Interesting. I haven't yet gotten a strange or hostile reaction. People always ask, "What are you?" and then I rattle off a few things and I ask them about their background.
There have been times when I've been annoyed by a few fellow alleged biracials who look monoracially Black and who volunteer that they are "Scottish, Irish, British, French, Indian [rest of long list] ... and [finally] Black".
@CheezInspector I wonder how my half-sister would feel after reading this; in the rest of the family’s opinion she looks black. It shouldn’t matter, but it does to some people. I wonder why you were annoyed by this; I’ve yet to feel that way, yet I have been the annoying one. On occasion, I’ve asked people of African-American heritage what they were mixed with to have them glare at me or laugh and say that they were just black (not what I see, but what do I know?) – goes both ways I guess.
@wrouillie, yeah, it could be annoying either way. My pet peeve -as stated above - is that it seems to suggest self-hate at times. Some of my family are maybe too Eurocentric, while the Black heritage is an after-thought at best. My bro won't even call himself Black/African, but proudly lists everything ELSE we are. My mom, whose mostly Black, talks proudly of her White heritage but thinks Black people are ugly and uncivilized. It's annoying because it all seems racist and weird.
@wrouillie, yeah, it could be annoying either way. My pet peeve -as stated above - is that it seems to suggest self-hate at times. Some of my family are maybe too Eurocentric, while the Black heritage is an after-thought at best. My bro won't even call himself Black/African, but proudly lists everything ELSE we are. My mom, whose mostly Black, talks proudly of her White heritage but thinks Black people are ugly and uncivilized. It's annoying because it all seems racist and weird.
@celena332 - funny how people how strange ideas. One of my favorites was when I was a little girl, a class mate couldn't understand how I could be more than 2 things if I only had 2 parents. :D
@ OneSummerSky - a person of Northern European heritage for instance may be referring to more than one heritage in the region, or genetic testing may have narrowed heritage to the region, or the person is being vague for reasons that are simply personal. I see no problem here and can respect that.
@wrouillie This is the case with my father. His paternal grandmother came from a different north European country than where my father is born. In my fathers case (although he does speak both European languages) he acknowledges his grandmothers heritage (and so do I) but he doesn't identify with it (and neither do I). I too speak both European languages and I’ve been to that country many times (also because my mother has family living there).
@wrouillie (cont) But personally, I prefer to make a distinction between acknowledgment and identification, whereby the latter entails aspects that are more actively ingraining into my daily reality.
I perceive identity as something relational, which acquires meaning and form through interactions with social contexts and through memories. The interaction with my paternal great grandmother’s ethnic heritage is too little to be able to speak in terms of a deeply ingraining imprint.
@wrouillie (cont) However, to avoid being seen as a cultural essentialist, I like to state out that I perceive people as individual beings first and foremost, instead of cultural beings. I reject cultural essentialism or cultural determinism. I also see race as a social construct, that’s why genetic heritage doesn’t mean much to me, other than the inheritance of certain physical appearance characteristics and to a lower extend some behavioural temperaments.
@wrouillie (cont) To elaborate a little bit more on what I said about the meaning of the genetic heritage: what I meant to say is, it doesn't have much meaning in itself (other than what I mentioned). But it acquires meaning when it can be linked to a cultural heritage.
(cont) I have both languages, both cultures, both families etc. My mothers genetic heritage doesn’t have a face or a voice. Sure it’s part of who she is (and who I am) but on a totally different level.
It feels completely different when identifing as mixed (black mother/white father) than with identifying with native American and white genes of generations ago...
I acknowledge them as being part of my heritage but there is too little to go out and tell the world I can honestly identify with.
(cont) A genetic heritage can be the starting point to learn more about the cultural heritage, but in the absence of the latter, it feels so empty....
I have a white (North European) father and a black mother. My mother is from the Caribbean and further down the family tree she has mixed ancestry. But when I compare my daily reality to my maternal mixed genetic heritage (or even to my mothers own experience of having a mixed ancestry), it’s a totally different experience.
Thank you for the video response! Let me start by saying that I have absolutely no problem with people identifying as mixed. The only thing I don’t understand is what it is people are identifying with when they claim something they don’t know. I’m from northern Europe. When people say they are also partially North European but yet don’t know what it entails, it feels totally awkward (even slightly superficial).
Interesting. I haven't yet gotten a strange or hostile reaction. People always ask, "What are you?" and then I rattle off a few things and I ask them about their background.
There have been times when I've been annoyed by a few fellow alleged biracials who look monoracially Black and who volunteer that they are "Scottish, Irish, British, French, Indian [rest of long list] ... and [finally] Black".
CheezInspector 7 months ago
@CheezInspector I wonder how my half-sister would feel after reading this; in the rest of the family’s opinion she looks black. It shouldn’t matter, but it does to some people. I wonder why you were annoyed by this; I’ve yet to feel that way, yet I have been the annoying one. On occasion, I’ve asked people of African-American heritage what they were mixed with to have them glare at me or laugh and say that they were just black (not what I see, but what do I know?) – goes both ways I guess.
wrouillie 7 months ago
@wrouillie, yeah, it could be annoying either way. My pet peeve -as stated above - is that it seems to suggest self-hate at times. Some of my family are maybe too Eurocentric, while the Black heritage is an after-thought at best. My bro won't even call himself Black/African, but proudly lists everything ELSE we are. My mom, whose mostly Black, talks proudly of her White heritage but thinks Black people are ugly and uncivilized. It's annoying because it all seems racist and weird.
CheezInspector 5 months ago
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@wrouillie, yeah, it could be annoying either way. My pet peeve -as stated above - is that it seems to suggest self-hate at times. Some of my family are maybe too Eurocentric, while the Black heritage is an after-thought at best. My bro won't even call himself Black/African, but proudly lists everything ELSE we are. My mom, whose mostly Black, talks proudly of her White heritage but thinks Black people are ugly and uncivilized. It's annoying because it all seems racist and weird.
CheezInspector 5 months ago
@celena332 - funny how people how strange ideas. One of my favorites was when I was a little girl, a class mate couldn't understand how I could be more than 2 things if I only had 2 parents. :D
wrouillie 7 months ago
@ OneSummerSky - a person of Northern European heritage for instance may be referring to more than one heritage in the region, or genetic testing may have narrowed heritage to the region, or the person is being vague for reasons that are simply personal. I see no problem here and can respect that.
wrouillie 8 months ago
@wrouillie This is the case with my father. His paternal grandmother came from a different north European country than where my father is born. In my fathers case (although he does speak both European languages) he acknowledges his grandmothers heritage (and so do I) but he doesn't identify with it (and neither do I). I too speak both European languages and I’ve been to that country many times (also because my mother has family living there).
OneSummerSky 8 months ago
@wrouillie (cont) But personally, I prefer to make a distinction between acknowledgment and identification, whereby the latter entails aspects that are more actively ingraining into my daily reality.
I perceive identity as something relational, which acquires meaning and form through interactions with social contexts and through memories. The interaction with my paternal great grandmother’s ethnic heritage is too little to be able to speak in terms of a deeply ingraining imprint.
OneSummerSky 8 months ago
@wrouillie (cont) However, to avoid being seen as a cultural essentialist, I like to state out that I perceive people as individual beings first and foremost, instead of cultural beings. I reject cultural essentialism or cultural determinism. I also see race as a social construct, that’s why genetic heritage doesn’t mean much to me, other than the inheritance of certain physical appearance characteristics and to a lower extend some behavioural temperaments.
OneSummerSky 8 months ago
@wrouillie (cont) To elaborate a little bit more on what I said about the meaning of the genetic heritage: what I meant to say is, it doesn't have much meaning in itself (other than what I mentioned). But it acquires meaning when it can be linked to a cultural heritage.
OneSummerSky 8 months ago
(cont) I have both languages, both cultures, both families etc. My mothers genetic heritage doesn’t have a face or a voice. Sure it’s part of who she is (and who I am) but on a totally different level.
It feels completely different when identifing as mixed (black mother/white father) than with identifying with native American and white genes of generations ago...
I acknowledge them as being part of my heritage but there is too little to go out and tell the world I can honestly identify with.
OneSummerSky 8 months ago
(cont) A genetic heritage can be the starting point to learn more about the cultural heritage, but in the absence of the latter, it feels so empty....
I have a white (North European) father and a black mother. My mother is from the Caribbean and further down the family tree she has mixed ancestry. But when I compare my daily reality to my maternal mixed genetic heritage (or even to my mothers own experience of having a mixed ancestry), it’s a totally different experience.
OneSummerSky 8 months ago
Thank you for the video response! Let me start by saying that I have absolutely no problem with people identifying as mixed. The only thing I don’t understand is what it is people are identifying with when they claim something they don’t know. I’m from northern Europe. When people say they are also partially North European but yet don’t know what it entails, it feels totally awkward (even slightly superficial).
OneSummerSky 8 months ago