Mixed Race Identity Narratives and the Operation of the External Racial Gaze

• In Event: 130 - Section on Racial and Ethnic Minorities Roundtable Session (one-hour).
  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 03. Mixed Race Studies

Abstract

Scholarship on mixed race theorizes that the operation of the external racial gaze is signaled through the ‘what are you?’ question faced by mixed race people in their everyday lives (Haritworn 2012) as well as how mixed race people are ‘racially mismatched’ by others, and how they respond to this (Song and Aspinall 2012). In interviews conducted with mixed race young-adults in western Canada, it was evident that the ‘what are you?’ question is the verbal form of the gaze’s need to fix the ambivalence it perceives in mixed race bodies. However, this study also found that mixed race people have “at the ready” identity narratives in response to the ‘what are you?’ question. This paper shows the importance of these narratives to extending the theorization of the racial gaze. The content of mixed race people’s identity narratives and when and where they use their narrative signals how the gaze operates in mixed race people’s lives (how they experience social power, and how they make sense of and respond to it).

Author

• Jillian Paragg, University of Alberta