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Author: Chandra

3rd Annual What Are You?

The Brooklyn Historical Society will be hosting the 3rd Annual What Are You? – A Discussion About Mixed Heritage event Saturday, November 9, 2013 at 2:00pm.

This year they will be discussing questions like: “How do we perform and display our identities? How does media, film, art, humor and photography shape and mediate mixed-race identity?”

Check out their great panel (including Toasted Marshmallows which we have featured on HERE‎). They will even have a special dance performance.

http://cbbg.brooklynhistory.org/blog/3rd-annual-what-are-you-discussion-about-mixed-heritage

This event is FREE! If you are on the East Coast…this is an event worth attending! It will be held at:

Great Hall, Brooklyn Historical Society
128 Pierrepont Street
Brooklyn, NY 11201

Sister, Sister!

Tia & Tamera, from the 90s TV show Sister, Sister have a blog that “is an online community…that focuses on family, motherhood, health, beauty and style.”

http://tiaandtameraofficial.com/

Tamera often posts and shares her life story by posting updates about her husband and son.  Tamara is in an interracial marriage and has a mixed race son. 

Check out her recent family photos!

MusingMomma

Blogging Momma, Ellie, has done an amazing job providing discussion and resources. Her Multiracial Family Resources Page is a great resource for parents of multiracial kids. She also provides parenting tips and stories of other multiracial families. Most recently she has written about “Supporting Health Identity in Our Mixed Kids.”  This is such an important topic for parents to be talking about.  Parents have great influence on the life stories their children are creating.

This is a blog to share with all the parents you know!  http://www.musingmomma.com/

 

 

The Whipping Boy

Letters To A Mixed Race Son

My dad had stories. Near the end of the 1800s, his father was brought up with a whipping boy. The idea was to use the natural affection the little white boy would have for his playmate. The threat or punishment of the little black boy was used to control the white boy. Later as they grew up, the culture would not permit them to remain as friends, certainly not equals, so they were required to part ways. My dad said his dad loved his friend, but I don’t even know the man’s name, was told they set him up in business when airplanes were new, as a barnstorming wing walker. He even described the ad that was used. I am the grandson of someone who had a whipping boy.

 -Frank Robinson
Frank &amp_ Sandra Wedding - Copy

Free Range: Where Heritage Meets Hope

Free Range: Where Heritage Meets Hope is a rockumentary style film that follows Jessica Marie Porter (Chinook) as she embarks on a journey to transform her life. Her travels take her to indigenous communities and sacred regions around the world.

https://www.facebook.com/freerangethefilm

Free Range is currently running a KickStarter campaign that ends in 16 days! Support Alicia Woods and Jessica Marie Porter by spreading the word/liking their Facebook page/donating!

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/428245815/free-range-where-heritage-meets-hope-rockumentary?ref=live

Amon. My Grandfather Would Have Shot Me

Jennifer Teege

 

 

Here is a story that crosses race, culture, history and all knowing of who we think we are.

 

Jennifer Teege grew up in a foster home as a child.  As an adult she begins to explore the history of where she comes from…her biological parents background.  Not talking about her family story created internal turmoil that led to depression.

“You think that if you don’t talk about something, then it won’t have any impact on you. But in my case the silence had a destructive effect,” she said.

She begins to explore her story as she writes this book, and finds that storytelling can be healing.

“Your origin is decisive in your own identity, and every person needs to feel their own identity,” Teege said. So far she has focused on her German family history but in the future she wants to get to know Africa and travel to Nigeria – the home of her biological father.

http://www.dw.de/my-grandfather-would-have-shot-me/a-17109468

“I am not a reflection of this part of my family story but I am still very connected to it. I try to find a way to integrate it into my life.

It is a story that is very unique and very unusual, and a story that has a deeper meaning. It is more about the universal question of how to deal with the weight of the past on the present – and it should show that it is possible to gain personal freedom from the past.”

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-24347798

Living a life of multiplicity often presents the finding of ‘skeletons in the closet.’ Teege provides some guidance on how to gracefully put our past in its rightful place and not let it overshadow our life.

Check out the above links to more information about her story!

Mixed Roots Stories Partners with The Big Mix

 

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Mixed Roots Stories is excited to be partnering with The Big Mix! (see our Partners page!)

The Big Mix (www.thebigmix.org) is a family, entertainment and education focused event featuring all forms of entertainment, celebrity appearances, media events, kids activities, mixed cultural cuisine, education platforms and public interest vehicles celebrating diversity and inclusion for all people.

The first Festival takes place August 22-24, 2014 in Richmond, VA. It will be a “major multicultural event, celebrating diversity, with a specific focus on the mixed American and blended Families. In subsequent years, more cities will be added, for a nationwide, simultaneous celebration.”

Mixed Roots Stories will be collaborating with The Big Mix and contributing to their cultural and family programming.

Spread the word, Visit their site, Plan to attend – The Big Mix!!

Multiracial Mysteries

If you are a teen or know a teen.. check out Rachel and Rachael. These Canadian multiracial teenagers have created a site, Multiracial Mysteries, to help them and other multiracial teens deal with “everyday stresses of being different from ‘the norm'”. Their blog discusses myths, stereotypes, and experiences of multiracial teens.  Rachel and Rachael-Keep up the good work sharing the stories of the multiracial youth!

http://multiracialmysteries.wix.com/modernyouth

Little Miss Multiracial

Children’s pageants have gained popularity with reality shows like Toddlers in Tiaras. Little Miss Pageants have been around for years, and off shoots of the pageant franchise have found a place for specific racial categories (Miss Black –Insert State; Miss Hispanic –Insert State; etc).  Which pageant is best for those who are Multiracial?

Jakiyah McKoy won Little Miss Hispanic Delaware, but now there is question as to if she can hold the title due to having to prove her Latina heritage.

See the story here: http://colorlines.com/archives/2013/09/little_miss_hispanic_delaware_stripped_of_crown.html

 

CMRS Conference Call for Proposals

CRITICAL MIXED RACE STUDIES CONFERENCE 2014

GLOBAL MIXED RACE

Conference Description: Global Mixed Race, the third biennial Critical Mixed Race Studies Conference, will be hosted at DePaul University in Chicago, November 13th-15th, 2014. It will bring together scholars from a variety of disciplines around the world to facilitate a global conversation about the transnational, transdisciplinary, and transracial field of Critical Mixed Race Studies.

Proposals: We invite panels, roundtables, and papers that address the conference theme, although participants are also welcome to submit proposals that speak to their own specialized research, pedagogical, or community-based interests. The primary criterion for selection will be the quality of the proposal, not its connection to the conference theme. Proposals might consider the ways different disciplines approach or provide methodologies for critical analyses of mixed race issues. Proposals might also consider the following ideas as related to this year’s themes:

– tracing the history and historiography of mixed race in academic, popular, and legal discourses in a global context;

– identifying and measuring the impact of global migration, settlement, and sociocultural encounter and interaction on these mixed-race histories and historiographies;

– encouraging broad, interdisciplinary debate connecting different historical periods and seemingly disparate or far-flung regions of the world, such as comparative racial ideology in Europe, Africa, Latin America, and Asia or the study of comparative anti-miscegenation laws.

Panels, papers, and roundtable proposal submission deadline: January 15th, 2014

Please send inquiries to cmrs@depaul.edu or Camilla Fojas cfojas@depaul.edu

Please visit the CMRS website and Facebook page for updates: http://criticalmixedracestudies.org

https://www.facebook.com/criticalmixedracestudies

WE WILL SEE YOU THERE!