We Are a People: Narrative and Multiplicity in Constructing Ethnic Identity

Posted in Anthologies, Anthropology, Asian Diaspora, Books, Brazil, Identity Development/Psychology, Media Archive, Social Science on 2010-10-05 01:54Z by Steven

We Are a People: Narrative and Multiplicity in Constructing Ethnic Identity

Temple University Press
January 2000
304 pages
7×10
5 tables 5 figures
Paper EAN: 978-1-56639-723-0; ISBN: 1-56639-723-5

edited by Paul Spickard, Professor of History
University of California, Santa Barbara

and W. Jeffrey Burroughs, Dean of Math and Sciences and Professor of Psychology
Brigham Young University, Hawaii

As the twentieth century closes, ethnicity stands out as a powerful force for binding people together in a sense of shared origins and worldview. But this emphasis on a people’s uniqueness can also develop into a distorted rationale for insularity, inter-ethnic animosity, or, as we have seen in this century, armed conflict. Ethnic identity clearly holds very real consequences for individuals and peoples, yet there is not much agreement on what exactly it is or how it is formed.

The growing recognition that ethnicity is not fixed and inherent, but elastic and constructed, fuels the essays in this collection. Regarding identity as a dynamic, on-going, formative and transformative process, We Are a People considers narrative—the creation and maintenance of a common story—as the keystone in building a sense of peoplehood. Myths of origin, triumph over adversity, migration, and so forth, chart a group’s history, while continual additions to the larger narrative stress moving into the future as a people.

Still, there is more to our stories as individuals and groups. Most of us are aware that we take on different roles and project different aspects of ourselves depending on the situation. Some individuals who have inherited multiple group affiliations from their families view themselves not as this or that but all at once. So too with ethnic groups. The so-called hyphenated Americans are not the only people in the world to recognize or embrace their plurality. This relatively recent acknowledgment of multiplicity has potentially wide implications, destabilizing the limited (and limiting) categories inscribed in, for example, public policy and discourse on race relations.

We Are a People is a path-breaking volume, boldly illustrating how ethnic identity works in the real world.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
1. We are a People – Paul Spickard and W. Jeffrey Burroughs

Part I: The Indeterminacy of Ethnic Categories: The Problem and A Solution
2. Multiple Ethnicities and Identity Choices in the United States – Mary C. Waters
3. That’s the Story of Our Life – Stephen Cornell

Part II: Construction of Ethnic Narratives: Migrant Ethnicities
4. Black Immigrants in the United States – Violet M. Johnson
5. The Children of Samoan Migrants in New Zealand – Cluny Macpherson and La’avasa Macpherson

Part III: Ethnicities of Dominated Indigenous Peoples
6. Narrating to the Center of Power in the Marshall Islands – Phillip H. McArthur
7. Discovered Identities and American-Indian Supratribalism – Stephen Cornell
8. Racialist Responses to Black Athletic Achievement – Patrick B. Miller
9. I’m Not a Chileno! Rapa Nui Identity – Max E. Stanton and Andrés Edmunds P.

Part IV: Emerging Multiethnic Narratives
10. Multiracial Identity in Brazil and the U.S. – G. Reginald Daniel
11. Mixed Laughter – Darby Li Po Price
12. Punjabi Mexican American Experiences of Multiethnicity –  Darby Li Po Price

Part V: Theoretical Reflections
13. Rethinking Racial Identity Development – Maria P. P. Root
14. The Continuing Significance of Race – Lori Pierce
15. What Are the Functions of Ethnic Identity? – Cookie White Stephan and Walter G. Stephan
16. Ethnicity, Multiplicity, and Narrative – W. Jeffrey Burroughs and Paul Spickard

Read an excerpt of chapter 1 here.

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Ethnic Identity Among Mixed-Heritage People In Hawaii

Posted in Articles, Asian Diaspora, Identity Development/Psychology, Media Archive, United States on 2010-01-07 22:52Z by Steven

Ethnic Identity Among Mixed-Heritage People In Hawaii

Symbolic Interaction
Volume 14, Number 3 (Fall 1991)
Pages 261–277
DOI 10.1525/si.1991.14.3.261

Cookie White Stephan, Emeritus Professor of Sociology
New Mexico State University

In this study, intensive interviews were used to explore the identity of a sample of mixed-heritage Hawaiian college students from a variety of ethnic groups. The great majority of respondents listed at least one multiple-heritage identity (e.g., Chinese-Japanese). While cultural exposure and ethnic identity were strongly associated, cultural exposure is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for ethnic identity to occur. Differences in perceptions of ethnic identity between respondents with stable and situtionally changing identities were discussed. The conceptions of identity proposed by processual and structural symbolic interactionists both received some support in these data.

Read or purchase the article here.

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Racially Mixed People in America

Posted in Anthologies, Autobiography, Books, Census/Demographics, Identity Development/Psychology, Media Archive, Politics/Public Policy, Social Science, United States on 2009-10-14 00:31Z by Steven

Racially Mixed People in America

SAGE Publications, Inc.
1992
400 pages
Paperback ISBN: 9780803941021

Edited by Maria P. P. Root

Recipient of the Gustavus Myers Center for the Study of Human Rights in the United States 1993 Outstanding Book Award.

America has been the breeding ground of a “biracial baby boom” for the past 25 years. Unfortunately, there has been a dearth of information regarding how racially mixed people identify and view themselves and how they relate to one another. Racially Mixed People in America steadily bridges this gap and offers a comprehensive look at the social and psychological adjustment of mixed-race people, models for identity development, contemporary immigration and marriage patterns, and methodological issues involved in conducting research with mixed-race people, all in the context of America’s mixed race past and present. Including contributions by ethnohistorians, psychologists, and sociologists, this powerful volume will provide the reader a tool for examining ideologies surrounding race, race relations, and the role of social science in the deconstruction of race. Racially Mixed People in America is essential reading for researchers and practitioners in cross-cultural studies, psychology, family studies, sociology, and social work.

Table of Contents

  • PART ONE: RACIAL ECOLOGY
    • Within, Between, and Beyond Race — Maria P. P. Root
    • The Illogic of American Racial CategoriesPaul R. Spickard
    • The Human Ecology of Multiracial Identity — Robin L. Miller
    • Developmental Pathways — Deborah J. Johnson
    • Toward an Ecological Theoretical Formulation of Race Identity in Black/White Biracial Children
    • Mixed Heritage Individuals — Cookie White Stephan
    • Ethnic Identity and Trait Characteristics
    • The Quiet Immigration — Michael C. Thornton
    • Foreign Spouses of US Citizens, 1945-1985
    • Beauty and the Beast — Carla K. Bradshaw
    • On Racial Ambiguity
  • PART TWO: RECOVERING THE MULTIRACIAL PAST
    • Passers and Pluralists G. Reginald Daniel
    • Subverting the Racial Divide
    • Blood Quantum — Terry P. Wilson
    • Native American Mixed Bloods
    • La Raza and the Melting Pot — Carlos A. Fernandez
    • A Comparative Look at Multiethnicity
    • From Dust to Gold Kieu — Linh Caroline Valverde
    • The Vietnamese Amerasian Experience
    • An Invisible Monster — Cynthia L. Nakashima
    • The Creation and Denial of Mixed Race People in America
  • PART THREE: WHAT OF THE CHILDREN
    • Back to the Drawing Board Maria P. P. Root
    • Methodological Issues in Research on Multiracial People
    • Identity Development in Biracial Children — James H. Jacobs
    • Between a Rock and a Hard Place — Ana Mari Cauce et al
    • Social Adjustment of Biracial Youth
    • Negotiating Ethnic Identity — Jewelle Taylor Gibbs and Alice M. Hines
    • Issues for Black/White Biracial Adolescents
    • Offspring of Cross-Race and Cross-Ethnic Marriages in Hawaii — Ronald C. Johnson
    • Please Choose One — Christine C. Iijima Hall
    • Ethnic Identity Choices for Biracial Individuals
    • Interracial Japanese Americans — Amy Iwasaki Mass
    • The Best of Both Worlds or the End of the Japanese American Community?
    • Prism Lives Teresa — Kay Williams
    • Identity of Binational Amerasians
    • The Developmental Process of Asserting a Biracial, Bicultural Identity — George Kitahara Kich
  • PART FOUR: CHALLENGING THE CENSUS
    • Is Multiracial Status Unique? The Personal and Social Experience — Michael C. Thornton
    • Coloring Outside the Lines — Christine C. Iijima Hall
    • Multicultural Identity and the Death of Stereotypes — Philip Tajitsu Nash
    • Beyond Black and White — G. Reginald Daniel
    • The New Multiracial Consciousness
    • From Shortcuts to Solutions — Maria P. P. Root
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