Mixed Race Studies

Scholarly perspectives on the mixed race experience.

The most unique disadvantage of formal identities, relative to ascriptive and elective ones, is that they are confounded by dynamic identities: identities that change over time or depend on context. Formalities leave documentary traces that “inhibit forgetting.” The idea that a past formality might estop an individual from claiming a different identity is based on an understanding of identity as impervious to change or reformulation depending on context. But people do not always experience identity in this static and acontextual way. Researchers have found that many multiracial individuals change their racial identifications in different situations and over their lifetimes. For example, consider a multiracial woman who is only willing to identify as such if she believes her employer’s diversity program is genuine as opposed to tokenizing. The effects can be passed down through the generations, as one whose ancestors did not sign the Dawes Rolls may not have a claim to tribal membership. Or a person whose parents brought her to the United States without pursuing immigration formalities may find herself estopped from claiming U.S. citizenship. This estoppel problem is a growing risk as technology facilitates better collection and retention of records.

Jessica A. Clarke, “Identity and Form,” California Law Review, Volume 103, Number 4 (August 2015), 882. http://www.californialawreview.org/1identity_form/.

Ceremony

Posted in Asian Diaspora, Books, Media Archive, Native Americans/First Nation, Novels, United States on 2021-06-10 02:09Z by Steven

Ceremony

Penguin Random House
2006-12-26 (originally published in 1977)
272 Pages
5-5/8 x 8-7/16
Paperback ISBN: 9780143104919
Ebook ISBN: 9781440621826

Leslie Marmon Silko
Introduction by Larry McMurtry

The great Native American Novel of a battered veteran returning home to heal his mind and spirit

More than thirty-five years since its original publication, Ceremony remains one of the most profound and moving works of Native American literature, a novel that is itself a ceremony of healing. Tayo, a World War II veteran of mixed ancestry, returns to the Laguna Pueblo Reservation. He is deeply scarred by his experience as a prisoner of the Japanese and further wounded by the rejection he encounters from his people. Only by immersing himself in the Indian past can he begin to regain the peace that was taken from him. Masterfully written, filled with the somber majesty of Pueblo myth, Ceremony is a work of enduring power. The Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition contains a new preface by the author and an introduction by Larry McMurtry.

Tags: Larry Jeff McMurtry, Larry McMurtry, Leslie Marmon Silko, Penguin Random House

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Mixed Race Studies

Ceremony

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