What race is a mixed race child?

Question

My friend holds that if a black man and a white woman (or indeed a white man and a black woman) have a child then that child is black.

This is true, he maintains, even if the child is quite fair in complexion to the extent that you would think it was white if you hadn't seen the parents.

My friend does not profess to be racist and in my judgement is not!

Answer 1

Way too complicated but I know a few mixed race friends who depending on their 'need' will pull the I'm Black card. I think it depends mostly on what the child feels comfortable calling themself. I am mixed race myself but for the whole tick the white european box or white british box. It just gets too complicated to put anything else!

Answer 2

I have heard many people say what your friend is saying and I think it is because no matter how fair or dark a mixed "race" person is who is both black and white they will be seen and thus treated as black. Just because you are viewed in one way doesn't make you that way. My personal viewpoint is that they are mixed but i guess people have the right to call themselves what they want. Ultimately I dont believe there is any such thing as a black race or a white race just different cultures and different shades.

Answer 3

First of all its important to define what 'race' means. In sociology the word race means many different things as many would argue that race doesn't exist! And indeed there is no biological difference between a black man and a white man or an Asian and a Mexican. "There is as much genetic difference between 1 so called race as there is between 2 so called different races" Sociologists would argue that race is a socially constructed idea in bedded into our common sense view through socialisation. So to call someone mixed race is in a sense creating a 'them' and 'us' culture which leads to tension in society. And this tension is simply biologically and physiologically false.

However a common sense view of race (everyday view) is someone of different race and is someone who holds a different culture, skin colour, born in a different country etc. However as i said above this is wrong and the reason we all hold these view is because of how we have been socialised though out history such as the slave trade!

Answer 4

Mixed-race is really when any two people of different races produce a child. Such as black and white producing a child, or Samoan and White producing a child and so on.

Generally, and especially in the South US, mixed-race refers to a child that is black and white mixed-race. I know this because my son is one.

As far as what they would claim....many federal and state forms are getting better and letting you check more than one box for "race". But according to what I was told by the school system when I went down to sign him up for Kindergarten in SC......whatever minority he was, that was what race box he should check on the form. I figured out later it was because they get more $$ for minorities than for non-minorities but I did what I was told....and that's the way most governmental places will tell you if you can only check one box for race.....check the minority.

Answer 5

A scientist might argue that there is no such a thing as 'race'. But from a sociologists point of view race exists as a social reality. In his view the child may be black but the majority would class the child as mixed-race.

Answer 6

how do you define race because lets face it we are all mixed races there are very few pure race people in the world if you look back in your family you will find many different races its only in royal families that you find pure breeds and lets face it the majority of royal families are ugly .ok I'm old but we used to call mixed races half cast which could refer to a person whose father or mother was black and there other parent was white personally i didn't think there was anything wrong with this but i don't think that is PC now ,to me half cast of any race tend to be more attractive than the so called pure breeds Asian and white parents produce beautiful people as do black and white parents,oh in case your wondering I'm one of the ugly so called pure race although my mother is Lithuanian Jewish and my father Church of England Welsh so i suppose that makes me a bit of a mongrel too or just a dog.

Answer 7

i'm blended and so is my newborn, and my better half. My better half is white French and black African. i'm white Irish and black Caribbean and my son is a mix of those. To be truthful human beings asserting your newborn would have id subject concerns. no longer truly. in case you make an effort as mothers and fathers to fully show your newborn on the two one among her mothers and fathers cultures etc then i do no longer see a controversy. I effective as hell have not got id subject concerns. Nor do i've got self belief the would desire to attempt and slot in with a particular ethnicity.

Answer 8

To paulrb8 it's good to know that you are a top contributor with views like that ..So by using your view point our current queen should not be because her line goes back to queen Victoria whose grand mother was queen Charlotte .Who just happens to be England's second black queen .Queen Phillipa the mother of Edward the third (the black prince ) being the first

Answer 9

Human race,

Answer 10

Hmmm!!
A tough one that because I'm mixed race. My biological father (black) is from Barbados and futher down the line from him he stems from Africa.

My mother (white) was born in England but my grandfather came from Wales and his father came from Scotland.

My grandmother on my mother's side came from Bavaria in Germany to whom she married my grandfather from Wales.

I suppose my answer to you is really it is not your parentage that matters. It just depends whether you see yourself as human being and enjoying other humans regardless of ethnicity.