Diane Lee ~ ASA 115 ~ Week 1 Readings

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The readings for week one addresses various topics such as the mixing of races, identity, and categorization. This week's readings connects to the theme: Introduction  Race Traitors and Art Production, The (In)visible Monster-Mutant and Eugenics by revealing how being mixed race comes with discrimination, confusion, subjection, and identity exploration. Being mixed race myself, I could relate with incidents of when others would group me into a race that I did not belong to. Plus, there were times when I felt that I could not embrace being mixed. In one of the readings, “An Invisible Monster: The Creation and Denial of Mixed-Race People in America” written by Cynthia L. Nakashima discusses the harsh history of being mixed race and hybrid degeneracy. Nakashima clearly states that the theory of hybrid degeneracy is the assertion that multiracial people “are genetically inferior to both (or all) their...races” (165). The author seems to uncover that even though hybrid degeneracy was a past “widely accepted theory” (165), the concept plays a role in the subjection, confusion, and identity exploration of mixed race individuals. Multiracial people were seen as inferior and unnatural as well as seen as better than their monoracial counterparts and attractive. All of the experiences of multiracial people seem to pressure these individuals to “choose”. Whether that decision is to belong to one race, identify with an entirely different race from their own parents, or become “groupless”(177) depends on the person and reflects how in society the categorization of race is not supportive of multiracial people. I wonder if there was more support for multiracial people would there be less pressure to “choose”?