Mixed Race Studies

Black History Month Events at Two Colleges

The San Diego Union-Tribune
2013-02-09

Karen Pearlman

El Cajon — Both East County community colleges are getting into the commemoration of Black History Month with free events this month.

A library exhibit featuring John Robert Clifford, a seminal figure in African-American history (and a forefather of a Cuyamaca College administrator) and a stepping demonstration by members of a historically black fraternity are part of the commemoration at Cuyamaca College.

At Grossmont College, the celebration will take on a culinary and artistic flair, with events ranging from a soul food lunch with live jazz, a visit by a pair of blues and jazz masters, and the showing of a student documentary…

…Grossmont College film student Sicarra Devers, 22, cites her mixed-race heritage as inspiration for her documentary, “Who Are We Really: An Exploration of Multiculturalism Self-identity,” which will be shown at 4 p.m. Feb. 19 in Room 220 of Building 26. The film explores self-identity through the lens of a multicultural society and includes interviews of students, faculty and community members to highlight issues related to race relations.

Read the entire article here.

Obama Has Shattered America’s Racial Ceiling

San Diego Union-Tribune
2012-02-12

Constance M. Carroll, Chancellor
San Diego Community College District

If he could visit 21st-century America, Alexis de Tocqueville would be amazed to find Barack Obama, an African-American, as president of the United States. However, he would not be surprised to find that, despite this powerful symbolism of progress, race is still a divisive force in the country.
 
Following his tour of this young nation in the 19th century, Tocqueville, a French historian and political activist, published “Democracy in America” in 1835. In this book, he described slavery as “the most formidable evil threatening the future of the United States.” Aware of the growing impetus to abolish this practice, Tocqueville noted, “I see that slavery is in retreat, but the prejudice from which it arose is immovable.”
 
173 years later, Americans elected an African American to hold the highest office in the nation. During election eve on Nov. 4, 2008, many wept, shared their enthusiasm with friends and family across the country, and actually believed that this was it: the end of racial strife in America. Given the nation’s difficult journey from slavery and its abolition, from Jim Crow laws and their dissolution, from segregation and its demise, to the continuing civil rights struggle to eliminate the vestiges of this dark history, Barack Obama’s election was heralded by many as the start of a new era of equality and racial peace…

Read the entire article here.

Obama and the complexities of identity

The San Diego Union-Tribune
2008-06-19

Bey-Ling Sha, Professor of Journalism and Media Studies
San Diego State University

In a recent commentary titled “What He Overcame,” Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson described Barack Obama as a “young, black, first-term senator.” In her campaign-suspension speech, Hillary Clinton said, “Could an African-American really be our president? . . . Sen. Obama has answered that one.” These descriptions of Obama are typical of many others offered by and reported in the news media.

What’s wrong with these descriptions of Obama as being black or African-American? As others have already noted, these descriptions reify the supposedly outdated “one-drop rule,” whereby any individual with even “one drop” of African heritage was considered black.

A second, related problem is that these descriptions are instances of identity ascription, whereby one person assigns an identity to another person, usually based on physical characteristics. Thus, someone with blond hair and blue eyes is usually called “white,” even if that person has African, Asian or Native American heritage somewhere in his or her background…

Read the entire article here.