2/7/2011 What Being Biracial Means Today - NYTi…

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February 5, 2011

What Being Biracial Means Today

To the Editor:

Re “Black? White? Asian? More Young Americans Choose All of the Above” (“Race Remixed”
series, front page, Jan. 30):

As an early national leader for biracial equality, I am gratified, 20 years later, to see self-
confident, beautiful young people boldly speaking out. But your article does not fully do them
justice.

A biracial identity is not about defeating societal prejudice or eliminating affirmative action; it is
a personal decision. It is insulting to refer to multiracial people as “ethnically ambiguous.”

Being biracial means embracing all that you are, regardless of what society says. As the African-
American father of two proudly biracial young adults, I am hopeful that our colorful future will
mirror what we yearned for in the past.

Edwin C. Darden
Springfield, Va., Jan. 31, 2011

The writer is a past president of the Interracial Family Circle of Washington, D.C., Maryland
and Virginia and a past vice president of the Association of Multi-Ethnic Americans.

To the Editor:

This is a tough one. On the one hand, it is important and valid for people to respect one
another’s ethnicity and cultural backgrounds. On the other hand, our collective focus on our own
individuality is eroding our sense of nationalism and our ability to act as a collective.

Without making any judgment on either side of these aspects of our American culture, it is
important to note that China seems to have more of a monoculture, imbuing its people with a
sense of being part of a collective whole. In the coming decade it will be interesting to see how
its monoculture fares in the wake of growing economic prosperity, and how the United States
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economy fares in the wake of our eroding social fabric.

Tom Short
San Rafael, Calif., Jan. 30, 2011

To the Editor:

I was glad to see you raise the issue of the “where are you from?” question. Those of us who
look different (not white) are frequently asked this offensive question. Most who ask are
innocently curious, but they don’t realize that by asking “where are you from?” in terms of
racial heritage, they are implying that we aren’t “real” Americans.

When someone asks me “where are you from?” I answer literally (the United States, Oregon or
my hometown), prompting the lovely follow-up question “No, where are you from?” Obviously,
I’m meant to realize that he or she is asking for my racial background, yet the phrasing sets me
apart: not a real American, but someone in America originating elsewhere.

I am an American of Japanese and European extraction. My mother’s family has lived here for
more than 100 years, and my father’s ancestors fought against the British. And yet, every time
someone asks those questions I am reduced to defending my right to simply be “American.”

Sumiko Chambers
Sherwood, Ore., Jan. 30, 2011

To the Editor:

I have recollections of how Virginia’s racial laws affected my multiracial families — Hemings and
Bolling.

Up until 1910, if a person had less than one-quarter of Negro blood and was free, that person
was legally white. When some of my Hemings family members were freed, they didn’t have to
pass for white in Virginia because by law they were white.

The Racial Integrity Law of 1924 deemed anyone with a single drop of nonwhite blood as being
colored. But there was one exception to the law — often referred to as the Pocahontas
exemption. Had this exemption not existed, some of my Bolling family members, like Rear
Adm. Richard Byrd, the polar explorer, Edith Bolling Wilson, wife of President Woodrow Wilson,
and many others, who claimed descent from Pocahontas, would have been classified as colored
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in Virginia.

Edna Bolling Jacques

Chappaqua, N.Y., Feb. 1, 2011

To the Editor:

We noted that many of the biracial young people interviewed in your article were also
binational, meaning born to parents of different nationalities.

In our research on ethnic identity formation of binational and biracial young adult Americans,
we found that having one foreign-born parent and thus a deep understanding of at least one
other culture and worldview had a significant, positive impact on the participants’
understanding of themselves and their place in the world.

Early on, these binational and biracial individuals learned that the meaning of race is contextual;
their being biracial in America was a totally different experience from being biracial in other
countries, especially in countries that use identity constructions for people of a mixed racial
background. These young adults know, from personal experience, that racial identity is a fluid,
culturally determined phenomenon, and that how they are seen, racially, and whether that
perception carries positive, negative or neutral connotations, depends on where they are.

Your article was excellent, but missed this significant aspect of the biracial experience in the
United States.

Anne Paxton
Priscilla Wade
New York, Jan. 31, 2011

The writers are, respectively, associate clinical professor of epidemiology and population and
family health, Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University; and clinical director,
Psychological and Consultation Services, East Lansing, Mich.

To the Editor:

Oh, big deal! In 1947, as college students, we used to answer the race question with “human.”
Each generation thinks it’s inventing the wheel!

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Amalia Jacobucci
Centerville, Mass., Jan. 30, 2011

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