{"id":41458,"date":"2015-06-17T19:56:54","date_gmt":"2015-06-17T19:56:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/?p=41458"},"modified":"2015-06-17T19:56:54","modified_gmt":"2015-06-17T19:56:54","slug":"the-trouble-with-virginia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/?p=41458","title":{"rendered":"The Trouble with Virginia"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Trouble with Virginia<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Michele Beller: writing the mixed-race experience of America, from Buckingham County, Virginia, to Dominica, West Indies, and beyond<\/a>
\n 2014-11-21<\/a><\/p>\n

Michele Beller<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Finally. My book project is coming to life. My dream of writing is here. As I learn new things or have something interesting to share, I promise you, I\u2019ll post it here. Now. Here is the story of my (first) book:<\/p>\n

The Trouble with Virginia<\/em> is a historical novel based on the true story of my great-great grandmother, Virginia. She was the daughter of a prosperous white plantation owner and a mulatto<\/a> slave who lived openly as husband and wife \u2014 a dangerous way to live in the antebellum South<\/a>. Virginia grew up with many privileges of her white father, yet her father had to buy her a husband from a nearby plantation. Her first two children were born into slavery\u2014her father\u2019s property. Then came the Civil War<\/a>, marching right through Virginia\u2019s front yard.<\/p>\n

But this isn\u2019t just a story about our distant past. My parents married in 1958\u2013a time when it was still illegal for them to marry in sixteen states; like Virginia, my father is white and my mother is black. My parents believed there\u2019s no such thing as race or color. I didn\u2019t understand until I grew up how defining race still is; it may have been a hundred years later, but when I left home, neither side knew what to do with me. My parents loved me, but they didn\u2019t prepare me for the fight that awaited me out in the world. I had no idea race was such a defining issue…<\/p>\n

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

The Trouble with Virginia Michele Beller: writing the mixed-race experience of America, from Buckingham County, Virginia, to Dominica, West Indies, and beyond 2014-11-21 Michele Beller Finally. My book project is coming to life. My dream of writing is here. As I learn new things or have something interesting to share, I promise you, I\u2019ll post […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,1245,459,8,6940,20],"tags":[20265,20266],"class_list":["post-41458","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","category-biography","category-history","category-media-archive","category-slavery","category-usa","tag-michele-beller","tag-michele-beller-writing-the-mixed-race-experience-of-america"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41458","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=41458"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41458\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=41458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=41458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=41458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}