Black AND Brown, Brown AND Black
Thinking about Americans in traditional boxes is overly simplistic in 2024, including for Kamala Harris, who is multiracial — both Black and South Asian.
Issue #80
Hi all —
In a July interview with Black journalists, former President Donald Trump questioned Vice President Kamala Harris’ racial identity: “I didn’t know she was Black until a number of years ago, when she happened to turn Black, and now she wants to be known as Black. So I don’t know, is she Indian or is she Black?”
Later in August, in Harris’ first TV interview since she had become the Democratic nominee, CNN’s Dana Bash asked her about Trump’s comments. Harris brushed it aside, saying: “Same old, tired playbook. Next question, please.”
Of course Trump’s attacks are absurdly false: Harris has long acknowledged her multiracial background, as the daughter of an Indian mother and Jamaican father, both first-generation Americans.
But it’s clear during this campaign season, even the Harris-Walz campaign is not engaging much in conversations about Harris’ identity as a woman or person of color, Harris implying in interviews that it’s implicit, while also asserting the true measure of a political candidate is based on their professional qualifications.
But Harris’ multiracial identity is worth discussing, because it directly represents demographic shifts in the United States, as more and more Americans themselves are multiracial.
Clearly, American politics haven’t caught up with that, the discourse largely focusing on Harris as Black and South Asian as mostly singular parts of her identity and not a unique combination of her own life experiences being raised primarily by an Indian woman in largely Black communities. Cable TV news pundits talk about Black voters and Latino voters as singular groups (rarely, if ever, mentioning Asian voters, by the way).
The Wall Street Journal recently published a solid story on multiracialism in American politics, stating:
The categories familiar to recent generations—white, Black, Asian, Native American, Native Hawaiian and Hispanic—are dissolving rapidly, yielding to more fluid and complex identities that researchers and politicians are struggling to understand.
By one definition, the U.S. multiracial population surged from nine million to almost 34 million from 2010 to 2020, or from about 3% to more than 10% of the population, according to the Census Bureau.
Also, from the Red, White and Brown archive, check out this interview with scholar Hannah H. Kim on the complexities of multiracial identity in America today.
Monoracial normativity is this cultural assumption we have that the “normal” or “default” way to be is to have one race. So either you’re an Asian, or you’re Black, or you’re white, or these are just kind of the normal, default ways to be — such that when people don’t fit that box neatly they become like this other thing.
…
The biggest problem with monoracial normativity is that it tries to understand multiracial identity through the lens of monoracial categories. That gets in the way of multiracial people trying to really understand themselves on their own terms.
Even years after the first multiracial president, Barack Obama, it is clear we still need to reinvigorate a mostly ignored conversation about multiracial identities in American politics.
Thanks for reading,
Vignesh
TONIGHT: Book event in the Bay Area
This year, author Nina Sharma published her memoir, “The Way You Make Me Feel: Love in Black and Brown,” which is a collection of essays reflecting on her life through the lenses of identity, her interracial relationship and her mental health.
Join Sharma, Indian Matchmaking’s Vyasar Ganesan (from the very first season of the hit Netflix show) and I for a discussion at Books Inc. Palo Alto on Thursday, Oct. 24 at 7 p.m. Pacific.
We hope to see attendees from various generations who want to chat about and better understand dating, relationships and marriage discussions across our communities.
What’s your name story?
This is a long-term project, so we still want to hear from you as we chronicle stories about names in South Asian American communities. If you (or anyone you know) is interested in sharing a story about your name, feel free to call or text us at 347-470-0064 or fill out this online form. Nothing will be published until we speak with you and get your consent. (Thanks to everyone who has already shared!)
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