Blended Nation
==============
Wolran Kim
November 2012
A book, Blended Nation, is composed of portraits and interviews of Mixed-Race Americans as the subtitle says. The title, blended nation and the words mixed-race suggest many similar words to my mind such as melting pot, salad bowl, mixed blood, half-breed, and multiculturism. Mike Tauber took photographs and interviewed shoots portraiture, documentary and location/architectural imagery for editorial and commercial clients from his base in New York. His career in photography was inspired by the study of anthropology and environmental science in college and in Tanzania and was reinforced by his yearlong travels throughout Africa, Asia, Australia, and the South Pacific after graduating. Besides Tauber, Pamela Singh was co-producer, Ann Curry wrote the foreword, Rebecca Walker wrote the introduction, and Alan Goodman wrote the essay in this book.
Half of this book is filled with 66 individual or family photos and the other half is depicting their candid minds about their identities through interviews. Those photos and interviews contain their past, present, and future, of those living as complex races in the reality of the United States. Adia Hoag, who is living in Long Beach, states the theme of this book, “In 1980 I was White (at under a year old I had no real pigment yet, so my mother is), in 1990 I was Black, and in 2000, thanks to a lot of lobbying, I was finally me: mixed.”
In the 2000 U.S. Census, for the first time, multiracial individuals were allowed to indicate more than one race, and nearly seven million Americans did so. Blended Nation features individuals from this rapidly growing demographic of mixed race Americans across the country that identify as more than one race. Mike Tauber and Pamela Singh explore the concept of race in America through the prism of the very personal experiences of people of mixed race heritage.
How should we define race and who should define it? According to “Ten things everyone should know about Race” by California Newsreel, race is a modern idea, has no genetic basis, has no human subspecies exist, is from slavery predates, evolved with freedom, justified social inequalities as natural, and is not biological, but is still real. Skin color really is only skin deep and color-blindness will not end racism. Our eyes tell us that people look different, and no one has trouble distinguishing a Czech from a Chinese. But what do those differences mean? Why has race always been with us and always affects people? Genetically we are all the same. Society has carved out categories in which to classify people so that it can better understand itself.
In the foreword, Ann Curry says that we are the new face of America and its noble ideals of equality and freedom. She is half Asian and half Caucasian, and her father told her, “You are the best of both worlds.” Rebecca Walker says in her introduction, “Out heritage is vase. We contain multitudes. Human history belongs to all of us. Each of us is entitled to claim its riches. And each of us is responsible for what we do with is wealth.” Alan H. Goodman says in her essay that race is not a human genetic variation. There is no scientific justification beyond convenience and maintenance of the status quo to continue to racialize human biological variation. Real human suffering may result from poor conceptualization of human variation. Many scholars-individuals who spend their lives studying race have also been dazed and confused.
The participants in this book are members of a new blended nation, one that seems possible with globalization and tolerance. The protagonist of the first photo, half Indian (Bombay, Goa) and half White (Jewish Russian-Romanian), Ananda says that she feels like an American who has an Indian heritage. Her sister, Rehana says that she feels more White than Indian but she has always been proud of her Indian heritage and feels that it has brought color and spice to her life. Phoenix Blackhorse who is five-eighths Native American (Cherokee, Lakota, Blackfoot), quarter African American, one-eighth French and Caribbean, says he is commonly called a Native American though that’s not what they commonly refer to themselves. His elders were the most influential in the creation of his comprehension of self, and his lessons also included what all other people are, so he has a better sense of being than most. He can refrain from passing judgment on those whom he has no understanding about. It’s a shame that others don’t do the same.
Kelly Ogilvie who is half Asian (Japanese), one-eighth Asian (Filipino), three-eighths White (German, French, Spanish) says that the general influences of society have shaped his own self-image to an extent. Sarah Haas who is quarter Asian (Indonesian), three-quarters White (Dutch, German, Lithuanian) says that she is glad that people cannot so easily define her. But she finds it sad that society perpetuates the need to fit people into narrowly defined categories. Tamiko who is half White (Irish, English), quarter African American, quarter Native American says she lives an adapted life where she can speak many languages and move through cultures like gliding on ice. She is waiting for the world to catch up with her. Frances Kao who is half Asian (Chinese, Korean), half White (Sicilian, Italian) says: “Until there is a box that reads Korean, Chinese, Italian American, I’ll continue to tick the OTHER box.”
We all are used to seeing skin color first before we see the color of the person. We are accustomed to view the personality and abilities of the individual which are already colored. This is not different from us seeing through colored eyeglasses because the world looks the same as the color of our glasses. Society has played a role in the sense of racial identity, but individual freedom and intention are explored differently to seek the side of the creative world. Kim Hunter who is half White (German), half Black says that denying who you are is always worse. So many of our educational, social, business and governmental policies are based on fixed racial categories.
Researchers say that as the number of interracial marriages increases, so does the level of social acceptance and awareness about multiracialism. One out of seven pairs is married to other racial or ethnic spouses, and multiracial marriages are at 9 percent in the United States. This has increased twice during the past 20 years and is surging to a major shift in the demographic view. According to U.S. Census estimates, multiracial Americans have become one of the country’s fastest growing demographic groups. Nicholas Jones, chief of the U.S. Census Bureau's Racial Statistics Branch, says the number of mixed-race individuals has increased about 25 percent since the 2000 census. "These are mainly driven by births of children from interracial parent couples," he says. The U.S. Census Bureau estimated that 35 percent of the total population is half-blood, and inter-racial boundaries are crumbling fast according to the skyrocketing of mixed race in American society.
Israel Zangwill wrote a play Melting Pot when over 18 million immigrants came from Italy, Germany, Ireland, and Eastern Europe to the United States between 1890 and 1920. This concept has been accepted to explain the American society for a long time that one American newly born out of the melting pot contains American values such as democracy, freedom, and the responsibility of all kinds of immigrants. However, this theory lost power since the black-and-white confrontation in the 1960s and the massive influx of immigrants from Latin America and Asia in the 1970s and 1980s.
The first wave of immigrants of the 20th century had a strong willingness to assimilate to the ruling class, Anglo-Saxon’s Protestant culture, and it was possible. But the second wave of immigrants and black people who have completely different faces and cultures did not assimilate into white American society, because the alienation from whites with superiority emphasized the unique identity, and tendency of avoiding exchanges. Thereupon, the ‘salad bowl’ theory has emerged. United States formed one society in harmony with multi-racial and multi-ethnic culture without losing the individuality. However, in reality, there were also objections that the integration has not made better and all ingredients playing apart and not mingling as a bad salad.
Americans’ mixed race increased the four times from 500,000 in 1970 to 2 million in 1990, and research has predicted it to reach 21 percent in 2050. The current (2008) composition of the population in the United States is White non-Hispanic 67%, African Hispanic 15%, American 12%, Asian and Pacific Islander 5%, and American Indian 1%. In 2100, American society will not be any longer a white society with these rates, White non-Hispanic 40%, Hispanic 33%, Asian and other 14%, and African Americans13% (Schaefer Richard). However, the increase of multiracial people outshines even this prediction. Racial marriage rates have increased along the generations of immigrants, and the case of third-generation of Hispanics is expected to reach up to 57%.
As taking these circumstances into consideration, this book gives strength to face diversity with pride. The stories are both heartwarming and heart breaking because confrontations along racial, ethnic, or religious lines can lead to extermination, expulsion, secession, segregation, fusion, assimilation, or pluralism. The racial issues are associated with various human rights and political and economic policies in a macroscopic look and personal relationships in a microscopic look.
Therefore, there are racial reconciliation needs as well collectively. No one is willing to make troubles with racial issues as endemic here because of a painful long history, but development comes through overcoming difficulties. My daughter is Korean American and her boyfriend is Brazilian American, but she seems to not worry about anything regarding racial differences. Her young and innocent mind only sees a person beyond skin color. This simple mindset must be our dearest wish that has been argued in a large scale of race, ethnicity, culture, politics, or religion for a long time.
==============
Wolran Kim
November 2012
A book, Blended Nation, is composed of portraits and interviews of Mixed-Race Americans as the subtitle says. The title, blended nation and the words mixed-race suggest many similar words to my mind such as melting pot, salad bowl, mixed blood, half-breed, and multiculturism. Mike Tauber took photographs and interviewed shoots portraiture, documentary and location/architectural imagery for editorial and commercial clients from his base in New York. His career in photography was inspired by the study of anthropology and environmental science in college and in Tanzania and was reinforced by his yearlong travels throughout Africa, Asia, Australia, and the South Pacific after graduating. Besides Tauber, Pamela Singh was co-producer, Ann Curry wrote the foreword, Rebecca Walker wrote the introduction, and Alan Goodman wrote the essay in this book.
Half of this book is filled with 66 individual or family photos and the other half is depicting their candid minds about their identities through interviews. Those photos and interviews contain their past, present, and future, of those living as complex races in the reality of the United States. Adia Hoag, who is living in Long Beach, states the theme of this book, “In 1980 I was White (at under a year old I had no real pigment yet, so my mother is), in 1990 I was Black, and in 2000, thanks to a lot of lobbying, I was finally me: mixed.”
In the 2000 U.S. Census, for the first time, multiracial individuals were allowed to indicate more than one race, and nearly seven million Americans did so. Blended Nation features individuals from this rapidly growing demographic of mixed race Americans across the country that identify as more than one race. Mike Tauber and Pamela Singh explore the concept of race in America through the prism of the very personal experiences of people of mixed race heritage.
How should we define race and who should define it? According to “Ten things everyone should know about Race” by California Newsreel, race is a modern idea, has no genetic basis, has no human subspecies exist, is from slavery predates, evolved with freedom, justified social inequalities as natural, and is not biological, but is still real. Skin color really is only skin deep and color-blindness will not end racism. Our eyes tell us that people look different, and no one has trouble distinguishing a Czech from a Chinese. But what do those differences mean? Why has race always been with us and always affects people? Genetically we are all the same. Society has carved out categories in which to classify people so that it can better understand itself.
In the foreword, Ann Curry says that we are the new face of America and its noble ideals of equality and freedom. She is half Asian and half Caucasian, and her father told her, “You are the best of both worlds.” Rebecca Walker says in her introduction, “Out heritage is vase. We contain multitudes. Human history belongs to all of us. Each of us is entitled to claim its riches. And each of us is responsible for what we do with is wealth.” Alan H. Goodman says in her essay that race is not a human genetic variation. There is no scientific justification beyond convenience and maintenance of the status quo to continue to racialize human biological variation. Real human suffering may result from poor conceptualization of human variation. Many scholars-individuals who spend their lives studying race have also been dazed and confused.
The participants in this book are members of a new blended nation, one that seems possible with globalization and tolerance. The protagonist of the first photo, half Indian (Bombay, Goa) and half White (Jewish Russian-Romanian), Ananda says that she feels like an American who has an Indian heritage. Her sister, Rehana says that she feels more White than Indian but she has always been proud of her Indian heritage and feels that it has brought color and spice to her life. Phoenix Blackhorse who is five-eighths Native American (Cherokee, Lakota, Blackfoot), quarter African American, one-eighth French and Caribbean, says he is commonly called a Native American though that’s not what they commonly refer to themselves. His elders were the most influential in the creation of his comprehension of self, and his lessons also included what all other people are, so he has a better sense of being than most. He can refrain from passing judgment on those whom he has no understanding about. It’s a shame that others don’t do the same.
Kelly Ogilvie who is half Asian (Japanese), one-eighth Asian (Filipino), three-eighths White (German, French, Spanish) says that the general influences of society have shaped his own self-image to an extent. Sarah Haas who is quarter Asian (Indonesian), three-quarters White (Dutch, German, Lithuanian) says that she is glad that people cannot so easily define her. But she finds it sad that society perpetuates the need to fit people into narrowly defined categories. Tamiko who is half White (Irish, English), quarter African American, quarter Native American says she lives an adapted life where she can speak many languages and move through cultures like gliding on ice. She is waiting for the world to catch up with her. Frances Kao who is half Asian (Chinese, Korean), half White (Sicilian, Italian) says: “Until there is a box that reads Korean, Chinese, Italian American, I’ll continue to tick the OTHER box.”
We all are used to seeing skin color first before we see the color of the person. We are accustomed to view the personality and abilities of the individual which are already colored. This is not different from us seeing through colored eyeglasses because the world looks the same as the color of our glasses. Society has played a role in the sense of racial identity, but individual freedom and intention are explored differently to seek the side of the creative world. Kim Hunter who is half White (German), half Black says that denying who you are is always worse. So many of our educational, social, business and governmental policies are based on fixed racial categories.
Researchers say that as the number of interracial marriages increases, so does the level of social acceptance and awareness about multiracialism. One out of seven pairs is married to other racial or ethnic spouses, and multiracial marriages are at 9 percent in the United States. This has increased twice during the past 20 years and is surging to a major shift in the demographic view. According to U.S. Census estimates, multiracial Americans have become one of the country’s fastest growing demographic groups. Nicholas Jones, chief of the U.S. Census Bureau's Racial Statistics Branch, says the number of mixed-race individuals has increased about 25 percent since the 2000 census. "These are mainly driven by births of children from interracial parent couples," he says. The U.S. Census Bureau estimated that 35 percent of the total population is half-blood, and inter-racial boundaries are crumbling fast according to the skyrocketing of mixed race in American society.
Israel Zangwill wrote a play Melting Pot when over 18 million immigrants came from Italy, Germany, Ireland, and Eastern Europe to the United States between 1890 and 1920. This concept has been accepted to explain the American society for a long time that one American newly born out of the melting pot contains American values such as democracy, freedom, and the responsibility of all kinds of immigrants. However, this theory lost power since the black-and-white confrontation in the 1960s and the massive influx of immigrants from Latin America and Asia in the 1970s and 1980s.
The first wave of immigrants of the 20th century had a strong willingness to assimilate to the ruling class, Anglo-Saxon’s Protestant culture, and it was possible. But the second wave of immigrants and black people who have completely different faces and cultures did not assimilate into white American society, because the alienation from whites with superiority emphasized the unique identity, and tendency of avoiding exchanges. Thereupon, the ‘salad bowl’ theory has emerged. United States formed one society in harmony with multi-racial and multi-ethnic culture without losing the individuality. However, in reality, there were also objections that the integration has not made better and all ingredients playing apart and not mingling as a bad salad.
Americans’ mixed race increased the four times from 500,000 in 1970 to 2 million in 1990, and research has predicted it to reach 21 percent in 2050. The current (2008) composition of the population in the United States is White non-Hispanic 67%, African Hispanic 15%, American 12%, Asian and Pacific Islander 5%, and American Indian 1%. In 2100, American society will not be any longer a white society with these rates, White non-Hispanic 40%, Hispanic 33%, Asian and other 14%, and African Americans13% (Schaefer Richard). However, the increase of multiracial people outshines even this prediction. Racial marriage rates have increased along the generations of immigrants, and the case of third-generation of Hispanics is expected to reach up to 57%.
As taking these circumstances into consideration, this book gives strength to face diversity with pride. The stories are both heartwarming and heart breaking because confrontations along racial, ethnic, or religious lines can lead to extermination, expulsion, secession, segregation, fusion, assimilation, or pluralism. The racial issues are associated with various human rights and political and economic policies in a macroscopic look and personal relationships in a microscopic look.
Therefore, there are racial reconciliation needs as well collectively. No one is willing to make troubles with racial issues as endemic here because of a painful long history, but development comes through overcoming difficulties. My daughter is Korean American and her boyfriend is Brazilian American, but she seems to not worry about anything regarding racial differences. Her young and innocent mind only sees a person beyond skin color. This simple mindset must be our dearest wish that has been argued in a large scale of race, ethnicity, culture, politics, or religion for a long time.