Mixed Race Studies

Sesquicentennial Event Addresses Colorado Inequality

Clarion: The University of Denver’s Newwspaper Since 1892
Denver, Colorado
2014-10-21

Carissa Cherpes

DU hosted a Sesquicentennial Conversation entitled Miscegenation Law, Marriage Equality, and the West 1864-2014 on Oct. 15 in the Sturm College of Law.

Over 50 students, faculty and others gathered to listen to three panelists lecture on how Miscegenation Laws and inequality affected our region throughout history. Miscegenation Laws banned marriages or relationships between mixed raced couples.

The three panelists were Rachel Moran, Ronald J. Stephens and Anna N. Martinez. The moderator was Bill Convery, who holds the position of Colorado State Historian…

…Next to present was Moran. She described how Miscegenation Laws originated in the South when concern over mixed race slave children became an issue. The popular opinion was that “mixed race children were black,” and therefore could not be considered free or have rights.

She then went on to talk about California’s Miscegenation Laws, which targeted Asian immigrants. In California, the laws were designed to force Chinese, Japanese and Filipino immigrants to return to their native country.

Moran then discussed how the Colorado territory had Miscegenation Laws as well, but only after additional land was acquired from Mexico. Because the people living in the territory had different customs and laws, there was an invisible boundary where mixed race couples were more accepted. She concluded by explaining how it was not until the 1960s that the Supreme Court decided Miscegenation Laws were unfair…

Read the entire article here.

ASEM 2535: The Multiracial Individual

The Womens College, University of Denver
Fall Quarter, 2011

Arthur C. Jones, Clinical Professor and Chair of Culture and Psychology

From the beginning of its history, the United States has always been a place where bi-ethnic and bi-racial romantic alliances have been common, producing children with multi-ethnic and multi-racial roots. This was inevitable in a country that evolved as an international “melting pot,” including Native American peoples, enslaved Africans, and successive waves of immigrants and refugees from around the world. Yet, it was not until the year 2000 that the U.S. Census included a category that allowed respondents to indicate a bi-racial or multi-racial heritage/identity. This course will explore the historical racial tensions in the U.S. that have made it difficult to acknowledge the reality of multi-racial peoples in its midst, and will trace the trends in culture and national consciousness that made it possible for a change to occur in the 2000 Census. We will survey the varying ways in which multiracial people have been regarded by the larger society in different social contexts, as well as the ways in which the sociological, psychological, and political dynamics of multiracial identity have changed over time, and have impacted the experience of multiracial people themselves. Finally, we will examine the contemporary social and psychological dynamics of race and ethnicity in the U.S., including the continuing controversy surrounding the very idea of a multiracial identity.

For more information, click here.