Beyond FACTS: WHAT ARE YOU? VOICES OF MIXED-RACE YOUNG PEOPLE

I just sent along an e-mail to a high-school teacher in rural Arkansas who is concerned about a student of mixed-race heritage and is looking for resources for him. I suggested the MAVIN site, for starters, as well as the book What Are You? Voices of Mixed-Race Young People by journalist Pearl Fuyo Gaskins. I just dug out my copy and found my favorite back-cover quote. It’s from 15-year-old Derek Salmond:

“People often ask me the question ‘So what are you anyway?’ I say, ‘I’m a human being. Why? What are you?’”

Derek is featured on page 21. His essay “I’m a Little Bit of Everything” includes a pet peeve of his: that most people “automatically assume that my parents must be split up because (theirs is) an interracial marriage. They have this idea that biracial children don’t live with both of their parents at the same time.”

This book effectively dismantles many, many such myths thanks to Gaskins’ interviews with 80 young people of mixed-race heritage. Originally published in 1999, her book captures the realities of daily life for millions—yes, millions—of people of mixed-race heritage in this country and holds them up for others, perhaps even a lonely high-school student in rural Arkansas, to view and consider.