The Race Card Project
By Michele Norris
Beatriz McConnie Zapater,
Jamaica Plain, MA.
I am Puerto Rican with white, indigenous, Spanish, and African ancestry. When I hear that I do not look Puerto Rican, I ask the person, “How many Puerto Ricans do you know?”.
Daniel,
Charlotte, NC.
I do not want to say what country I am from, because I want you all to guesstimate my ancestry? Where would you say I am from? What part of the world do my features reflect? Please explain your responses! Please share your thoughts with me.
I am NOT from the U.S.A.
I am NOT from Canada.
I am NOT from South America.
I am not from the Americas.
Candance W Reaves,
Seymour, TN
I may look like I’m only a Scots Irish woman. I’m not. There’s a story in my ancestry that says someone in the past was African American. I hope it’s not a sad one.
Mary Jo Latham-Martin,
Houston, TX
After being diagnosed with Essential Tremor, and being told it was hereditary, I started on a quest to learn about the father I never knew. My mom would never talk about him. I did genealogy and DNA testing and found he was a white boy from Kentucky, who was a sailor in WWII. My mom was a Marine and they met in San Diego. The DNA testing showed I have African ancestry. That was a big – but pleasant – surprise for a white girl. Pleasant because I’ve had many Black friends over the years; one of whom told me that that explained why I was so cool.
What wasn’t so pleasant was learning that I had slave-owning ancestors on both sides of my family. That made my heart sink, but it’s likely not that unusual for people with colonial American ancestry. I know I had nothing to do with that, but it pained me to discover that slaves in the early census data were only described by sex and age. It still hurts when I think of that. So, that part of my ancestry is a mystery I’ll never solve.
Adrienne Zimiga,
Minneapolis, MN.
I was born and raised on the Pine Ridge reservation my first 12 years. Upon moving from Batesland, SD to Castlewood, SD my caucasian grandmother was concerned that my brothers, sister, and I could face social problems being part Native American (iyeska: mixed blood/race) in an all white community. She told us “Now you don’t have to go around telling everyone here that you’re Indians. Besides your just enough to make you look pretty.” It was a very confusing statement for me as an adolescent. I came from a place where I was very proud to be who I was as a person and now I have my own grandmother telling me it may be best to keep it under wraps that “Indian” part of me. Anyone who knows me knows THAT will never happen. I’m very proud of my ancestry, my culture, my heritage, and my connection to it. It is the driving force that has made me the person I am today.
Leah Wilson,
Moreno Valley, CA
I’ve lived too long to have personal issues with another person’s race. Went thru trying to identify my mixed racial ancestry. I just look at the person that presents their identity to me in their word and actions.
Taylor Butts,
Chesapeake, VA.
I’m Black. Completely. I’ve tried to trace my ancestry but couldn’t get very far. I’m very light skinned and “talk white” aka speak proper english so I don’t always fit in with my fellow African Americans but my hair never matched the white girls. Needless to say, I had a hard time finding my place in the world until I became at peace with who I am and whatever it is I’m made of!
Luis Toro,
Denver, CO.
They try to tell us Hispanics are either white or black but my family’s ancestry is definitely Native American, we even know what tribes.
Isabella Evans,
Seaford, VA
Growing up I did not know much about my family tree. I only knew a select amount of my family. Digging further, I found out I have a Iranian great uncle on my mothers side and two half Iranian second cousins. On my fathers side, I have a German grandmother and a German great grandmother who are still around. Knowing I have different races in my family tree has told me so much about my family history and encouraged me to learn more about their past and experiences.
Lily,
Lake Forest, CA.
Currently taking Biological Anthropology and am finding it both fascinating and eye-opening. My six words are an excerpt from Lady Gaga’s song “Born This Way”. It probably looks corny or, perhaps, cliché but I did put some thought into it!
When I had first heard those lyrics, I had to research the validity because I had not studied human DNA before. Finding-out that we (humans) are fundamentally identical was relieving. I also learned that individuals that are closest to the equator tend to be darker skinned and skin tone becomes lighter the farther one’s self or ancestry is away from the equator. With the knowledge that we are fundamentally identical and skin color is based on your latitude, do you think more people would be more accepting to other races and not be too quick to pass judgment?
Candace,
USA
I am white. I hold ancestry from several European countries but identify strongest with my Italian side. I am proud to be third generation Italian American. I grew up knowing and loving my nonna who was born in Italy and devouring the stories of my family who fled to the United States as refugees under the Mussolini regime. I have cousins who still live there. I speak and love the Italian language. I have traditions. I have stories. I have food. My Italian last name is constantly mispronounced. My eyebrows are thick and my hair is curly. People ask to touch it, a lot. My skin is white but distinctly olive. My eyes are hazel green. I’m frequently asked “what are you?”, called exotic, and I’ve had a racial slur or two dropped about me. But wait…..those things are micro aggressions right? Nah. Turns out it’s not a micro aggression if the answer to “what are you?” is something European. But my least favorite comment of all? It’s the people who have never met me who want to erase my history and just call me “white” aka boring, bland, the oppressor, the one with no culture. White is a skin tone, and a very subjective one. Of course there’s no culture, because white isn’t a culture! We have the same rich diversity of nationalities as any other race. I am proud to support anti-racism and social equity, I’m proud to listen and amplify the voices of my BIPOC friends and neighbors. I’m proud to live in an America working so hard to stamp out institutionalized racism and celebrate diversity. And you know what? I am equally proud of my family history, because it’s a part of that diversity. I’m so much more than just “white”.
Melissa U.,
Charlotte, NC.
My Taino people would love me, from my plump lips to my curly hair. My African people would love me from the rhythm in my hips to the powerful thoughts in my mind. My Spanish people, they might deny me, but I can’t deny them. They are in my language, they are on my skin. They took over my ancestry, and hijacked my history. They came in as unsolicited “saviours,” and attempted to rob us, but we are resilience. Our roots run strong and deep. I ask myself, “should I identify with you?” And in this manner they attempt to grab hold of me, and control me, but they cannot. I am free. Though I must accept their language as my own, my soul is AFRO LATINA. It runs through my veins and propels me forward through anything that may come my way.
Creytisha Gray,
Lubbock, TX
After centuries my ancestors being stripped from my Homeland, I have no idea where I, nor my ancestors are from. The only clues I get are through DNA ancestry (which does not tell me where exactly my ancestors settled). No traditions, values, religion, or even language is known to me about my people.
Paper Genocide,
Pinnacle, NC.
Pictured: Monacan Indian Children at Recess
How Jim Crow Practiced Paper Genocide Against Native American Indians.
Jim Crow laws were a set of oppressive laws that reclassified Native American Indians into the category of Colored.
Jim Crow reached their greatest influence during the decades of 1910, 1920, and 1930.
Among them were hypodescent laws, defining as black anyone with suspected black ancestry, or even those with a very small portion of black ancestry. Tennessee adopted such a “one-drop” statute in 1910, and Louisiana soon followed. Then Texas and Arkansas in 1911, Mississippi in 1917, North Carolina in 1923.
Fact: the State of North Carolina vital records began using the one drop rule law in labeling Indians Colored BEFORE Walter Plecker initiated it in Virginia.
Birth records were also “delayed” in states enforcing the one drop rule, they were filed late to make these oppressive racial changes. The Virginia law which allowed for delayed birth registration declared its own purpose differently; its formal title was “An Act to Preserve Racial Integrity,”and it went into effect in 1924, this also occurred in North Carolina as well as in other states. Virginia began the one drop rule in 1924, Alabama and Georgia in 1927, and Oklahoma in 1931.
During this same period, Florida, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, and Utah retained their old “blood fraction” statutes de jure, but amended these fractions (one-sixteenth, one-thirty-second) to be equivalent to one-drop de facto.
The one drop rule was overturned in 1967 by the U.S. Supreme Court, the one drop rule is illegal.
But before this time many Native American Indians were not allowed by law to claim a legal status as Indian due to white vital records officials and census takers enforcing the one drop rule and through government records suppressed an Indians Native blood ancestry on official documents. So when people ask why didn’t Natives have records changed back to Indian?
A law prevented this from being done, and any Indian born before 1967 who wasn’t living on a government regulated Indian reservation, or in a community with a massive Indian population was forcefully listed as Colored by vital records offices.
We are not Black We are not White We Are Not Latino
Juanita Duran-Wilson,
Arcata, CA.
Kimmberlie Sims
Mobile, AL
Alexandra Vogt
Crofton, MD
Because I was not raised in the Jewish faith, I feel unable to claim my ancestry on my father’s side the way I do with the family history on my mother’s side (Norwegian immigrants.) I wish there were commonly used terms that differentiated Jewish ethnicity from the religion.
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