Meet the woman who’s finally getting us talking about mixed race identity

Scholarly perspectives on the mixed race experience.

Every few months I come across assimilated Asian men venting on social media about the time one of their white neighbors in buildings just like mine in Brooklyn mistook them for delivery men, inevitably followed by a firm statement of their credentials: “I guess he didn’t know, I am a journalist/doctor/lawyer/hedge-fund manager!” It’s embarrassing for both sides when this happens, but the implication has always felt so bizarre to me; the real offense is being mistaken for being poor. What sets modern, assimilated Asian Americans apart, when it comes to these sorts of differentiations made by so many immigrant groups, is that our bonds with our brothers and sisters are mostly superficial markers of identity, whether rituals around boba tea, recipes or support for ethnic-studies programs and the like. Indignation tends to be flimsy — we are mad when white chefs cook food our parents cooked, or we clamor about what roles Scarlett Johansson stole from Asian actors. But the critiques generally stay within those sorts of consumerist concerns that do not really speak to the core of an identity because we know, at least subconsciously, that the identity politics of the modern, assimilated Asian American are focused on getting a seat at the wealthy, white liberal table. Or, if we want to be generous, we fight about food and representation and executive-suite access because we want our children to live without really having to think about any of this — to have the spoils of full whiteness.

We, in other words, want to become as white as white will allow…

Jay Caspian Kang, “The Myth of Asian American Identity,” The New York Times Magazine, October 5, 2021. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/05/magazine/asian-american-identity.html.

Meet the woman who’s finally getting us talking about mixed race identity

Meet the woman who’s finally getting us talking about mixed race identity

METRO.co.uk
2018-01-31

Miranda Larbi, Senior lifestyle reporter

Mixed race identity is complicated, to say the least.

You’re neither one thing or the other while simultaneously being both. Try speaking about your identity (online at least) and you inevitably met with criticism – whether it’s from ‘colour-blind’ types dismissing the need to talk about race at all, or from people accusing you of choosing a side to identify more with.

According to National Statistics, mixed race people will be the largest minority group in the UK by 2020…and while it might still be in vogue to favour racially ambiguous beauty (literally in the case of Adua Aboa), very little attention is paid to the experience behind the curly hair and tanned skin.

Being mixed race is far more than simply being half black and white. It’s an identity that covers all fractions, and all kinds of mixes.

Which is why Susan Dale has set up the Haluhalo Project…

Read the entire article here.

Tags: HaluHalo, Haluhalo Project., METRO.co.uk, Miranda Larbi, photography, Susan Dale

This entry was posted on Friday, August 10th, 2018 at 02:16Z and is filed under Articles, Arts, Identity Development/Psychology, Media Archive, United Kingdom. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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Mixed Race Studies

Meet the woman who’s finally getting us talking about mixed race identity

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