{"id":21545,"date":"2012-03-17T17:27:51","date_gmt":"2012-03-17T17:27:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/wordpress\/?p=21545"},"modified":"2015-11-06T21:47:23","modified_gmt":"2015-11-06T21:47:23","slug":"st-patrick%e2%80%99s-day-holds-mixed-emotions-for-some","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/?p=21545","title":{"rendered":"St. Patrick\u2019s Day holds mixed emotions for some"},"content":{"rendered":"

St. Patrick\u2019s Day holds mixed emotions for some<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The Boston Globe<\/a>
\n2012-03-17<\/p>\n

Martine Powers<\/a><\/strong>, Globe Staff<\/p>\n

Ryan McCollum knows that on St. Patrick\u2019s Day<\/a>, he cuts an unusual figure.<\/p>\n

All in green, a traditional Irish Claddagh ring<\/a> on his finger and a houndstooth flat cap on his head, everything about his attire screams \u201cIrish and proud.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n

But McCollum, 33, is also black. His father, a Navy man from Springfield<\/a>, married an Irish-American girl from Downeast Maine<\/a>.<\/p>\n

He knows his appearance does not fit the bill of a stereotypical Irishman\u2014most assume he\u2019s black, or maybe Latino\u2014but since childhood, his mother mandated that his Irish pride run fierce.<\/p>\n

Ryan McCollum, a political consultant and owner of RMC Strategies, is part Irish.<\/p>\n

\u201cGrowing up, I knew I was Irish,: said McCollum, of Springfield, \u201ceven if the rest of the world didn\u2019t know I was Irish.\u201d<\/p>\n

As the American population has grown increasingly mixed-race in recent decades, some descendants of Irish immigrants are claiming a multiracial heritage, though they may differ in appearance from their red-haired, freckled ancestors. For them, the joys of embracing Irish roots are complicated by the challenges of being multiracial.<\/p>\n

\u201cI always feel this deep kinship with Irish people in Boston<\/a>,\u201d said Kelly Bates, a mixed-race Irish-American who lives in Roslindale<\/a>. \u201cBut I don\u2019t always feel like they have this kinship with me.\u201d…<\/p>\n

…Paul J. McNamara, president of the 275-year-old Charitable Irish Society<\/a>, said he does not believe that any of the organization\u2019s 400 current members are multiracial, but the group welcomes membership applications from anyone interested in promoting Irish history and culture…<\/p>\n

…While Irish and African-American communities worked and lived in close proximity in the decades after America\u2019s founding\u2014both groups were stigmatized by English landowners\u2014they grew antagonistic toward one another at the end of the 19th century, said Marie E. Daly<\/a>, library director at the New England Historic Genealogical Society<\/a>. In the last century, the communities have butted heads over labor rights, housing, and public school desegregation.<\/p>\n

Bates said she is just as proud to be African-American as she is proud to be Irish. After all, she said, the sound of bagpipes and African drums both give her chills. But she sometimes worries about expressing pride in her Irish roots. As much as Irish is a national origin, she said, it also identifies her as white. She does not want others to think she has distanced herself from her black identity…<\/p>\n

Read the entire article here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

St. Patrick\u2019s Day holds mixed emotions for some The Boston Globe 2012-03-17 Martine Powers, Globe Staff Ryan McCollum knows that on St. Patrick\u2019s Day, he cuts an unusual figure. All in green, a traditional Irish Claddagh ring on his finger and a houndstooth flat cap on his head, everything about his attire screams \u201cIrish and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,125,8,20],"tags":[4072,10076,10075,10074,5579],"class_list":["post-21545","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","category-identitydevelopment","category-media-archive","category-usa","tag-boston-globe","tag-marie-daly","tag-marie-e-daly","tag-martine-powers","tag-the-boston-globe"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21545","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21545"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21545\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43802,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21545\/revisions\/43802"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21545"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21545"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21545"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}