Mixed Race Studies

2017 Critical Mixed Race Studies Conference Call for Papers

University of Southern California
Los Angeles, California
2017-02-24 through 2017-02-26

Explorations in Trans (gender, gressions, migrations, racial) Fifty Years After Loving v. Virginia

Deadline: 2016-04-30
Notification: 2016-07-31
Presenters at the conference must be members. Registration/membership will be available in 2016. Details below.
Subject Fields: We welcome submissions from scholars from all fields, cultural workers, and activists.

The next major Critical Mixed Race Studies Conference will be held February 24-26, 2017, at University of Southern California and will be hosted by the Shinso Ito Center for Japanese Religions and Culture. The conference will include film screenings and a live performance showcase produced by Mixed Roots Stories.

Download the CMRS 2017 Call For Papers [PDF]

The year 2017 marks the 50th anniversary of the 1967 Supreme Court decision in Loving v. Virginia, which declared anti-miscegenation laws unconstitutional. As a commemoration to Loving’s golden anniversary coupled with the geographic location of California, this conference provides an excellent site to examine critical mixed race issues. With a focus on the root word “Trans” this conference aims to explore interracial encounters relating, but not limited to, transpacific Asian migration, transnational migration from Latin America, transracial adoption, transracial/ethnic identity, interracial marriage from a transregional perspective, the intersections of trans (gendered) and mixed race identity, and mixed race transgressions of race, citizenship, and nation.

The intersections of transmigration/national/regionalism with respect to miscegenation are clear in light of varying marriage proscriptions across geographical regions within the continental United States. California enacted its anti-miscegenation law in 1850, forbidding whites (this category included Mexicans) from marrying blacks, Filipinos, and Asians. Twelve states additionally prohibited intermarriage with Asians, nine prohibited intermarriage with Filipinos, and some prohibited intermarriage with American Indians. Intermarriage with “Hindus” was prohibited in Arizona. Oregon prohibited whites from marrying Native Hawaiians or Kanakas; and Virginia’s anti-miscegenation law forbade intermarriage with anyone of non-Caucasian strain. During Reconstruction, rampant fears of hypersexualized Chinese men marrying white women underscored the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. Even following World War II soldiers faced dilemmas as Congress enacted restrictions regarding non-citizen wives entering the U.S that affected the mixed race children of these interracial unions whose occupancy within an interstitial racial space remains a confusing and complex reality in 21st century America. It was not until 1948 that anti-miscegenation laws were abolished in California.

As this conference commemorates the 50th anniversary of Loving v. Virginia with a focus on “Trans” issues relating to interracial encounters, participants from all fields are invited to present new insights, which will contribute to a broader and deeper understanding in Critical Mixed Race Studies…

For more information, click here. Additional Questions? Contact us at: cmrsmixedrace@gmail.com.

Jews of Color National Convening

Congregation Beit Simchat Torah (CBST)
130 West 30th Street
New York, New York 10001
2016-05-01 Through 2016-05-03

Recent events have moved the struggle for racial justice and inclusion in America to the forefront of public consciousness. Jews of Color occupy a unique space within that struggle, living at the intersection of multiple communities and identities. We come together this spring as Jews and as People of Color to celebrate our diversity and build our strength as a community. We want to build a world in which our Jewishness thrives; a world where we are valued as leaders within the Jewish community; a world where our identities as People of Color are supported by Jewish communities committed to the fight against racism.

The convening will include music and art, content for families and children,, community building, and workshops, trainings and other sessions on building our power to fight for ourselves and our communities.

About the Presenting Sponsors:

This event is presented and sponsored by the Jewish Multiracial Network and Jews For Racial & Economic Justice (JFREJ) It is co-sponsored by Bend The Arc: A Jewish Partnership for Justice and supported by The Ford Foundation…

For more information, click here.

The Man Who Stole Himself: The Slave Odyssey of Hans Jonathan

University of Chicago Press
2016
264 pages
8 color plates, 49 halftones
6 x 9

Gísli Pálsson, Professor of Anthropology
University of Iceland

The island nation of Iceland is known for many things—majestic landscapes, volcanic eruptions, distinctive seafood—but racial diversity is not one of them. So the little-known story of Hans Jonathan, a free black man who lived and raised a family in early nineteenth-century Iceland, is improbable and compelling, the stuff of novels.

In The Man Who Stole Himself, Gisli Palsson lays out Jonathan’s story in stunning detail. Born into slavery in St. Croix in 1784, Jonathan was brought as a slave to Denmark, where he eventually enlisted in the navy and fought on behalf of the country in the 1801 Battle of Copenhagen. After the war, he declared himself a free man, believing that not only was he due freedom because of his patriotic service, but because while slavery remained legal in the colonies, it was outlawed in Denmark itself. Jonathan was the subject of one of the most notorious slavery cases in European history, which he lost. Then, he ran away—never to be heard from in Denmark again, his fate unknown for more than two hundred years. It’s now known that Jonathan fled to Iceland, where he became a merchant and peasant farmer, married, and raised two children. Today, he has become something of an Icelandic icon, claimed as a proud and daring ancestor both there and among his descendants in America.

The Man Who Stole Himself brilliantly intertwines Jonathan’s adventurous travels with a portrait of the Danish slave trade, legal arguments over slavery, and the state of nineteenth-century race relations in the Northern Atlantic world. Throughout the book, Palsson traces themes of imperial dreams, colonialism, human rights, and globalization, which all come together in the life of a single, remarkable man. Jonathan literally led a life like no other. His is the story of a man who had the temerity—the courage—to steal himself.

Contents

• Prologue: A Man of Many Worlds
• I. The Island of St. Croix
  • “A House Negro”
  • “The Mulatto Hans Jonathan”
  • “Said to Be the Secretary”
  • Among the Sugar Barons
• II. Copenhagen
  • A Child near the Royal Palace
  • “He Wanted to Go to War”
  • The General’s Widow v. the Mulatto
  • The Verdict
• III. Iceland
  • A Free Man
  • Mountain Guide
  • Factor, Farmer, Father
  • Farewell
• IV. Descendants
  • The Jonathan Family
  • The Eirikssons of New England
  • Who Stole Whom?
  • The Lessons of History
• Epilogue: Biographies
• Timeline
• Acknowledgments
• Photo Catalog
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index

Mizrahi Jews, Jews of Color, and Racial Justice

Jewschool: Progressive Jews & Views
2016-04-28

Keren Soffer Sharon
Queens, New York

As a Mizrahi Jew organizing for justice in my city, I initially questioned whether I had a role to play in the upcoming National Jews of Color Convening. Even though I co-founded the Mizrahi Caucus at Jews for Racial and Economic Justice [JFREJ], I still doubted whether I — a half-Iraqi Jew who has been racialized as white in this country — had any right showing up at this thing. And I sure as hell questioned whether I had any right to lead.

But my discomfort showed me precisely what our movement stands to gain when we collectively identify as Jews of Color, Sephardim, and Mizrahim in our intersectional struggles for the liberation of all people.

I began organizing at JFREJ as a self-identified white person, interested in moving past my immobilizing guilt over racial privilege into accountable action to transform the systems that exploit low-income folks, people of color, and immigrants in my city. It was through finding a Jewish Left community that is committed to ending racism in all of its forms that I came into a deeper understanding of how I can do that work as a mixed-race Mizrahi Jew, who is both white and Arab at once…

Read the entire article here.

“Diversity” Won’t Challenge Jewry’s Role in White Supremacy

Jewschool: Progressive Jews & Views
2016-04-27

Mark Tseng Putterman
New York, New York

In addition to my own mother, “Linda” was the only other Asian American woman at the Reform synagogue I grew up attending. It was a friendly, liberal, and white Jewish space in our affluent New England suburb, a space where I often felt welcome while always, at some level, aware that I could count the number of people of color in our synagogue on one hand. That didn’t stop my indomitable mother from becoming more and more invested in our Jewish community. But amidst her drive and commitment to her adopted community was a twinge of cynicism: when she became our temple’s president, she joked that she only did it so that people would finally stop confusing her with Linda.

I wonder — would our temple peers have been better able to decipher my mother’s “foreign” face  if there were simply more of us? Would a more diverse congregation have prepared our white, liberal, and colorblind community to address the realities of racism for Jewish youth of color like myself? To prepare my youth leader to unpack why El Al security singled me out for questioning during my 9th grade trip to Israel? Or to provide my white Jewish peer with the language with which to challenge the Hasidic man who questioned her of my presence on our flight there?…

Read the entire article here.

Made Black

Jersey City Theater Center
Merseles Studios
339 Newark Avenue, 2nd Floor
Jersey City, New Jersey
Saturday, 2016-05-07 20:00-23:00 EDT (Local Time)

JCTC New Play Reading presents Schwarz Gemacht (Made Black) a cutting-edge, controversial play exploring race and identity through one of the most overlooked subcultures of the 20th century – mixed-race black German citizens during the 1930’s. This uniquely provocative work by Alexander Thomas, is on research and true stories of the people caught between two worlds in one of the most racially conflicted eras in history. Schwarz Gemacht (Made Black) premiered in Berlin at the English Theater of Berlin last year, then at the 2015 New Black Fest at The Lark, receiving a rave Playbill review by Olivia Clement: “Set in 1938 in Berlin, the play is centered on an Afro-German actor and his encounter with an African-American musician and activist that leads to questions about identity and the treatment of people of color both in Germany and in the United States.”

For more information, click here.

“One Drop of Love”: The Keynote Performance for the Mixed Heritage Conference at UCLA

University of California, Los Angeles
James West Alumni Center
325 Westwood Plaza
Los Angeles, California 90095
Saturday, 2016-04-30 14:30-16:00 PDT (Local Time)

Join us for some or all of this enlightening and affirming conference. One Drop will start at 2:30 pm in the James West Alumni Center.

TICKETS: FREE and open to the public!

We remain so very grateful for your continued support and look forward to sharing One Drop with you.

For more information, click here. To RSVP, click here.

Beyond Black and White: Biracial Attitudes in Contemporary U.S. Politics

American Political Science Review
Volume 110 / Issue 01 / February 2016
pages 52-67
DOI: 10.1017/S0003055415000556

Lauren D. Davenport, Assistant Professor of Political Science
Stanford University

The 2000 U.S. census was the first in which respondents were permitted to self-identify with more than one race. A decade later, multiple-race identifiers have become one of the fastest-growing groups in the nation. Such broadening multiracial identification poses important political ramifications and raises questions about the future of minority group political solidarity. Yet we know little about the opinions of multiple-race identifiers and from where those opinions emerge. Bridging literatures in racial politics and political socialization, and drawing upon a multimethod approach, this article provides insight into the consequences of the U.S.’s increasingly blurred racial boundaries by examining the attitudes of Americans of White-Black parentage, a population whose identification was traditionally constrained by the one-drop rule. Findings show that on racial issues such as discrimination and affirmative action, biracials who identify as both White and Black generally hold views akin to Blacks. But on nonracial political issues including abortion and gender/marriage equality, biracials who identify as White-Black or as Black express more liberal views than their peers of monoracial parentage. Being biracial and labeling oneself a racial minority is thus associated with a more progressive outlook on matters that affect socially marginalized groups. Two explanations are examined for these findings: the transmission of political outlook from parents to children, and biracials’ experiences straddling a long-standing racial divide.

Read or purchase the article here.

‘Our schools are failing mixed raced children’

The Voice
London, England, United Kingdom
2016-04-02

Dinah Moreley

Stereotypical expectations that this group have ‘confused identities’ often mean they experience racism from teachers and fellow pupils

A REPORT by People in Harmony, (PIH) the national charity for mixed race people and families has highlighted the experience of mixed race children in the education system. Stereotypical expectations that this group have ‘confused identities’ often mean they experience racism from teachers and fellow pupils. Here, PIH’s Dinah Morley tells how the report and the seminars it was based on were put together.

IT IS over a decade since People in Harmony (PIH) published Mixed Race and Education: creating an ethos of respect and understanding, a conference report on mixed race children and young people in the education system.

PIH has now revisited the subject of mixed race young people in education in a new report called Mixed Race and Education: 2015 in order to consider ways in which a better dialogue with schools could be achieved to help improve outcomes and to add some substance to a patchy body of research…

…AWARENESS

The debate in April 2015 facilitated by Martin and Asher Hoyles, educators and authors of books on race and culture, was constructed to address four specific topics that had arisen from the earlier seminar.

Racism and discrimination in school was also discussed by the young people and parents. They identified:

• The curriculum content does not acknowledge the mixed race presence.
• A failure to stimulate an awareness of mixed race students and families.
• Schools lack resources needed about mixed race achievers and role models
• Appearance often incorrectly determines how mixed race students are related to.
• Teacher stereotyping leads to incorrect assumptions about students’ backgrounds and needs.
• The default position applied to mixed race people is usually black.
• Others are deciding the terminology used in schools for mixed race people.

It is important for teachers and others to understand the experiences of mixed race people and the fact that lazy racist stereotypes are not helpful in helping children from these backgrounds to settle and to achieve…

Read the entire article here.

Race identity for mixed race kids in America

The Collegian
Stockton, California
2016-04-24

Shellcia Longsworth

Being a mixed kid wasn’t easy growing up.

My mother is white and Samoan. My father is Belizean.

I was born and raised in Tracy. I was one of two black children in my elementary school.

I recall having moments of prejudice against me when I was young. I got called the “N” word so many times in my life I am numb to it.

I shouldn’t be…

Read the entire article here.