{"id":54593,"date":"2017-07-21T18:54:42","date_gmt":"2017-07-21T18:54:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/?p=54593"},"modified":"2017-07-21T18:54:42","modified_gmt":"2017-07-21T18:54:42","slug":"twitter-and-rashida-jones-helped-me-embrace-my-blackness-as-a-biracial-person-no-really","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/?p=54593","title":{"rendered":"Twitter and Rashida Jones helped me embrace my Blackness as a biracial person \u2014 no, really"},"content":{"rendered":"

Twitter and Rashida Jones helped me embrace my Blackness as a biracial person \u2014 no, really<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

HelloGiggles<\/a>
\n2017-07-18<\/p>\n

Jessica Tholmer<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

<\/a>
\nJessica Tholmer<\/small><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t look like my mother. My mother is short, blonde, and very, very Irish. I am much taller and have a bigger frame, even from a young age. My hair is soft and curly<\/a> and mousy brown. My hands are big, my feet are big, and my skin is not very Irish<\/a>. Though I was raised single-handedly by my white mother<\/a>, I have never considered myself white.<\/p>\n

This is being biracial.<\/strong><\/p>\n

My father is a Black man \u2014 Black and Sicilian, if we\u2019re getting specific. He is quite a bit older than my mom and was an afro-sporting, bell-bottom jean-wearing Black Panther in the \u201970s. I knew him when I was young, but not for much of my life. Between 8 and 24, we didn\u2019t speak to one another at all<\/a>, not once. But even though he didn\u2019t raise me, his lineage, his blood, our story was always there.<\/p>\n

I have always identified as biracial, though it took me until recently to admit that I identify more with my \u201cBlack side.\u201d In many different social situations growing up, I had to announce my Blackness. I have been in rooms with people who did not know I was Black, and I have heard how white people will talk to one another about things they do not know in the presence of someone with an ambiguous background. (No, not all white people.) I have always been uncomfortable in certain situations \u2014 around people who grew up conservatively or without knowing any people of color. At a very young age, I learned to ask, \u201cIs it racist?\u201d when someone asked me if I wanted to hear a joke. I do not look\u00a0Black<\/em>, but I have no problem prefacing a potentially upsetting situation with the fact of my Blackness…<\/p>\n

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

I have always identified as biracial, though it took me until recently to admit that I identify more with my \u201cBlack side.\u201d In many different social situations growing up, I had to announce my Blackness.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,395,8,20],"tags":[27341,27342,5468,20101],"class_list":["post-54593","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","category-autobiography","category-media-archive","category-usa","tag-hellogiggles","tag-jessica-tholmer","tag-rashida-jones","tag-twitter"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54593","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=54593"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54593\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54594,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54593\/revisions\/54594"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=54593"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=54593"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=54593"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}