Who’s black and who isn’t?

One of the men in this picture is black. The other isn’t. How so? Well, President Barack Obama describes himself as African American even though his mother was white. This is in stark contrast to Tiger Woods.

There was astonishment – largely by African Americans – when Woods described himself as “Cablinasian”. This word was a contraction of his mixed Caucasian, Black, Indian (Native American) and Asian roots. Black America was in uproar that the first black man to win the US Masters had essentially, opted out of being black.

So who’s right? The answer is – they both are. Being mixed race, to a certain extent, allows you to define your identity as you see fit. Though a hangover from the bad old racist concepts of purity means that someone of mixed race is denied calling themselves white, unless they clearly look it. Even then in the US, the “one-drop” rule in force in certain states used to decree that a person with any black ancestry was black.

The fact that “not white” in our own particular society equals “black” is one of the reasons I describe  myself as black AND mixed race. When I say black,  I refer to concept of political blackness, which came out of the American civil rights movement – a unifying call to all those of African heritage to embrace their blackness, no matter what their racial mix.

I am black in the sense that I could not go undercover at a BNP meeting; I’m always asked where I’m from even though I was born in the United Kingdom, and I have experienced racism. That’s what makes me black.

But I’m also mixed race. I’m as proud of my roots in Manchester as those in Barbados. So, I am British, black and mixed race. The thing about being mixed is your identity is multifaceted which means you can tick various boxes. Besides It makes filling in “diversity monitoring” sections on forms more fun.

So when it come to ticking the box on a form, for mixed race people there will never be one  answer as to how we define ourselves. It may differ from our own siblings, and may even change over time.  They key thing is, it’s all about self-definition.I often hear radio phone-ins where callers ring in to enlighten us that “Obama/Hamilton/Berry isn’t black, they’re mixed race”. Well caller, it isn’t for you to say.

With racism less prevalent that it used to be, a new generation of young people are describing themselves as mixed race without also describing themselves as black, preferring to see “black” in the context of race  and culture, rather than the political sense. So there are signs that the concept of political blackness may well be on its way out.

But not so fast. There are still disturbing statistics about black school underachievement (with “Mixed White and Black Caribbean” pupils performing similarly to “Black Caribbean” children). Black men in particular are disproportionately unemployed, and there is still a lack of black faces in the City of London. Here is a quote from my brother, who worked in the City for many years and is involved in the government’s REACH role model programme for young black men:

“I never met a professional with Afro-Caribbean heritage in the City and have encountered very few black business people with institutional financial backing, yet young black men have an enormous contribution to make in business and finance”

My brother, my two cousins and I went to university with African-Caribbean and mixed race men. Why, then, are they invisible in the City? Until challenges such as these are even halfway to being sorted out, mixed race people identifying and being identified as black will be with us for some time. The warm and fuzzy race-doesn’t-matter, cafe-au-lait utopia isn’t here by a long chalk.

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