Mixed Race Studies

The Roanes of Virginia: 2 families with the same surname. Are they related or not?

Genealogy Adventures
2015-09-20

Brian Sheffey

What could possible be confusing about two immigrant families coming from the same region in Europe and landing in the US around the same time? When it comes to pre-Revolutionary War Era Roane family…there’s plenty.

One group of early 18th Century Roanes were Scots-Irish in their origins, descendants of the northern Irish landowner of Scottish origins, Archibald Gilbert Roane. The other Roane family hailed from England, descendants of Charles “The Immigrant” Roane.

As I’ve previously written, these two men were not directly related to one another. If I had the power to correct every single Roane family tree that shows Charles as being the father of Archibald, I would do it in a heartbeat :o)…

Read the entire article here.

The 1965 Act at 50

Adam S.I. Goodman
2015-09-24

Adam Goodman

President Lyndon B. Johnson signing the Hart-Celler Act, 3 October 1965, Liberty Island, NY, NY. (Photo credit: LBJ Presidential Library/Yoichi Okamoto)

Next week marks the 50th anniversary of the signing of the 1965 Immigration Act. By eliminating the discriminatory national-origins quota system, the Act created new opportunities for people from across the world to migrate to the United States. But it also restricted immigration from the Western Hemisphere for the first time, contributing to the subsequent growth of undocumented migration in the decades to come.

Understanding the 1965 Act and its consequences is essential to understanding the history of the United States during the last half century…

Read the entire article here.

“I’ve never been ashamed to say, nor do I shy away from that fact that I am black. I’ve grown up black, black is the only existence I’ve ever known. But it’s strange when you live in a world where people go ‘OK but biracial—then which piece of this, which piece of that?’” —Trevor Noah

Amber Payne, “Trevor Noah Brings ‘A Different Perspective’ as Daily Show Host”, NBC News, September 23, 2015. (00:00:19-00:00:35). http://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/trevor-noah-talks-diversity-new-daily-show-n432236.

Every Family Has Its Secrets: Lacey Schwartz Connects with Film Forward Audiences in Taiwan

Sundance Film Forward
2015-09-24

Lacey Schwartz, Director Little White Lie

This Sundance Film Forward trip to Taiwan marked the Asian Premiere of Little White Lie. It also was my first time ever in Asia. The things that people seemed to say I had to experience while there were the food and the shopping – I was told soup dumplings and night markets were mandatory. I learned that their passion fruit is addictive. What I didn’t have a sense of was how the audiences in Taiwan would respond to Little White Lie. I wondered if they would be confused by the racial identity dynamics. Would they think the film was revealing too much in a public manner? Would they relate to the struggle to come to terms with family secrets and denial? I had shown the film previously in countries that had much more diversity in their society such as Trinidad where the story seemed to strongly resonate. I wondered if the homogeneity of the people in Taiwan would make Little White Lie harder for them to connect to. The screenings showed that my concerns were unwarranted…

Read the entire article here.

New Documentary Reveals the Strange Life of Korla Pandit

NBC Bay Area (KNTV)
San Jose, California
2015-08-27

In the category of unusual entertainers, there are few who could hold a candle to Korla Pandit. And now a new documentary will feature his life. Joe Rosato Jr. reports.

Zun Lee’s Polaroid Archive Preserves African-American Self-Representation

Photo District News
2015-08-26

Holly Hughes

Photographer Zun Lee is dedicated to countering stereotypical, often negative views of the African-American family. While he was working on Father Figure, his book about African-American fathers, he stumbled on some old Polaroids that appeared to have fallen from a family photo album. He was intrigued to see how the Polaroids —”the Instagrams of their day,” he calls them — reflected “the way black people saw themselves in private spaces and in ways not intended to be seen, or judged, by others.” By searching yard sales and e-Bay, Lee has amassed 3,000 of these now “orphaned” mementoes and recently began posting them on a Tumbler and an Instagram feed named “Fade Resistance.” After winning a Magnum Foundation Fellowship last week, Lee now plans to develop his Fade Resistance collection into an interactive digital archive that will allow the public and collaborators from other disciplines to add their own stories, videos and images. His long-term goal, he says, is “to encourage new ways of understanding black identity and representation in today’s world.”…

Read the entire article here.

Ronnie: Tasmanian Songman

Magabala Books
January 2009
164 pages
240 x 165
Paperback ISBN: 9781921248108

Helen Gee and Ronnie Summers

Musician, storyteller and craftsman, Ronnie Summers recalls the freedom of growing up on Cape Barren Island and how the island’s music shaped his life. He draws on a childhood working the muttonbird islands, a ‘kangaroo court’ prison term as a bewildered teenager, and then turning to alcohol after the death of his baby son. Born an ‘Islander’—not Aboriginal, not white—Ronnie Summers was without race. This story documents his struggle for a place in his own country and echoes that of the Tasmanian Aboriginal community. Includes a CD featuring Cape Barren Island music—a unique blend of Cajun, blues, country and folk.

How To Resist White Supremacy In Your Love Life: A 5-Step Guide

Black Girl Dangerous
2015-09-25

Cathy Chen, Co-Founder and Outreach Director
Fab Lab El Paso, El Paso, Texas

“We’re never gonna get anywhere as long as our economies of attraction continue to resemble more or less the economies of attraction of white supremacy.” –Junot Diaz, Keynote Speech at Facing Race 2012

Over the years, I have had many friends, both hetero and LGBTQIA (lesbian, gay, trans, queer, intersex, and asexual) people of color, who practiced radical politics in their lifestyle and work but I’ve noticed a curious pattern—that they almost exclusively formed romantic relationships with socially privileged—in other words, mostly white—partners…

Read the entire article here.

Being Biracial: Where Our Secret Worlds Collide

Heritage Press Publications
2015-09-06
192 pages
9 x 6 x 0.4 inches
Paperback ISBN-13: 978-1937660666

Sarah Ratliff

Bryony Sutherland

Good, bad, ugly and illuminating-everyone has an opinion on race. As biracial people continue trending, the discussion is no longer about a singular topic, but is more like playing a game of multi-level chess. The anthology, Being Biracial: Where Our Secret Worlds Collide, cites the experiences of twenty-four mixed-race authors and those in interracial partnerships of all ages and backgrounds, from all over the world. It blends positivity, negativity, humor, pathos and realism in an enlightening exploration of what it means to be more than one ethnicity.

Jews in America struggled for decades to become white. Now we must give up whiteness to fight racism.

The Washington Post
2015-09-22

Gil Steinlauf, Senior Rabbi
Adas Israel Congregation, Washington, D.C.

Let’s teach our children that we are, in fact, not white, but simply Jewish.

Adapted from a Rosh Hashanah sermon delivered at Adas Israel Congregation.

This summer, I had a conversation with a young woman about her Jewish identity. She told me how she grew up in a family that was very involved in her synagogue. She went to Jewish day school. She had been to Israel multiple times. But she felt very far from her Jewishness. She simply couldn’t find the relevance of Judaism as she was making her way on her own in the world. I asked her what she did feel passionate about. She told me she has been reading and thinking a lot about racial justice. What moved her was the #BlackLivesMatter movement — how, in light of Ferguson, Charleston and seemingly endless incidents of injustice against black people in our society, she felt a need to grapple with the racism that is so pervasive in this country and how it affects her identity.

“As a white woman,” she said, “as the product of so much white privilege, it makes me all the more angry to see how other white people so blindly and carelessly feed into the racial climate of our society.” “So the fact that you are white makes this issue all the more painful, all the more personal for you?” I asked. “Yes,” she said.

I certainly identified with her angst. I find the reality of American racism unbearable: the legacy of slavery; the institutional discrimination that is so pervasive; the scourge of mass incarceration of black Americans, with its collateral damage on families; the ongoing blight of housing segregation; the role of law enforcement in furthering racist systems and hierarchies; all this, and so much more. My answer to her, and my answer for all American Jews during these Days of Awe, is that finding our true Jewish identity can begin by questioning our whiteness…

Read the entire article here.