Understand and Appreciate Multiracial Identities

Today’s message is from Exchange Leader and Oh Boy! author Francis Wardle, also our top commenter on ExchangeEveryDay! At age 12, my son travelled to Brazil to train with a local soccer club, by invitation from a colleague I had met on a recent visit. In the U.S., my son’s racial label was Black; when he arrived in Rio, it was mixed-race (pardo in Portuguese). In the U.S. anyone with any Black heritage has historically been regarded as Black – and expected to fully embrace a Black identity. In Brazil, a person with a mixed-race identity has always been recognized as mixed. While these differences reflect the strange history of racial labels, it’s important to understand why many people even today believe mixed-race Americans are Black and must identify as Black. This idea began in the Jim Crow era, where strict segregation between Black people and White people had to be maintained. However, due to a long history of interracial relationships – some consensual, some not – many Americans were, in fact, mixed-race. This posed a dilemma in enforcing Jim Crow’s stick rules. The solution: the one drop rule (ODR) - anyone with any Black DNA is considered Black. As a part of the multiracial movement of the 1980s-90s, my family and other interracial parents challenged this rule, affirming our children’s multiracial identity from an early age. But we continually faced the view of many teachers and others who automatically repeated, “Society sees your children as Black, so you must raise them as Black.” In today’s climate of racial tension and the affirmation of single-race identities, interracial families experience this same pushback from teachers, administrators, parents, book publishers, and even so-called diversity experts. Some interracial parents choose to raise their children as Black, and their choice should be respected. However, early childhood teachers and other staff need to deeply understand and appreciate the struggles families experience when they choose to affirm their children’s full multiracial identities. *Brasil is the Portuguese spelling.

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