Janine Nguyen ASA 115 Week 1 Readings

Janine Nguyen
ASA 115 001
Week 1 Reading Blog


Throughout Week 1, we largely discussed the concepts of race traitors and the divide that multiracial people feel both physically and mentally in their identities and livelihoods. With race traitors in particular, histories of those who are mixed race are commonly associated with tragedies. The psychology of being mixed race is depicted as being mentally unstable, confused, and not knowing where one fits. Race is a social construct formed by dominant powers during the period of colonization when conquerors enslaved Africans on basis that lighter-skinned folks were superior to darker-skinned folks. Eugenics is defined as how one's traits are linked to scientific justifications that lighter-skinned groups are of higher status than darker-skinned groups. In Cindy Nakashima's "Invisible Monster", multiracial people are described to be unnatural because they challenge the traditional notions that society sets forth in regard to race, gender, and sexuality. People who are mixed race feel out of place in both cultures they are a part of; they lack the sense of belonging and community because of how they phenotypically look, a place of origin, or limited language fluency. Multiracial people feel disconnected because of cultural barriers and language barriers that may prevent them from feeling they belong to a community. The innate idea that we as individuals must come from a "pure, undiluted" bloodline is derived from a monoracial "hegemonic" culture that refuses to adjust the system for multiracial people. Specific terms such as “hybrid degeneracy”, which states that people of mixed race heritage are seen as genetically inferior, prove that colonizers used scientific excuses to enable racism. With excuses that multiracial people are weaker in emotional, physiological, and psychological senses, they are supposedly unable to reproduce, and multiraciality would apparently lead to “human extinction”, the true intention of whites was to keep white blood "pure" and "superior" because it would have been against "God's wishes". The theories that were established to essentially discourage multiracial relationships had dire consequences due to the stigmas that followed.

Personally, I think it is outright disgusting how multiracial people were perceived as either depressed, moody, sexual-deviants, or unnatural. It is absurd that throughout my entire life, only now have I been able to slightly understand how multiracial people have gone from being scrutinized to objectified. With the social stratifications set into place by racial categorization of people, it makes me think: since mixed race people are often labelled or put into a box, what factor influences the shaping of identities of mixed race people the most? Do environmental or genetic factors play a more prominent role? How can we fight our own judgments and adjust our dictions when asking people about their backgrounds and heritage? How can we fight these existing notions that lighter-skinned people are more successful(in terms of career and as the highest standard of beauty) in society?

The video linked down below, "Shutting Down Bullsh*t About Multiracial Identity", showcases the stories of multiracial people and how we as individuals can improve upon on our own approaches and how we act towards multiracial people.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sYt_XQg4i3Q