but in this racialized society he is seen as a black man.

Scholarly perspectives on the mixed race experience.

One thing that I learned while doing all my research was that there was a lot that I hadn’t learned in school. For instance, I learned the Southeast was just a empty wilderness when the settlers arrived at Jamestown. But in my research I discovered that it was crawling with people. Hundreds of thousands of natives. If you look at the maps of their villages they’re all over the place. There were also a lot of European and Africans who were there for various reasons and they were mostly young men, so they were mixing and melding with the native women. So the earliest years of our country, the population was quite mixed. I mean the whole melting pot idea didn’t come in with the nineteenth century; it was here all along. So, these earliest people, as Britain won out over Spain and Portugal, everyone wanted to be English, so everybody denied the rest of their heritage.

Lisa Alther, “Author Explores Racial Mixing In New Historical Novel,” VPR News, Vermont Public Radio, (March, 14, 2012): 00:01:45-00:02:45. http://www.vpr.net/news_detail/93768/author-explores-racial-mixing-in-new-historical-no/.

but in this racialized society he is seen as a black man.

Everyone seems to be negating President Barack Obama’s own story. The man himself has said publicly in print that, yes, his mother is white; yes, he is technically bi-racial, mixed race, whatever the language is people choose to use, but in this racialized society he is seen as a black man. And for that reason he identifies as black.

—Yaba Blay

Patrice Peck, “Biracial versus black: Thought leaders weigh in on the meaning of President Obama’s biracial heritage,” TheGrio, November 19, 2012. http://thegrio.com/2012/11/19/bi-racial-versus-black-thought-leaders-weigh-in-on-the-meaning-of-president-obamas-bi-racial-heritage/#s:president-obama-4

Tags: Patrice Peck, Yaba A. Blay, Yaba Amgborale Blay, Yaba Blay

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Mixed Race Studies

but in this racialized society he is seen as a black man.

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