Ethnicity questions from in-laws!!

[Funinthesun20]

My in-laws don’t seem to understand my ethnicity and mostly “where my curly hair comes from?” And that of the kids curly hair and the fact that they tan easily!!

Background: So, I identify (mostly because I look) as a white woman with thick light brown curly hair. My kids (3) one is curly dark haired, two are blonde/light brown looser curls.

My grandad was a black man (Jamaican) , married an Irish white woman, and my dad and aunts and they are light skin but mixed race. My dad married a white woman and had 3 children. We are all light/white skinned but all with brown curly hair.

You could say that we (My dad, me and my siblings are “racially ambiguous looking” as in we are white with something going on!! 😛

My in laws met my grandad a couple of time when he was alive. But after 10 years it still baffles them that he is my grandfather!!
They are by no means racist, more ignorant I guess.

To be honest, since I have been wearing my hair curly (to help the kids love their curls, I needed to love mine and show them that their hair is beautiful) it’s become a thing to comment on, as I guess I do look more ethnic.
Asking “is it natural” “where does that come from?” “How do you get it so curly”

When my brother came home from travelling he had let his hair grow to a full hair of beautiful brown sun kissed curls and he was so unbelievably tanned! And they couldn’t get their heads around it when they saw pictures of him. Again, not in a racist way more in a completely oblivious way as to why he is able to tan so well!

I was blunt with them on Easter Sunday, after they commented on my hair and the kids hair as to where my hair comes from. I just kind of shouted out, well my grandad was black wasn’t he!!
My husband is completely on my side and said i wasn't rude, but firm.
He also doesn’t seem to get why they are so fascinated and perplexed as to how genetics work, and how my grandfather can be black but I am white!
He has spoken them about it and reiterated that my her grandfather was black.

I don’t even know where I’m going with this post! It’s weird for me as I am in all sense a white woman. So I don’t think they can or are being racist to me as I am white like them? (I hope that makes sense?)

I would be the same as OP’s children in that my great grandfather is of another race to myself.

My great grandfather was a white Scottish man who married a black Jamaican woman.
Their son, my granddad, went on to marry a maroon ( part indigenous Jamaican part black African) woman.

My mum and her siblings varied in skin tone and although they spoke about their white Scottish grandfather they never referred to themselves as mixed race.

I always refer to myself as black, I may discuss my heritage if it comes up and would be interested if someone in the family traced our white Scottish heritage but I would never claim to be mixed race.

One of my kids is much much fairer than the other and myself, with a much looser curl pattern but if anyone was to ask I’d just explain there is a mixed heritage in the family. In the Caribbean perhaps it it more widely recognised that most if not all have some mixed heritage.

So how many generations before you feel it would be appropriate to say you are what you look?
Should Ian Duncan smith say he is mixed race because his great grandparent is Japanese?

@aurynne

Obama was mixed race, but looks black, so everyone called him black.

Exactly.

And the OP is mixed race but looks white so why are some people not wanting to call her white?

It's a bit ridiculous calling yourself mixed race when the world can see you are white. Much like it's a bit 🙄calling yourself mixed race if you are full on black.

Of course you can tell people about your full heritage but people refer to themselves by what they look like. Frankly it would be ridiculous for these people to call themselves anything other than white even if they happily discuss their mixed heritage when talking fully on the topic much as a you might discuss having French, Welsh and English heritage but not list that everytime the subject comes up.

Seb Coe 1/4 Punjabi
Tahmoh Penniket 1/2 First Nation people (see image)
Pete Wentz 1/2 Jamaican
Halsey 1/2 black (see image)
Mark-Paul Gosselar 1/2 Indonesian (see image)
Emilia Clarke 1/8 Indian
Isn't Duncan Smith 1/8 Japanese

It's not for people to have to qualify their colour. If they look white then they are white.

Biologically speaking race does not exist. So calling someone by a colour is literally stating what colour they are.

sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2017/science-genetics-reshaping-race-debate-21st-century/

scienceandsociety.duke.edu/does-race-exist/#:~:text=Biologically%20speaking%2C%20race%20does%20not,of%20race%20certainly%20does%20exist.

Stephen Graham has a Jamaican grandfather

It wouldn't be an issue if her in laws didn't make such a big deal of sounding mystified that she snd their grandchildren have curly hair!

@ggggggooooo

Do you really believe that people call themselves a different race due to the fact that they look like a specific colour (e.g., a mixed race person calling themselves white because they look white). It runs much deeper than that. Forget that race is biologically construct and put that to one side. When people call themselves white, they are inferring that they are associated with a particular culture of people. Whether you like to admit it or not and OP said the same (I associated with being white because I haven't experienced the racism that black people / mixed people face). If a mixed race person calls themselves white, one assumes that they are referring themselves to a particular group of people who share similar cultural characteristics, not only looks, eg., both parents are European.

It is very very common for mixed heritage people (mixed race or whatever you want to call it) to disassociate with their "ethnic side", usually black, Indian, etc due to negative connotations. There is research that suggests that mixed heritage children of white single mothers experience identify issues (not surprising considering some of the comments that the white mothers of mixed race children have commented on this board about not teaching their children their multi heritage ). Racism or (inherent racism) comes to light when the white passing mixed heritage person starts to look a bit ethnic (in OP's case).

Thank you for explaining what it is to be mixed race.

I don't know how I have survived for the past 56 years as a biracial person without the benefit of your wisdom.

I also don't know how I have worked in the diversity space for the past 15 years without the benefit if your extraordinary knowledge and wisdom 🙄🙄🙄

A biracial person calling themselves white (with a fully black/Asian etc paren) might signify some identity issues or something, sure.

But I cannot grasp how a woman with one black grandparent should call herself mixed race if she (a) looks white and (b) identifies more with the English side of her heritage.

Her grandfather may not have even had a strong African or Caribbean culture if he grew up here decades ago and felt the need to conform to be accepted into society. Who knows?

Do you not think there are plenty of black families, with one fairly recent white ancestor, who still consider themselves black?

OP - long thread now, but practically, I think maybe I'd just address it with your ILs directly.

I might be inclined to ask your husband, if you haven't, what he thinks is going on. And ask yourself, are these people generally good with words? A lot of people aren't and it makes a huge differernce to how they express themselves on topics others might seem as sensitive. Some families are very blunt about talking about physical appearance in general in a way other families never would.

But mainly I'd just take one of them aside, or wait till you are alone, and ask what's up, and that it makes you feel a little uncomfortable. It might become clear that, like a pp suggested, they are a bit out of it and really aren't remembering the connection, in which case I'd drop it. But if not maybe it will be a chance to clear up what they are really asking, or for them to see that it's making you feel unhappy.

Peter Davidson had a black father, IIRC - at one point he said he was the first black Dr Who, when they were making a big deal about it being Jo Martin. I don't think people took the idea that he was black very seriously though.

In my experience, people are somewhat more likely to call themselves mixed if they grew up in a household that was actually mixed culturally, or where the parents were differernt races - regardless of how they child in question looks. I think it's pretty obvious that's because they experience rowing up in some kind of mixed cultural setting.

But with a grandparent, much less a great-grandparent, often that connection doesn't really exist, so it's very much academic. Like genealogical research, rather than an experience of a particular ethnic background directly.

They are racist, and ignorant, and also incredibly rude to discuss physical features of other human beings as if you were bloodstock.

@secular37

But she is denying a part of her heritage- and it is always the "black side"

This is just nonsense.
No one is calling the following people white and denying the black side least of all they themselves. The idea that it's always the black side that is denied is frankly ridiculous

People who look white and white have lived a life where society have considered them white are likely to consider themselves whilte. Just as people who look black or obviously partly black who have lived a life where society have considered them black are likely to consider themselves black.

Bob Marley
Obama
Kamala Harris
Halle Berry
Lenny Kravitz
Thandiwe Newton
Zendaya
Mel B

I can't even be bothered going on.