to hate it when people refer to their duel heritage children as.....

[Parachute2011]

1/3 of this, 1/4 of that, 3/4 of the other. People are people and I hate to hear them being referred to like slices of pizza. If someone is going to be racist to you, they would ask if your grandfather was Swiss before insulting you.

I do think that the many cultures that are part of the child's life should be celebrated. But IMO referring to a child or adult as anything less than a whole person is insulting.

I also wonder about the British thing. Do people describe themselves as British if they're not a bit posh and/or of a mixed heritage?

Why do people use British, rather than English/Scottish/Welsh?

DP said this vey thing irritated him last night. I asked him what he would describe me as, as my father is half Bangladeshi and my mother is white British. I think, for me, that when people talk about their heritage it is because they are proud if it. I certainly grew up saying I am 1/4 Bangladeshi. That came from me working it out as a child, like someone else said up thread.

It is something that I very much feel is part of my identity. Its where I come from genetically speaking and I feel as though it ties me in to something bigger than myself. Saying that, I wouldn't tell my children they were an eighth Bangladeshi, if they asked I would say their great grandfather was Bangladeshi and leave it at that. If they chose to categorise themselves then I wouldn't stop them

I am 1/8 Belgian.

It doesn't mean I only think of myself as 1/8 of a person, merely that I am 7/8 something else and 1/8 Belgian.

The Belgian bit is important to me, in my head as important as the 7/8 bit.

A person's genetic background can affect their health, skin, hair etc, so, whilst i agree that people are people, they can refere to themselves however they find useful.

I have the same strain of Lupus that my GF and half his family had (Native American). Everytime i take my DM to hospital, they think that she has jaundice, i have to explain that is her natural colour, although she has very blue eyes. My DD's are very dark and were born with the type of dry skin condition that NA's are born with, so although we are UK born, we are not UK genetic heritage, so i am not going to describe myself as such, to suit other people.

DH's heritage is so mixed he just puts 'other' these days.
In fact when he filled out the census online, it took him so long to choose the most approximate classification, it had timed him out of the system!

Yup definitely over thinking it OP.

Aren't we all mixed race if we're going to be literal about it? Even the most "English" person will be mixed race if you go back far enough: Vikings, Romans, Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Celts, Norman etc etc. And that's just some of those who came here. People moved around and with a single person 1000 years ago begetting(sp??) thousands of deacendents we are all pretty mixed.

I'm a bit of this and a bit of that. Which means I usually have a whole lot of teams to support when the World Cup or olympics come around. ;)

MillyR- I classify myself as British, I am from Britain, and live in Britain, and I see myself as British before English (though I am white, and was born in England to parents also born in England)

Are you a bit posh?

its not about making yourself sound more interesting, its where you are from!

ive never called it dual heritage before, just family from all over. I also spent ages asking questions and trying to work out what % i was from talking to family members too. cant believe how any one could see this is a negative light !

YABU
My son is half english and half Moroccan. He's not half a person, but he has parents from two very different countries, cultures and ethnicities. So he's half and half. He has british nationality and speaks english, he will grow up culturally english, so his half moroccanness is pretty important to his father, and hopefully to him as he grows up.

Mixed race is fine, by the way. Dual heritage is public sector wankery (and I'm a social worker) IMO. My H is mixed heritage and mixed race. He has one parent who is pure Arab and one parent who is culturally Sahrawi - a culture which is mixed in itself, with elements of Arab, berber and sub saharan african culture. Ethnically his father is black african and his mother is arab. My son is mixed. He is not dual heritage, he has many different heritages in his immediate background.

I've never heard anyone use the term dual heritage in real life, in fact I've only ever seen it in a little booklet of pc terms we were given at work years ago. Have only ever heard people use the term mixed race, can see nothing wrong with saying half or quarter, it's purely descriptive.

We're all the same according to the 'out of africa' theorists.

And i'm happy with that.

Some people like to be more recent with their genealogical past and attach labels.

And i'm happy with that.

:)

Your son is LOVELY, Eric :)

CaptainNancy - it sounds like we're much the same, being from white British backgrounds, but unlike you I would always describe myself as English before British. British is for bureaucracy, English is for me.

EricNorthmansMistress - thank you for officially sanctioning 'dual heritage' as public sector wankery Do you think I can afford to stop using it now that I have the final adoption order?

I think you're overthinking it. My children asked once if we were entirely white British. My great grandmother came from Poland, so I said they were 1/16 non-British. They were terribly proud of this and spent several weeks telling everyone they met.
They also have 1/8 unknown but I didn't go into that with them, so maybe 3/16 other!
I would still just put white British on forms.

Hahaha Hester now that he/she is yours I think you can start ditching the wankery using whatever terms you feel appropriate! I only use it on forms and I use mixed heritage anyway as the dual part is completely misleading in most cases. Actually I ask the young people how they describe their identity and most of the time the mixed race ones say mixed race...so that's what I put!

Thanks Evil

Why does it bother you so much? Do you actually have a mixed race child? and lol at duel (sic) heritage

My dd1 thinks her sister has jewel heritage. (I wish.)

I agree, OP. More surprising that everyone's leaping on the band wagon of "you must be racist".

"Why do people use British, rather than English/Scottish/Welsh?"

I use British because my parents are immigrants to this country. When I was a child I couldn't use the term English without being 'put right' by some friend/teacher/parent so I stopped using it.

My friend's dad told me I could be British because 'anyone' can be British. Not sure that was kindly meant but I kind of like the sentiment so that's what I am.

My grandparents were Polish, German, Spanish and Italian respectively, so if pushed I describe myself as a mongrel of European descent. My family are definitely outbreeders .

Dual heritage sounds like you are an aristocrat who inherited 2 castles!
Mixed race makes more sense as a term & is only 2 syllables :-D .

People can't actually know percentages for sure without having it checked.

You are about 50% of each parent, but not necessarily 25% of each grandparent. This is because the DNA you pass on to your children doesn't need to contain a 50:50 mix of each of your parents DNA.

Tell them this and they might stop doing it...

(so in answer to previous points, it's perfectly possible to be 1/3 of one grandparent, which would mean you are also 1/6 of their spouse)

Since when was mixed race derogatory?

It's what I call myself and the children (even though they have White skin).