two world Archives - The Race Card Project

Three months more, would they ask?

July 15, 2022July 15, 2022 AZ, child, father, German, mixed, mother, multiracial, name, Nina Martin, Phoenix, two world, what are you

Nina Martin
Phoenix, AZ

I am quietly proud of my multiracial background: my mother is Chinese, and my father is half German, half American. I also look absolutely nothing like my mother, save for straight hair and slightly tanner skin. While never a negative issue, this has led to some interesting situations since the time I was little: being the only “white” person in family photos among my Chinese cousins; having a substitute call another, Asian girl when my mother came to pick me up from school; my mother joking that people would think she was the nanny, or I was adopted.

I was also born three months premature, and for a while I have wondered what those three months would have given me. Would I look more “Asian” ? Would people no longer puzzle over my face, and ask me almost instantly “What are you” ? Would Cantonese flow off my tongue like water, rather than bricks as it does now?

Would I still feel the same?

To some degree, my childhood was filled with ambiguity. I knew our family was different, that I was different, and that was OK, but it becomes even harder to figure out who you are when you sit in the gray regions between two worlds. But it is the very lack of definition that has given me the freedom to explore exactly who I am, and also gives me the perspective to look at people who are different from me and find the common threads.

Those three months didn’t take anything away from me: they gave me who I am today. I chose my career in public health because I can help bring longer, healthier lives to people across the world; I fight to make a difference now because I came into this world fighting.

Not white enough and too white.

November 14, 2017 Central Texas, culture, dallas, female, Home, human, labels, life, Maritza Aviles de Garcia, norms, outside, Puerto Rican, sheltered, too white, two world, two worlds, TX, white, white enough, white folks

Maritza Aviles de Garcia,
Dallas, TX.

My entire life has been spent walking between two worlds, the predominantly white world outside of my home, and the watered-down Puerto Rican culture of my home. Growing in Central Texas, there were three Puerto Rican families. We were one of them. I translated for my parents whether they liked it or not. It made white people realize that if I was smart enough as a kid to translate between two languages, then my parents must be smart too. Some folks would change the way they treated my parents. I witnessed this as a child in the eighties.

As I got older, identity became more complicated. People were looking for clear-cut labels. On more than several occasions, I was asked, “What are you?” My response, “I’m a human female.” (I was a trekkie at heart.) No one liked that answer. When they persisted, I explained they were asking the wrong question. I’m not a “what,” I’m a “who.”

So to sheltered white folks, I wasn’t white enough. I was exotic. To everyone else, including other Puerto Ricans, I was white. I never belonged. It still kinda hurts me to say that. I wasn’t actively trying to defy societal norms regarding race and culture. It was pretty obvious to me when the lines were being drawn.

I also had issues with forms. Hispanic is not a race, it’s a culture. No, it’s a label for a group of people who speak Spanish. Spanish speakers come from different countries with diverse cultures and dialects. No one wanted to hear that back then.

Now I’m forty. Has anything changed? Yes. Those who love indiscriminately are more numerous than before. More voices speaking out all at once can’t be easily silenced.

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