical Appearance
  • Summary
• Chapter 3: Method
  • Recruitment
  • Sample
  • Site Selection
  • Interview Procedures
  • Interview Protocol
  • Data Coding and Analysis Procedures
• Chapter 4: Results
  • Qualitative Data Analysis
  • “My Mississippi self” Community Messages and Racial Identity
    • General Impressions of Community
  • Identity Options and Community
    • Mixed Messages
    • Prejudice and Identity Options
    • Messages Conveyed at School
    • Conclusions from Community Influences
  • The Role of Physical Appearance in Racial Identity
    • Reconciling Ambiguous Appearance
    • “How do people tell you apart?”
    • Conclusions about Appearances and Identity
  • “The Whitest Black girl” Racial Identity through the looking glass of Peer Culture
    • Media and “Cool-Pose” Culture
    • “It’s so funny!”
    • Conclusions from Peer Influences on Racial Identity
  • “You’re in the South now girl, you’d better buck up” Family Influences on Racial Identity
    • “Stop talking!”
    • Explicit Messages
    • Implicit Messages
    • Conclusions from Family Influences on Racial Identity
• Chapter 5: Discussion and Conclusions
  • Conclusions
    • Community Interpretations of Appearance
    • Gender and Color-based codes of Behavior
    • Construing Parental Messages
    • Negotiating Identity
    • Compromising
    • Evoking Mixed Parentage
    • Emotion Regulation
    • Using Humor
  • Discussion
  • Color-stratification and Identity
  • The Paradox of “Cool-Pose” Culture
  • The Familial Context
  • Negotiating Self
  • Limitations
  • Implications
    • Future Research
    • Symbolic Interaction
    • Bioecological Perspective
• References
• Appendices
  • Appendix A Informed Consent Document
  • Appendix B Assent Document
  • Appendix C In-Depth Interview Guide

LIST OF TABLES

1. Description of Respondents
2. Contextual Factors Salient to Racial Identity Development
3. Negotiation Strategies for Validating Racial Identity

Read the entire thesis here.

Identity Politics: The Ambiguity of Race and the “End of Racism”

The Atlanta Post
2011-07-11

Ezinne Adibe

Professor and author Kwasi Konadu discusses identity politics and what it means to be African

One hundred years from now what weight will race and/or ethnicity have on our understanding of identity?  Are we moving towards a society where race will become so ambiguous that notions tied into race will become a thing of the past? The concept of a post-racial society seemed to gain further traction during the election of President Barack Obama, but as author Dr. Kwasi Konadu notes, there hasn’t been much of a post-racial anything in the years since President Obama’s election. Dr. Konadu recently shared his thoughts on identity, post-racialism, and what it means to be African.

Ezinne Adibe: How has your identity shaped your work?

Dr. Kwasi Konadu: My work been very personal in that a lot of my research has been shaped by my ancestry. For instance, it was after a number of years of doing my family history through family elders that a dream about my great-great-grandmother led me back to Ghana to find out more. That led to my dissertation in Ghana, which led to a decade of research and partnership in Ghana, another home of mine in the African world. So, indeed, identity shaped by ancestry has been critical to how I choose what I am interested in, how I approach those matters with a kind of passion, and always the quest for getting the story right.

Ezinne Adibe: I come across many conversations about identity, especially with regards to national identity. There are some that feel national identity is more important than racial or ethnic affiliation. What are your thoughts?

Dr. Konadu: If we make the matter of identity an either or question, whether it is the clan or the nation, in terms of how we define nations and nationalism, or it is some other kind of affiliation, I think we miss a very subtle but important point about how Africans, and other humans, have historically identified themselves. Humans tend to have concentric circles of a composite identity. So, at the same time I can be a father, a husband, a professor, a brother to my own biological kin or a brother in a communal sense. And there can be no conflict with either of those circles, because these identities are not in conflict but are expressions of a composite, whole identity. I think they become conflictual because of the historical experiences that brought Africans to whatever side of whatever ocean/sea they now find themselves. Whatever means by which Africans were exported from their homelands, they have endured a certain kind of transformation where blackness became the demonic inverse, that is, it became the opposite of Judeo-Christian whiteness, and blackness also became a synonym for Africaness. And so, it’s not surprising to find that many of our peoples worldwide, but certainly in North America, are offended if called African, because African, in their mind, is shorthand for this package of barbarism, backwardness, idol worshippers, lacking beauty and intelligence. All this is packaged into being African. So, who wants to be African?…

…Ezinne Adibe: There is another interesting conversation related to identity, which is this idea that we will all be mixed sometime in the future. There are a lot of people who say that it will be great once we can move to that point where race is so ambiguous, because then people won’t be racist. What are your thoughts on this post-racial idealism?

Dr. Konadu: Well, I’m sorry to disappoint the people that feel that way or have come to that conclusion. You can have racism without race…I’ll give you a historical note. In the 15th century Spain and Portugal, there were dominant and pejorative ideas about African peoples as savages, barbarians, non-Christians, and therefore heathens, and under Papal or Catholic doctrine these Africans could be enslaved. The concept of race wasn’t truly refined as we know it today, but there was racism. Take for instance, the first group of Africans taken from the Senegambia region, what is now Senegal and the Gambia, and transported to Portugal. They were stripped naked and paraded through the streets of the capital city, Lisbon. It was a spectacle. You can imagine, from the Africans’ perspective, the sheer terror of having all these white folks stare at you as kind of a voyeur, and especially with the belief these white folks were cannibals. That was the introduction of Africans into this and perhaps other early European societies. So, there were ideas about race and racism; however, race wasn’t fully refined, whereby it was linked to the institutional terror and injustices as we find today. But there was racism without race. So, racism need not race as an appendage in order to be real. You can have the end of race as the New York Times announced when Barack Obama was elected, “a post-racial society” (laughs). Since his election, whatever people think about him and his administration, African folks in Africa and in North America have suffered greatly. There is greater racial violence, whether it is the unleashing of these white supremacist groups and even allied Chicano Mexican groups terrorizing black folks. There is another kind of violence – economic violence. In this so-called recession, black folks have felt it the hardest, in housing, jobs, prisons, hospital and educational program closings, the poorest quality foods, criminalization, and so. The point is the quality of black folks lives has exponentially declined since his inauguration and since the New York Times announced a post-racial society. So, if that’s any cue that this is what post-racialism looks like, I don’t think African folks want anything to do with it….

Read the entire interview here.

The Clamorgans: One Family’s History of Race in America [Review: Eubanks]

The Washington Independent Review of Books
2011-07-04

W. Ralph Eubanks, Director of Publishing at the Library of Congress
Author of Ever Is a Long Time and The House at the End of the Road

Julie Winch, The Clamorgans: One Family’s History of Race in America, New York: Hill and Wang, 2011. pp. 424.

In spite of the prominent role of race in our culture, American society has spent more than 200 years trying to find a way to downplay the role of it—whether through proclaiming our society color blind or a melting pot—with varying levels of success. Consequently, there are numerous stories of how race manifests itself as America’s original sin, many involving families that crossed and bridged racial lines, including my own family’s story. Few of these stories are as complicated and fascinating as the one Julie Winch tells in The Clamorgans: One Family’s History of Race in America.
 
Through the life and times of one American family, the Clamorgans of St. Louis, Missouri, Winch traces the evolving role race has played in family life, the law and broader American society, from slavery to abolition, to Reconstruction and beyond. Today’s millennial generation would label the Clamorgans as multiracial. But in the 18th and 19th centuries, and well into the 20th century, the one-drop rule marked them with a taint of African ancestry, in spite of appearances to the contrary. Still, the Clamorgans challenged traditional notions of race and identity and carefully negotiated a way through society’s complicated racial maze. To do this, they used the same confusing twists and turns used to define them as a means of furthering their own interests. As the author notes, the Clamorgans’ story is one of money, land, power and race. But at its core this is the story of a family with a scrappy survival instinct that transcends race, which is why the reader gets drawn into this saga quickly….

…Money was a means of whitening, since “a dark-skinned individual with money often made the transition from ‘black’ to ‘mulatto.’ The Clamorgans and other mixed-race people took the next step, moving from ‘mulatto’ to ‘white.’ ” Sometimes it was for a reason, other times it was because the census takers were confused by a person’s appearance or last name. In St. Louis, some names were exclusively “colored,” while others were exclusively white. Certain names existed in both communities, making the census taker’s job more complicated…

Read the entire review here.

A Breath of Freedom: The Civil Rights Struggle, African American GIs, and Germany

Palgrave Macmillan
September 2010
282 pages
6 x 9 1/4 inches, Includes: 50 pgs illus
Paperback ISBN: 978-0-230-10473-0, ISBN10: 0-230-10473-8
Hardcover ISBN: 978-0-230-10472-3, ISBN10: 0-230-10472-X

Maria Höhn, Professor of History
Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York

Martin Klimke, Research Fellow
German Historical Institute, Washington, D.C.

Based on an award-winning international research project and photo exhibition, this poignant and beautifully illustrated book examines the experiences of African American GIs in Germany and the unique insights they provide into the civil rights struggle at home and abroad. Thanks in large part to its military occupation of Germany after World War II, America’s unresolved civil rights agenda was exposed to worldwide scrutiny as never before. At the same time, its ambitious efforts to democratize German society after the defeat of Nazism meant that West Germany was exposed to American ideas of freedom and democracy to a much larger degree than many other countries. As African American GIs became increasingly politicized, they took on a particular significance for the Civil Rights Movement in light of Germany’s central role in the Cold War. While the effects of the Civil Rights Movement reverberated across the globe, Germany represents a special case that illuminates a remarkable period in American and world history.

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Closing Ranks: World War I and the Rise of Hitler
• Fighting on Two Fronts: World War II and Civil Rights
• “We Will Never Go Back to the Old Way Again”: African American GIs and the Occupation of Germany
• Setting the Stage for Brown: Desegregating the Army in Germany
• Bringing Civil Rights to East and West: Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in Cold War Berlin
• Revolutionary Alliances: The Rise of Black Power
• Heroes of the Other America: East German Solidarity with the African American Freedom Struggle
• A Call for Justice: The Racial Crisis in the Military and the GI Movement
• Epilogue

The Clamorgans: One Family’s History of Race in America

Hill and Wang (an imprint of Macmillan)
May 2011
432 pages
6 x 9 inches, 8 Pages of Black-and-White Illustrations
ISBN: 978-0-8090-9517-9, ISBN10: 0-8090-9517-3

Julie Winch, Professor of History
University of Massachusetts, Boston

The historian Julie Winch uses her sweeping, multigenerational history of the unforgettable Clamorgans to chronicle how one family navigated race in America from the 1780s through the 1950s. What she discovers overturns decades of received academic wisdom. Far from an impermeable wall fixed by whites, race opened up a moral gray zone that enterprising blacks manipulated to whatever advantage they could obtain.

The Clamorgan clan traces to the family patriarch Jacques Clamorgan, a French adventurer of questionable ethics who bought up, or at least claimed to have bought up, huge tracts of land around St. Louis. On his death, he bequeathed his holdings to his mixedrace, illegitimate heirs, setting off nearly two centuries of litigation. The result is a window on a remarkable family that by the early twentieth century variously claimed to be black, Creole, French, Spanish, Brazilian, Jewish, and white. The Clamorgans is a remarkable counterpoint to the central claim of whiteness studies, namely that race as a social construct was manipulated by whites to justify discrimination. Winch finds in the Clamorgans generations upon generations of men and women who studiously negotiated the very fluid notion of race to further their own interests. Winch’s remarkable achievement is to capture in the vivid lives of this unforgettable family the degree to which race was open to manipulation by Americans on both sides of the racial divide.

Table of Contents

Introduction: “The Clamorgans Are Fighters”
1. Sieur Jacques
2. “Ester, a Free Woman of Color'”
3. Natural Children
4. “In Them Days Everything Was Free and Easy”
5. The Aristocracy of Color
6. A Settling of Scores
7. An Independent Man
8. Thickets of the Law
9. The Mathematics of Race
10. “Well Known in Negro Circles”
11. Defining Whiteness
12. On the Fringes
Epilogue: Clamorgan Alley
Notes
Bibliography
Acknowledgments
Index

Read Chapter 1 here.

The Influence of Race and Ethnicity on Substance Use and Negative Activity Involvement among Monoracial and Multiracial Adolescents of the Southwest

Journal of Drug Education
Volume 39, Number 2 (2009)
Pages 195-210

Kelly Faye Jackson, Assistant Professor of Social Work
Arizona State University, Phoenix

Craig W. LeCroy, Professor of Social Work
Arizona State University, Phoenix

This study examined predictors of substance use and negative activity involvement among a diverse sample of European American, African American, Hispanic, Native American, and multiracial early adolescents (n = 749) living in a large urban city in the Southwest United States. This study investigated a broad set of predictor variables that tap sociodemographic, peer, family, community, and school influences. Overall, findings from this study confirm that lifetime substance use remains high among youth of color. Of particular concern is this study’s finding that multiracial adolescents are at elevated risk to use substances and engage in negative activities. The implications of this study for understanding how risk factors are influenced by race and other variables on different measures of problem behavior are discussed.

Read or purchase the article here.

Identifying Interventions to Improve the Retention of Biracial Students: A Case Study

Journal of College Student Retention: Research, Theory and Practice 
Volume 5, Number 4 (2003-2004)
pages 349-363

Nicole Sands
Johnson & Wales University, Colorado

John H. Schuh, Distinguished Professor of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies
Iowa State University

Biracial students represent a growing number of students on many campuses and an increasingly significant segment of the population of the United States. Nevertheless, this group of students rarely has been studied with respect as to how their experiences affect persistence at colleges and universities. This case study reports on the experiences of biracial students at one institution. It also analyzes their racial identity development and presents recommendations designed to improve their persistence to graduation framed by Tinto’s theory of academic departure. Recommendations for additional study are presented.

Read or purchase the article here.

College Students’ Multiracial Identity Perceptions and Experiences of Programs and Associations

Oregon State University
2011-04-19
89 pages

Lauren S. Plaza

A Thesis submitted to Oregon State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science

This thesis examined the identity transitions that occurred prior to enrollment at a predominantly, White, large, public research university and after completing at least one year of college for students who identify as multiracial. As a secondary purpose, this thesis also examined whether these students sought support through groups that are similar to their ethnic and cultural identities. Using a sample of 10 interviews and a review of the secondary research literature, the principal findings of this thesis are that multiracial students identify differently based on their age, physical appearance, and consciousness about their racialized heritage. Participation in student programs and associations was examined in conjunction with student identity development. In order to encourage success for the multiracial students at a large, public, research institution, the findings from this research suggest that there is a need to expand existing monoracial programs to include broader definitions of racialized categories. There is also a need to develop new programs and associations that are specifically targeted to multiracial students. By making these changes university administrators may be able to support the adjustment and transition to college for students who are often not included in one of the five recognized racial categories.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• Chapter 1: Introduction
  • United States Data and National Trends
  • Higher Education and Multiracial Students
  • Research topic and Proposed Thesis
  • Definition of Key Terms
• Chapter 2: Literature Review
  • History of Higher Education and Access for Students of National Data
  • Multiracial Students on College Campuses and Related Theories
  • Assessment of Current Services and Programs
  • Conclusion
• Chapter 3: Methods
  • Research Design Overview
  • Participants and Recruitment Methods
  • Data Analysis
  • Personal Disclosure
  • Summary
• Chapter 4: Results
  • Data Collection
  • Summary of Participants
  • Summary
• Chapter 5: Conclusion
  • General Conclusions
  • Anticipated Findings
  • Unanticipated Findings
  • Implications for Practice
  • Limitations
  • Recommendations for Further Research
  • Concluding Thoughts
• References
• Appendices

Read the entire thesis here.

Brown on the Inside: Multiracial Individuals and White Privilege

Oregon State University
2011-04-27
147 pages

Shannon D. Quihuiz

A Thesis submitted to Oregon State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science

Biracial and Multiracial people are one of the fastest growing racial groups in the United States. Individuals with a mixed identity have the ability to choose endless racial/ethnic designations that best exemplify their racial/ethnic social identity. However, people who are racially/ethnically mixed may receive criticism if their proclaimed identity does not coincide with the societal perceptions of their racial/ethnic identity. People who identify with more than one race or ethnicity and have White ancestry can be perceived as White by society. Therefore, Biracial and Multiracial people have the ability to pass as White if they have White ancestry and appear White. This study explored racially/ethnically mixed peoples’ perceptions of passing as White. Qualitative surveys were conducted to find if Biracial and Multiracial people thought they could pass as White.

When Biracial and Multiracial people have the ability to pass as White, they are associated with the White group. Association with the White group equates to being afforded advantages and benefits. Thus, White privilege may be afforded to racially/ethnically mixed people who pass as White. Qualitative interviews were used to explore if Biracial and Multiracial people identified with having White privilege. The research also examined the connection between Multiracial/ethnic people who can pass as White and White privilege. Findings suggest racially/ethnically people who can pass as White identified with having White privilege. Moreover, participants and a research team evaluation identified factors that contribute to passing as White. The findings presented in this study are significant as it explores the intersection between Biracial and Multiracial identity, passing as White, and White privilege. The information presented in this study implies that the phenomenon of passing is an important concept toward social justice and racial equity.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
  • Background of the Study
  • Statement of the Problem
  • Purpose of the Study
  • Significance of the Study
  • Overview of the Methodology
  • Definition of Terms
  • Summary
• CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
  • Multiracial Identity
    • Race and Ethnicity
    • Identity Development
  • Passing as White
    • Elements of Passing
    • Construction of Passing as White
  • White Privilege
    • Characteristics of Privilege
    • Becoming Aware of White Privilege
  • Summary
• CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
  • Purpose of the Study
  • Research Design
    • Participants and Recruitment
    • Two-Phased Approach
  • Data Collection
  • Data Analysis
  • Human Participants Protection and Confidentiality
  • Perspective of the Researcher
  • Perspective of the Research Team
  • Limitations
  • Summary
• CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS, ANALYSIS, AND DISCUSSION
  • Participants
    • Anne
    • Chris
    • Daniel
    • Emma
    • Greg
    • Jill
    • Kayla
    • Laura
    • Lynn
    • Theresa
  • Categorizing the Data
    • Theme 1: White Privilege
    • Theme 2: Navigating Social Circles
    • Theme 3: Burden
  • Summary
• CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
  • Summary of the Study
  • Conclusions
    • Research Question 1
    • Research Question 2
    • Research Question 3
  • Implications
  • Recommendations for Future Research
  • Concluding Thoughts
• REFERENCES
• APPENDICIES

LIST OF TABLES

• Table Page
• Table 1. Participant Demographic Information
• Table 2. Participant Racial/Ethnic Identity and Perceptions of Passing as White
• Table 3. Themes and Categories

LIST OF APPENDICES

• Appendix Page
• Appendix A: Recruitment E-Mail
• Appendix B: Recruitment Flyer
• Appendix C: Standard Response to E-Mail Inquiries
• Appendix D: Informed Consent Form
• Appendix E: Participants’ Intake Form
• Appendix F: Research Team’s Evaluation Form
• Appendix G: Interview Questions

Read the entire thesis here.