Is it OK to say ‘mixed-race’? No. But…

Begun July 2021 | 3,000 words | Contents

I was scolded on a local Facebook page for criticizing the phrase ‘mixed race’. The scolder said: ‘I’m mixed race – that’s what I call myself.’ ‘Yes, but…’ I thought.

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Is it OK to say ‘mixed-race’? No. But…

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Contents

• Introduction
• The words used
• Is a number needed to explain mixed ethnicity?
• Why describe ethnic origin?
• There are no human races
• The melting pot
• ‘Race’ as a social construct
• ‘If you’re not white, you’re black’
• ‘That’s what I call myself’
• Conclusion
• Comments

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Is it OK to say ‘mixed-race’? No. But…

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Introduction

Loaded phrase

Here in the UK, people have their ethnicity labelled, like it or not. But the phrase ‘mixed-race’ is loaded with prejudice. Isn’t it?

We’re asked to tick a box for our ethnic identity on forms gathering data for marketing or discrimination-monitoring purposes. The UK police use ethnic identity codes to describe suspects. The UK census asks, ‘What is your ethnic group?’

People of colour might, on the one hand, see such labelling as a form of racism. On the other hand, the concept of ethnicity allows people of colour to identify themselves – in positive terms.

Either way, ethnic identification is here to stay. So… is it OK to say ‘mixed-race‘? No. How can it be OK to say ‘mixed-race‘ when ‘race‘ is known to be a false category cooked up by white supremacists with fake science?

But… the phrase ‘mixed-race‘ is in widespread use by both white people and people of colour. In that context, race is supposedly a neutral ‘social construct‘ that simply describes the different human populations.

Even the Guardian (centre-left, the UK’s only national daily newspaper not owned by billionaires) uses ‘mixed race‘ to describe, for instance, Meghan Markle. (The usually brilliant Guardian style guide is silent on the subject.)

When ‘mixed-race’ is used in a social-construct sense, the toxicity of the word ‘race‘ is somehow shut out. The vile supremacist ideology scratches at the door, but is just ignored. The usage may be considered harmless but it carries the baggage of slavery.

As a zealous and pedantic antiracist, I objected to the use of the phrase on a local Facebook page and got a hostile response. People said, ‘I’m mixed-race – that’s what I call myself’.

But why would anyone accept ‘mixed-race‘ as a description of themselves, loaded as it is with outmoded prejudice?

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Is it OK to say ‘mixed-race’? No. But…

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The words used

‘Ethnicity’ is best. Isn’t it?

Which words are acceptable alternatives to ‘race’? Ethnicity? Heritage? Ancestry?

‘Race’ is used in what’s meant to be a neutral social-construct sense to describe the different human populations. But the supposed neutrality of that context doesn’t mask the word’s stench of bigotry. An alternative to the toxic word ‘race’ is needed.

Ethnicity

The UK government style guide recommends the word ‘ethnicity’:

We refer to ethnicity and not race…We don’t say ‘mixed people’ or ‘mixed race people’. We usually say ‘people with a mixed ethnic background’…

‘Ethnicity’ is an awkward mouthful of a word, and might seem blunt. But its meaning is clear – and it’s neutral.

The UK census uses the phrase ‘ethnic group‘. It quacks like a nerdy Dalek, ‘What is your ethnic group?’

Under ‘Mixed or multiple ethnic groups’, the UK census lists several options, including write-it-yourself in 18 characters or less (good luck with quadruple ethnicity):

(The insensitive Dalek means well. UK public services being mainly multicultural, the data can shape progressive policy.)

Heritage

The government guide and the census don’t use the word ‘heritage‘ – perhaps partly because there’s a connotation problem.

‘Heritage‘ could sound like something to do with the National Trust collection of stately homes – many of which, according to a 2020 NT report, have links to the slave trade and colonialism.

But ‘heritage’ has some merit as an alternative to ‘race’. ‘Mixed heritage‘ is a syllable shorter than ‘mixed ethnicity‘; and ‘heritage’ is easier to say than ‘ethnicity’, lacking that awkward ‘thn‘ sound.

Also, ‘heritage‘ sounds less personal and direct than ‘ethnicity‘. ‘Your heritage‘ sounds more discrete and less intrusive than ‘your ethnicity‘.

And when addressing someone’s cultural background, ‘heritage’ is more meaningful than ethnicity.

Note: The notion of cultural heritage might not be as innocuous as it sounds. Perhaps racism is boosted by culturism, in that the ‘strangerness’ of people of African or Asian ethnicity living in the west indicates a different culture. That cultural difference – perhaps perceived unconsciously – might elicit fear and prejudice in the ignorant.

Ancestry

Then there’s ‘ancestry‘, which is acceptable if the context is understood.

So…

‘Heritage‘ and ‘ancestry‘ are useful non-toxic alternatives to ‘race‘ and they’re less direct than ‘ethnicity‘. But they’re ambiguous and euphemistic. We’ve all got mixed heritage and ancestry – but we haven’t all got mixed ethnicity.

So – with some reservation – I’ll mainly use ‘ethnicity‘ in this post – it’s more meaningful.

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Is it OK to say ‘mixed-race’? No. But…

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Is a number needed to explain mixed ethnicity?

More than one

If you have more than one ethnic identity, would you want to say how many? If so, how would you say it – and when?

Some people describe themselves as having dual ethnicity. They want people to be aware of the challenges and benefits of having two different ethnic backgrounds.

That’s understandable. But ‘dual ethnicity‘ or the occasionaly used ‘biracial‘ – which includes that word – can be seen as pointlessly limiting, like the horrible ‘half-caste‘ (which leads to a hell-hole of outdated racist numerical classifications such as ‘quadroon‘).

What if you have more than two ethnicities? If, say, one of your parents has African ethnicity and the other parent has dual South Asian and European ethnicity, would you say you have triple ethnicity (or you’re triracial)?

What if your parents have four ethnicities? It’s increasingly possible: say, East Asian, South Asian, African and European. Would you say you have quadruple ethnicity? (It sounds a bit like ‘quadroon’…)

‘Mixed ethnicity‘ is discreet and flexible, giving enough information without a number. It says, in effect:

As you may infer from my facial appearance, I have more than one ethnic identity and that’s an important part of my character. I’ll give more information if and when it’s appropriate.

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Is it OK to say ‘mixed-race’? No. But…

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Why describe ethnic origin?

A need to identify

Ethnic identity is used negatively by racists. But it’s used positively by people of colour – and usefully by public services such as the census and the police.

Racists use ethnic identity negatively to assert their imagined superiority.

However, people of colour identify themselves positively as, for instance, black British, Asian British or mixed ethnicity, thereby identifying their family origins, the colour of their skin, and their cultural allegiances.

The UK census usefully records ethnicity statistics which can help shape progressive policies.

And apparent ethnicity can be useful to describe an unknown person. In the Facebook incident that prompted this post, a man harassing women in a park was described as ‘mixed-race‘.

The UK police use radio shorthand identification codes, known – tautologically – as IC codes, to describe suspects to colleagues. For instance, IC3 stands for black, IC4 for South Asian and IC5 for East Asian.

There’s no IC code for people whose appearance indicates mixed ethnicity. However, IC7 means unknown.

During ‘stop and search’ operations, police use more complex ‘self-defined ethnicity‘ codes. People stopped are asked to choose one of 18 codes. The codes follow census categories (see above) by including options for mixed ethnicity.

(Although such ‘racial profiling‘ is useful to the police, it’s also abused by them. For instance, the controversial practice of stop and search is overused against young black men by a force repeatedly said to be institutionally racist.)

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There are no human races

Just different populations

Science-denying racists say there are different human races, some of which are intrinsically superior to others. They’re wrong.

Pseudo-scientific racists, from Enlightenment philosophers (eg Kant and Locke) onwards, tried to justify colonialism and slavery by claiming Europeans are inherently more intelligent than other ‘races‘. They aren’t.

Taxonomically, all modern humans are Homo sapiens (the only surviving species of the genus Homo).

Race is a slippery concept, but in biology it’s an informal rank below the level of subspecies, the members of which are significantly distinct from other members of the subspecies.

Genetic research has confirmed the obvious: apart from some ‘single-gene’ disorders*, the differences that evolved between different human populations, albeit visually and culturally obvious, are not significantly distinct. This means the different populations are not races in any scientifically meaningful sense.

There are no different human races, just human populations – which are becoming increasingly mixed.

White racists, of course, don’t care if there are scientifically meaningful races or not. They just indulge in bullying prejudice against people of colour. The disused phrase, ‘colour prejudice’ is more linguistically meaningful than ‘racism’.

* Single gene disorder: genetic disease caused by a mutation in a single gene.

Some single-gene disorders are specific for certain populations, like Tay-Sachs disease among Ashkenazi Jews, cystic fibrosis in Caucasians, thalassemias among people from Southeast Asia and the Mediterranean countries, and sickle cell disease in people of Western African origin.

Single Gene Disorder, Science Direct, 2020

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Is it OK to say ‘mixed-race’? No. But…

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The melting pot

What we need

The different human populations are becoming mixed. The historical causes are bad but the mixing is good.

Increased travel in recent centuries brought large numbers of people of different appearance face to face for the first time in human history. Unfortunately, most of that contact was colonial.

The consequent vile transatlantic slave trade and carelessly engineered postwar mass immigration resulted in black and white people living in the same country. Inevitably, in spite of racism and conflict, they’ve mixed.

Before pseudo-scientific racism was rumbled, racists sneered about ‘miscegenation‘; and amongst ethnic minorities there’s pressure to resist assimilation and preserve cultural heritage by not ‘marrying out’.

But – some dodgy lyrics aside – Blue Mink were right: what we need is a great big melting pot. Marrying ‘out’ doesn’t have to mean loss of cultural heritage – it can be seen as marrying in.

Ethnicity is often related to religion, and there may be concern that marrying ‘out’ will dilute religion and therefore morality. But here in the western melting pot, we live in a post-religious age. God – as the source of morality – is dead.

Fortunately, as social animals we have innate goodness – and any innate badness can be constrained by the rule of law, preferably under liberal democracy (the worst form of government apart from all the others).

(Non-religious spirituality, on the other hand, is alive and well – and isn’t affected by inter-ethnic mingling.)

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Is it OK to say ‘mixed-race’? No. But…

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‘Race’ as a social construct

Linguistic dilemma

People say ‘race’ is a ‘social construct’. But the word ‘race’ is still toxic, and the abstract idea of a ‘social construct’ can be misunderstood – and misused.

Science shows there are no human races, but some say ‘race’ is a social construct which doesn’t have to be scientifically meaningful – it’s just a way of describing the different human populations.

A social construct is said to be a concept or category that exists due to shared agreement within a society, rather than being based on objective reality.

‘Race‘ as a social construct is used by non-racists as shorthand for populations of different ethnicity. It’s used in that way in speech by people of colour; and by both black and white writers and speakers in non-racist media. For instance, the liberal, antiracist UK Guardian happily describes Meghan Markle as ‘mixed race’.

But devious racists use the social construct idea to blur the issue and keep talking about ‘race‘ despite the evidence there are no races. Confusion between ethnicity and race is the loophole in the social construct through which racists can slip.

The social construct idea has complex theoretical academic origins. Not everyone gets it. Many people reading or hearing the word ‘race’ in the media, unaware of any ‘shared agreement’ about what it means, might understandably assume it refers to an objective reality and means what it says.

Many people reading or hearing the word ‘race’ will think – and will be encouraged to do so by loophole racists – it means what it meant in the days of empire, slavery and Holocaust, when ‘races’, identified by appearance or culture (or both), were ranked in order of superiority, with white at the top and black at the bottom.

Despite its frequent use by non-racists as – supposedly – a social construct, the word ‘race‘ is fundamentally toxic and redundant. For antiracists, the solution to this linguistic dilemma is to abandon the flimsy social construct context and stop using the word ‘race‘.

(‘Race‘ is, of course, implied in the word ‘racism‘ but until the misnamed thing ends, the word will probably continue to be used, trailing its toxic root.)

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Is it OK to say ‘mixed-race’? No. But…

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‘If you’re not white, you’re black’

Partial self-denial

Some black antiracist campaigners say mixed-ethnicity people should identify as black – but how can it be right to deny part of your ethnic identity?

Some radical black antiracists say: ‘If you’re not white, you’re black.’ They’re saying people of mixed ethnicity should identify solely as black (meaning non-white, ie black or brown).

One such proponent was prominent black UK broadcaster and antiracist campaigner, the late Darcus Howe. Fellow activist Sunder Katwala has recalled being on the receiving end of Howe’s rhetoric.

Katwala, the mixed-ethnicity director of immigration think-tank British Future, wrote about the encounter in the conclusion to his 2012 BF report The Melting Pot Generation.

Katwala and Howe were chatting after a TV discussion (about a controversial remark made by a black politician). Katwala apparently referred to himself as ‘mixed-race’, and Howe objected. Katwala:

“Mixed race? What’s all this mixed race nonsense? If you’re not white, you’re black.”

That old point was jovially roared at me with some emphasis by one of this country’s leading public raconteurs on race and racism.

“But I’ve never thought I was black. Shouldn’t it be up to me to decide?”

“What are you then?”

“British. And English. My parents are from India and Ireland, so I’m half-Asian and mixed race as well.”

“British? Why don’t you call yourself Indian? Are you ashamed of your father, boy?”

Howe was forcefully expressing the well-known position of radical antiracism: ‘mixed‘ is nonsense – if you’re not white, you’re black.

It’s an understandably angry political response to mixed-ethnicity people experiencing racism because they’re not white.

It’s a proud and noble gesture. But should people of mixed ethnicity feel obliged to deny a significant part of their cultural heritage? Isn’t the antiracist cause best served by people of colour feeling free to express their full identity?

(But beware of identity politics. See my post, Whatever happened to Black Lives Matter?)

Note: I came across the story about Howe and Katwala in a 2021 Conversation article by mixed-ethnicity author and academic Remi Adekoya. The article, Biracial Britain: why mixed-race people must be able to decide their own identity, was based on Adekoya’s groundbreaking 2021 book: Biracial Britain: What it means to be mixed race.

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Is it OK to say ‘mixed-race’? No. But…

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‘That’s what I call myself’

Whitesplaining word-nerd

Some mixed-ethnicity people call themselves ‘mixed-race’. It’s easy to say – and difficult to criticise.

Some people of mixed ethnicity say:

‘I’m mixed-race – that’s what I call myself. Don’t tell me what to say!’

It must be difficult enough being brown-skinned in a white world – facing microracism (‘Where are you from?’) and conscious and unconscious personal and institutional bias – without having a would-be white saviour (I’m white, by the way – Hi!) tell you how you should or shouldn’t describe yourself.

Whitesplaining word-nerd virtue-signaller – who do I think I am? It’s like a white person telling black Americans not to use the N-word: ‘I say, you rapper chappies – you really shouldn’t use that bad word.’

Except it’s not like that. When a mixed-ethnicity person uses the phrase ‘mixed-race‘ to describe themselves, they’re not re-appropriating the word ‘race‘ in a playfully political way.

They’re giving white people permission to use that phrase – and they’re inadvertently agreeing with zealous racists, the only people who think there actually are different races.

The question remains: why would anyone choose ‘mixed-race‘ as a description of themselves, knowing it to be loaded with outmoded prejudice?

Maybe mixed-ethnicity people call themselves ‘mixed-race‘, thinking, ‘So what? Who cares? It’s a social construct. It’s just what people say. And it’s only two syllables.’

Maybe they’re winding up mitherers like me. If so, damn – you got me!

I just hope it’s not an example of that depressing phenomenon, internalised racism.

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Is it OK to say ‘mixed-race’? No. But…

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Conclusion

Linguistic detox

‘Mixed race’ is easy to say and ‘race’ is now supposedly a neutral social construct. But shouldn’t that toxic word be retired?

Some people choose to describe themselves as ‘mixed-race‘. The word ‘race‘ has ugly roots but when it’s understood as a social construct rather than a fake biological category perhaps it seems better than the non-toxic alternatives.

The main alternative, ‘ethnicity‘, isn’t an easy word. Although it’s harmless and clear in meaning, it’s a difficult, official-sounding word. It doesn’t roll off the tongue easily – it’s definitely not a people’s word.

But in spite of that, ‘ethnicity‘ is still better than ‘race‘, isn’t it? The phrase ‘mixed race‘ is easy to say but even in a social-construct context it remains loaded with fake science and colonial notions of white superiority.

Shouldn’t the word ‘race’ be left in the shameful past where it belongs?

‘Mixed ethnicity‘ is a mouthful. It’s got academic roots, three extra syllables and an awkward ‘thn‘ sound. But it avoids that toxic word and in its neutral clarity it celebrates our differences and embraces their mixing.

A casual phrase in use is ‘mixed ethnic’. It’s easier to say someone is ‘mixed ethnic’ rather than saying they have ‘mixed ethnicity’, but when applied to a person, the casual abbreviation ‘ethnic’ might – understandably – be considered offensive.

A commenter on this post (see below) points out that young people of mixed ethnicity tend to refer to themselves simply as ‘mixed‘.

That’s a cool solution. When used in context, the abbreviation ‘mixed‘ keeps the meaning while avoiding both uncool words: ‘race‘ and ‘ethnicity‘.

For older people (like me) the – less cool – solution is:

Don’t say: ‘mixed-race’
Do say: ‘mixed-ethnicity’

The End

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Is it OK to say ‘mixed-race’? No. But…

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