Ask Code Switch: ‘Since You’re Black, You Must Be … ‘

Ask Code Switch: ‘Since You’re Black, You Must Be … ‘

Code Switch: Race and Identity, Remixed
National Public Radio
2017-08-26

Leah Donnella, News Assistant, Code Switch


Code Switch is tackling your trickiest questions about race.
amathers/iStock

Welcome back to Ask Code Switch, a segment where we dissect your trickiest questions about race. This week, we’re tackling one version of a question that we hear all the time: What do you do when people just won’t stop making assumptions about you because of how you look?

Franchesca in San Francisco writes:

I am mixed Filipino and black, but was raised by my Filipino side. Because I identify more with being Filipino, I get offended when people assume that I’m only black or that I’m only into “black things.” For example, they assume that I must be into black men, etc. It makes me feel like I’m being stereotyped based off my appearance (which is racially ambiguous and depends on who is looking at me and their own perceptions or experiences with different ethnicities). How can I avoid being offended and address the situation when I do feel like I am being boxed into a certain category, without making it a huge deal?…

Read the entire article here.

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