On a blog called No Snow Here, a post titled “Being Mixed Arab American” caught my attention. Questions of my personal racial identity have been swirling around in my head for years, but the quest for answers hasn’t been a pressing one. My ethnic background just isn’t something I tend to focus on, and most folks don’t know what I am either. Brown? White? Obviously mixed, but with what? Most ask if I’m Mexican. A few assume Native American. Those more traveled comment on my “Mediterranean features.” My mother says I’m half-Saudi but that is a part of my heritage I know nothing of having never met my biological father or been raised around other Arabs. Islam is a foreign religion to me. No clue how to put on a burka nor have I ever owned one.
It’s not about denying that part of my ethnicity, it’s about not fully identifying with any ethnicity or race. My ethnic makeup is responsible for coloring my skin but isn’t part of the culture I grew up with. Living in the Deep South and then in the Midwest with white family members has shaped my worldview. In my hometown I was the only one of my kind, rendering some people confused on how to treat or regard me. Some accepted me as white and a few (that I’m aware of) did not accept me at all, with most not seeming to care either way. The cities in the Midwest I’ve lived in had more diverse populations, though overall were predominantly white (usually 80% or more), creating little opportunity for exposure to other Arab-Americans. But on the rare occasion that we do meet, there’s this damned cultural divide.
Personally, I don’t worry with it too much. Who knows what the heck I am? My mother isn’t exactly a reliable source (not to slam her sexuality but her ability to tell the truth) so for all I know my biological father was actually East Indian. But who cares? I can see where others might, and that’s cool, but it’s just never been my central focus. Whether I’m part this type of brown or that seems irrelevant. My oblivious stance on personal racial identify may be due to my coloring attracting more curiosity than outright hostility. I don’t know. My ex-mother-in-law certainly didn’t approve of my mixed status, but well, whatever. Never liked that woman anyhow.
A few years back, the HR gal at this company I worked for asked if they could mark me down as a minority for grant proposal purposes (the more minorities they employ, the more grant money they receive). I usually mark Caucasian on applications since Arabs are technically Caucasoids, unless Mixed is an option (which it usually isn’t). It came across as an odd request at the time, but I consented.
I’ve experienced this odd phenomenon I call “racial/ethnic assignment” from all directions, with people generally lumping me in the category that best suits their needs and arguments at any given time. Like when a black female customer complained to me about a white female co-worker, addressing me as a “non-white” and phrasing her concerns in a way that left little doubt she expected me to identify with her perspective. Or the time I found myself in a dispute with a white male neighbor who self-righteously claimed that if the police were called, he believed they’d be more inclined to side with him because he is white and I “clearly” am not. (Nevermind the fact that he was a dopehead who abused his girlfriend.) Or the time a southern white man whom I’d never met before took it upon himself to walk up and announce, in front of an entire group of people, that he would never date me because I am not “all white.” Or my family glossing over the fact that I “have color” and speaking to me as though I should identify with “being white,” while step-family members routinely referred to my coloring as though it posed some sort of handicap and justified differential treatment. Or how about the Saudi male friend of my ex-husband who chastised me for marrying a white man (not in my husband’s presence, of course). People just seem to put me where they want me.
“Woman of color” isn’t a term I’ve ever applied to myself, but then again, neither is “white.” When people ask, I always say “half Arabic/half southern white blend” since that’s the easiest way to sum it up. “Southern white blend” for my purposes is comprised of English, Choctaw, Crowe, Scottish, and possibly Dutch. These other heritages are no more familiar to me than my Saudi heritage. My region provided the culture, experienced through the lens of growing up light brown/olive-toned in a white-identified family. But I was rather oblivious of my difference growing up, only internally confronting issues of race and ethnicity in recent years.
As time’s gone by, I’ve become more aware of my ethnicity and others’ reaction to it, not because I ever cared to but because people bring it up. There’s pressure out there if you’re part white and part something else to identify yourself with the something else first and foremost. If you have any color at all, you’re handed the “woman of color” label, and yet, you’re not accepted by most other self-identified “women of color” because you lack the ethnic cultural component and are thereby handed the label of “passes for white.” Then you carry that one around, not really sure what to think of “passing” but able to acknowledge that the claim is likely right. Okay. But then the white people you do know always remark on how you are “obviously mixed with something” and have “an exotic look.” If they see color, do I truly fully “pass” as white? Not fully. But still, racial discrimination isn’t something I encounter, as directed at me, on a frequent basis. At least not to such an extent that it creates obvious barriers that many other people experience. Or at least not that I’m aware of.
In class and gender are where my obvious barriers lie. With so much attention focused there, it never really dawned on me to question if color factored into the equation. That is until 9/11 at which point my grandma advised me to tell people I’m Hispanic since “they think you are anyway.” Hmmm. Yeah, people do like speaking Spanish to me, especially Hispanic people inquiring about my ethnicity. I figure if Hispanic people peg me as one of their own, then likely I am not “passing” all that well, at least in terms of coloring. Bucking the purported values of the mainstream culture probably doesn’t help with “passing” either.
Maybe the problem is equating color with culture, where you can “not pass” in color and yet “pass” culturally simultaneously. But what does that make you? And if you reject many of the values of the popular culture, where does that leave you? No true race, ethnicity, or culture to belong to, at least not in a way you meaningfully identify with. Personal issues of race and ethnicity becomes so muddy that it’s practically not worth the time and effort to sort out. But where I fall according to class and gender is clear and concrete.
That’s not to say race, ethnic, and cultural concerns aren’t very real issues within the population at-large and don’t deserve as much attention as issues of class and gender. They’re valid and real, absolutely, and I take the study of these issues seriously. But belonging in a racial/ethnic/cultural gray area keeps me from identifying fully with any “side” on race-related issues. That has its benefits though, allowing for the assessment of the arguments from various perspectives without feeling “attached” to any one in particular. I feel no strong sense of solidarity with any of the colors out there.
In one sense, it does sometimes feel like being left out, but the lack of social constraints is also liberating as my loyalties aren’t tethered to my racial or ethnic identity. Who would I be loyal to? White people? Arab-Americans? Native Americans? Other Southern white/Arab/Native American-blended folks (whom I’ve never met)?
If you’re unable to fully identify with being white, can you still identify with and be partial to “white culture”? Can you identify while simultaneously renouncing it as the “mainstream” bent on pursuing the interests of those in its middle-to-upper classes? If so, again, where does that leave a person? “Identifying with” isn’t necessarily the same as “supporting and remaining loyal to,” it seems.
These questions are probably rudimentary in nature, but that’s because they’re new to me. This is unexplored terrain for the most part. I can see how growing up in a white family could lead a person to more closely identify with the family’s culture, which in our case is the Southern white, working-class subculture, but that doesn’t automatically entitle the person to full-fledged status within the subculture in question.
On the topic of whites and culture. What exactly is “white culture”? In the past I’ve argued that the Southern white, blue-collar, working-class subculture stands in stark contrast with what is commonly referred to as “the mainstream” (which is representative of middle-to-upper class white people’s purported value system and perspective). Is “the mainstream” truly representative of all white people? Not by a long shot. White folks living below the “middle” largely claim to feel their interests are ignored by “mainstream” agendas. And they are (e.g. – globalization and outsourcing jobs). When white subcultures align with the greater white mainstream it’s usually in voting for conservative candidates, however, their reasons for doing so aren’t identical. But that’s a whole other topic to be discussed another time. The point here is that due to classism all whites aren’t perceived as being equal. If you more closely identify with a poor white subculture located near the bottom of the social hierarchy, does the fact that you’re white really matter that much? I mean, we’re talking about the successors of Irish immigrants and English criminals forced into indentured servitude here. Not the successors of plantation owners and industrial giants. Not the same people, even if they do share the same skin tone. They don’t share the same class or, in most cases, ancestry, but I’ll digress on that topic all night…
None of this has to blind a person to recognizing that this patriarchal oligarchy we live in is dominated by wealthy white men (with wealthy white women aiming to catch up). Or that much of the “mainstream” agenda panders to the interests of members of the middle-to-upper classes, white people primarily, along with mainstream feminism vying for positions within the current socio-political framework in order to install its most privileged. (Oh, and a few token minority women to lend “proof” to the claim of being progressive.)
My loyalty lies with those most affected by our social system, those identified near the bottom of the hierarchy, socially, racially, and economically, and with all humankind in the broad sense. My loyalty to women as a category extends only so far as fighting for equality and against sexual violence while upholding our right to reproductive freedom. No solidarity exists there as feminism, for me, is less about whether individual women are able to see eye-to-eye with one another and share a sense of community and more about helping all people to believe in and embrace feminist principles as part of their greater life philosophies, with principles that disallow for irrelevant genetic and biological variants (race and gender particularly) to play a role in determining one’s status in society inextricably included. These principles would be assumed inseparable for those seeking real social change and not just the furthering of one’s own agenda.
That many people, individually, can’t identify with being affected negatively by racial discrimination does not justify discounting racial oppression or denying it as one of the most serious social injustices humankind faces both presently and historically. Feeling detached and uninvolved doesn’t free anyone from responsibility or lessen the social obligation to improve conditions for all.
Like many others, I too am frustrated with racial/ethnic concerns being minimized by the white majority and the “great threat at the top.” Has my opposition to the so-called “mainstream” and it’s self-centered value system hampered my ability to identify with “popular white culture”? Yes, it seems so. But that doesn’t mean, by default, I identify with “minority culture(s).” Is a person obligated to identify with a set racial/ethnic group or is flexibility an option for those who don’t fit neatly anywhere?
A gray area appears to exist and I wonder just how many others populate it.
That’s enough babbling for now. I need to get some sleep.
Newsvine
nosnowhere said
hey sis, i think a lot about the issues you raise here too. this part in particular:
“the lack of social constraints is also liberating as I my loyalties aren’t based on my racial or ethnic identity. Who would I be loyal to? White people? Arab-Americans? Native Americans? Other Southern white/Arab/Native American-blended folks (I’ve never met another one)?”
i have had conversations with other mixed friends about this; being mixed, we don’t have a home in any one ethnic group, which can be both alienating and liberating. also wondering whether there is something liberating about self-representation through blogs and other independent media when you’re mixed; like i always feel like i’m under so much scrutiny in person because ppl are trying to figure out what i am, etc– this doesn’t happen online – if i call myself an arab american online, what image does that bring up for people? if i have to add qualifiers to that like “i’m arab but have a white mom,” what is the point of it?
i get really frustrated by labels, i have been renouncing all of them, taking some back, renouncing again … actually i didn’t start identifying as a person of color until about three years ago, before that i was just confused. actually the thing that you say here about arabs being caucasoid is interesting because that biological theory of race (caucasoid, negroid, mongoloid) is what made me the MOST confused about whether or not arabs where white, and then in college i learned that that theory was debunked in the 70s and is totally racist… but my world studies teacher had taught it as fact to my class in high school.
“If you have any color at all, you’re handed the “woman of color” label, and yet, you’re not accepted by most other self-identified “women of color” because you lack the ethnic cultural component and are thereby handed the new label of “passes for white.””
i think this is SO true, except that in recent years i have luckily been able to become part of a women of color community that includes lots of mixed “passes for white” women so i don’t feel inauthentic. but that is definately what kept me from being comfortable within the arab community for a long time – even still most arabs within my community are other rejects, lol. i think a lot of mixed-white women of color have experienced self-hate, wanting to be fully white, etc, and so when they see another mixed women not identifying as woc it can become personal: is it possible to just be, and feel like you’re something different, without it being self-hate?
there is definately a grey area. i have been feeling more attached to labels like mixed and queer, more than Arab American and feminist, lately. but still they’re so arbitrary! thanks for letting me leave such a long comment and thanks for writing this!
no snow here said
[...] 04 2008 Wake Me Now: On a blog called No Snow Here, a post titled “Being Mixed Arab American” caught my attention. [...]
wakemenow said
Hi nosnowhere,
Thanks for taking the time to read my post and responding!
“i get really frustrated by labels, i have been renouncing all of them, taking some back, renouncing again …”
I understand this. None of the racial/ethnic labels made any sense to me either, so I opted using descriptions instead. There’s never a simple, clear-cut word or term to sum it up nicely.
“biological theory of race (caucasoid, negroid, mongoloid) is what made me the MOST confused about whether or not arabs where white, and then in college i learned that that theory was debunked in the 70s and is totally racist… but my world studies teacher had taught it as fact to my class in high school.”
The biological classifications helped me make sense of things by offering an explanation of biological variants that determine what we know as “races.” I have heard the theory was debunked, likely for its racist implications (or more accurately, how it was improperly used to justify the racist agenda of those in power). As for the theory itself, I am not well-versed, but as I understand it it’s based on rather basic documented physical distinctions (forehead spacing, nose shapes, cheek bone prominence). Now, granted, plenty of the claimed distinctions likely are unfounded as it seems everyone throughout history has had an agenda to serve. But for me, this theory serves no real use in justifying differential treatment of humans based on the biological category (or categories) they belong to. It broke human groups down to varying external bodily characteristics, of which social and intellectual distinctions have been inferred, serving as the arbitrary basis on which to mount the concept of superiority/inferiority. This helps me to comprehend just how asinine and arbitrary our grand social hierarchy truly is.
“is it possible to just be, and feel like you’re something different, without it being self-hate?”
I don’t see why not. But I can also see where some individuals would experience a tremendous amount of conflict, especially if they form a prejudice against members of a race or ethnic group that they are part of. Just as prejudice of any kind typically requires a person to disassociate with the group they’re prejudiced against and stereotype the members using arbitrary criteria, the most effective way to combat this is to see and judge people as individuals first and foremost. If you’re not looking at people as simply members of various groups, there’s little reason to feel hate toward a group and all of its members, including yourself in the case of self-hating.
The term “hate” isn’t one I care to use often as, in my thinking, it can only be applied to specific individuals and entities and defies any useful logic when applied to entire groups. You may hate something some members or a group are doing, but how can you hate them all, collectively, without knowing them? Oh, granted, it’s claimed to happen all the time, but that’s still a tough concept for me to fully grasp as it doesn’t make sense or serve any useful humanitarian purpose. I find the popular usage of the word “hate” (no less “self-hate” ) troubling though it’s difficult to pin-point exactly why. Perhaps because that word doesn’t seem fitting. It’s something else. Hate is experienced between individuals and toward entities, but in reference to contemptuous behavior and feelings between and toward groups of people, I think it’s more complex than that. (Not that that matters really in this conversation.)
Thanks for leaving a comment! I’ve appreciated your input on the subject, as it isn’t everyday that I get to speak with someone with a similar …um…(I don’t even know what to call it lol)… Makeup! That’s a good way to phrase it I suppose.
AM