Struggle with Identity

On April 9th I attended a cultural event titled “Erotic, Exotic and Erased: Biracial Identities” in BMU 210. Throughout the event we heard from three speakers, all of whom were biracial. We also watched a short movie a biracial women and the struggles that she overcame.

Throughout the movie we heard from a biracial woman named Midori Waugh who called herself a “Hapa”. This term is used to describe her racial identity; Half Asian, Half Caucasian. She said that she started noticing differences between herself and her peers when she was in elementary school. She says that she was not accepted by the Japanese children because she was too Caucasian. Her Caucasian father died when she was fairly young and her mother taught her to embrace her Asian culture. Her mother thought that being a “Hapa” would be an advantage for her because she would be unique. Midori compares her journey of racial identity to that of her running career. She was unsure of each step in the beginning; she started running one mile and then two. She says that her journey was an evolution; she had to learn how to be both Asian and Caucasian. As the movie continues we hear from other biracial people who have similar experiences. There was Sue Hida who was also Japanese/Caucasian, Steve Ropp who was Japanese/ Caucasian and a man (who’s name I did not get), who was African American/Asian. This man’s experience was very interesting because he was half of two minority groups. He said that it was lonely being the only one of your kind. He claimed that he felt as though he did not really fit in anywhere. He was also able to share a funny story about going to an Indian restaurant. He said that after he ordered and his food arrived he took a bit and it was extremely spicy. He questioned the waiter and he said that the chef had made it especially for him, confused by this he asked to speak with the chef. The chef came over and said that he made it especially for him because he was Indian. The man started laughing and told the chef the he was not Indian, he was African American and Japanese, the chef had mistaken him for and Indian man. He said that both got a good laugh out of this, overall it was a good example of how race plays a part in everyday life.

The movie goes on to give statistics about biracial people and how they represent 7 million Americans. Historically, interracial marriages were discouraged and considered “mongrelization”. People wanted to stop interracial marriages in an attempt to keep the “purity” of races. However, people of different races married and in the 2000 Census they made it an option to mark more than one race. The results were that 32% of Americans considered themselves white and some other race. They concluded with prediction into the future and how by the year 2050 European Americans will be the minority.

The three different panelists we heard from were all Chico State students who were biracial. Spencer’s father an African American and his mother was Caucasian. Oya Rose Willcotte was of Jamaican and Caucasian descent while Christa Perez was of Indian, Black, Mexican American, Portuguese, and Spanish Descent. Overall the panelists said that they did not realize that their race was an issue until someone brought it up; for these three this was in elementary school. All three panelists were lucky because their families were very supportive and encouraged them to be part of all their races and cultures. Christa said that her inability to speak Spanish, despite being from a mainly Hispanic background, separates her from being Mexican and makes her not Mexican enough. Overall the panelists agreed that a biracial person typically identifies with what they look like despite what culture they are raised with.

For me, growing up in Mt. Shasta I experienced very little ethnicity, and there were very few biracial people. This conversation on diversity and biracialism was interesting and very educational. I never realized the struggle for identity that many biracial people have. Coming from a bi-religious background I could relate with their need to find out who they were without losing one culture/religion or the other.