Ellington

Sophomores Gabbie Duncalf and Fitsum Misgano were taking a class about mixed race when they first learned about the organization Mixed.

After hearing that the group — which caters specifically to mixed-race students but is open to anyone — was lacking officers, they decided to join during spring quarter of last year. Since then, the club has been an outlet for them to discuss mixed-race topics as well as an opportunity to spend time with other students who identify as mixed.

“As a mixed person, I have always felt hesitant to join monoracial organizations,” said Duncalf, whose mother is Filipino and father is Caucasian. “I feel different, and I don’t know if I fit in there, so I like that with Mixed, I can talk about race in different ways … I can talk to people who feel the same way and who want to change the way we talk about race.”

Discussions about new perceptions of race are important, not only among students but in society as a whole. Ralina Joseph, a communications professor at the UW, has made it her goal to change the way we talk about race, especially by disregarding the idea that multiracialism is a separate entity and using it to “deconstruct notions of race.”

“I think that I would encourage multiracial students to not only identify themselves with a multiracial group, but also to see themselves as a part of their larger racial and ethnic communities,” Joseph said.

Joseph studies the other groups that are “in between” in relation to mixed race in her class COM 490: Representing Beyond the Binaries: Mixing Race, Gender, and Sexuality in the Media. Also taught by LeiLani Nishime, the class discusses identities such as being transgender, another topic that is discussed at Mixed meetings.

“Sex, as well as gender, is not a binary system; it’s a spectrum, just like race,” Duncalf said. “It’s not like you’re at opposite ends. There are a lot of people who feel like they’re in the middle. They’re not just one thing or the other.”

While job and college applications have already started including a checkbox option that indicates a gender exceeding the binary concept of male or female, a box for being multiracial is becoming a more frequent option on many forms — namely, the U.S. Census, which made the “multiracial” checkbox available in 2000. According to a study done by the MAVIN Foundation, the UW is one of nine schools found to “collect data in a way that fully complies with OMB [Office of Management and Budget] guidelines and encodes mixed-heritage students in the way they self-report.”

“I think it’s really important, because people realize that there are a lot of mixed people out there, and it’s not just some kind of anomaly,” Duncalf said.

Mixed member and UW alumnus Chris Paredes believes the multiracial checkbox on the census is helpful in the allocation of resources.

“Sometimes, you might have resources that are effective with some groups but may not meet the needs of changing communities,” he said. “If you can better identify which communities are living in different areas and how they identify, you can start thinking about different ways that you can provide services to them.”

Joseph expressed many of the same thoughts.

“The census is important because those numbers really mean something in terms of representation,” Joseph said. “They mean something in terms of how people are counted for all different types of government services. So it’s not just about how I choose to identify myself, it’s going to be about how I’m choosing to identify myself in a way that’s going to determine how my community receives resources.”

Along with talk about checkboxes and representation, there are conversations about famous mixed-race people. With President Barack Obama being hailed as the “first black president,” though he is both black and Caucasian, it seems there is a pressure to choose one race, one identity, or one culture over the other. The members of Mixed find this to be a moot point.

“One thing I’d like people to steer away from is trying to ask mixed students to depict one race,” said Jessica Charity, Mixed’s public relations officer, who is a mix of Japanese, black and Native American heritage. “I know they want to categorize us, and they feel more comfortable to put us in one race, but it’s really hard for anyone to do that.”

Many of the members see their identities as situational.

“If I’m in a room full of Caucasian people, I will feel more Filipino, but if I were in a room full of Filipinos, I’d feel mostly Caucasian,” Duncalf said.

Joseph’s sentiments seem to reflect this.

“I think that for many of us who are multi- or monoracial, we identify in many types of ways,” she said. “I think that our language and understanding needs to catch up with that.”

These multiple identities seem to provide more opportunities for friendship than if mixed-race people were to identify with only one race or culture.

“I feel comfortable hanging out with Caucasians, Asians, blacks, Hispanics, etc.,” Charity said. “Because I’m mixed, I feel like I’m not required to hang out with only black or Asian people. It’s just a different feeling.”

But there is still that sense of being “not black enough” or “not Asian enough,” as Charity describes it.

“My black friends and I that are mixed get a lot of heat from the black community, like we’re not black enough,” she said. “My Japanese friends say we’re too dark. All the Native Americans are like, ‘You’re not Native American enough.’”

This is where Mixed comes in.

“We are able to get together [through Mixed] and talk about all our races as more of a beautiful thing,” Charity said. “It’s just a good place for everyone to feel secure about their ethnicity.”

Reach reporter Kristen Steenbeeke at lifestyles@dailyuw.com.