nobody but yourself
1
a day late
I really missed the boat on this one. A few days ago my mom emailed me a link to some old Life magazine photos taken immediately after Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination, but I was working out of town and not paying attention.
The Plane That Would Take Dr. King’s Remains to Montgomery
An airplane dispatched by the U.S. government to retrieve Dr. King’s body and return it to Montgomery, Alabama, waits on the tarmac in Memphis. “Here we were, two White guys in the Deep South right after the murder of the preeminent leader of the black community, and we’re taking pictures. Voyeurs, in a sense. We were apprehensive about it. But when we got there, there were no big problems for us.”
jalopies
I’ve never heard this one before…..
Half Black Geese
Monday, Jun. 28, 1937
Sirs:
Relative your article TIME, June 7 on the word “jalopy” and Webster R. Kent’s comments (TIME, June 21), I think you are both in error. Approximately ten years ago while in a Los Angeles café with the late Herbert Somborn, ex-husband of Gloria Swanson, approximately eight mulatto dancing girls appeared. Mr. Somborn exclaimed: “What beautiful jalopies!” Pressing him for information, he stated that a jalopy was anything half black and that the word originated in a certain part of Africa, where plurals are unknown, and a jalopy is a African half black geese.
weheartit.com
In case you hadn’t noticed, I spend a lot of time surfing the internets and I easily become addicted to entertaining websites. Thank goodness the addictions are usually short-lived. Here’s the latest: http://weheartit.com/. I’m still not exactly sure how it works just yet, but there are SO many fun things to look at. This is the first picture I saw on there…
It was love at first sight! I have a little confession to make…. I LOVE Snow White!! She’s my favorite Disney character. It’s always felt a little “wrong” for me as a (formerly) one-dropped biracial girl to love someone named Snow White. Identity issues much? I don’t think so, but I assumed everyone else would.
the shack
I finally finished reading The Shack. I really enjoyed it and am not sure why I put it down for a month and a half. Anyway, I highly recommend it. Especially if you’re someone who, like me, is a big fan of God but not of Religion. Written by Wm. Paul Young, it contains little pearls of wisdom. I did a lot of underlining. I think I’ll post a quote every now and then. I had a hard time choosing one to start with, but finally settled on this one:
“The will to power and independence has become so ubiquitous that it is now considered normal….It is the human paradigm…so prevalent that it goes unseen and unquestioned. It is the matrix; a diabolical scheme in which you are hopelessly trapped even while completely unaware of its existence.”
Halle Berry 17 years ago
It’s hard to believe that Halle Berry’s been on my radar screen for about 20 years now. I have lots of respect for her, so I am in no way picking on her (or her mother) by questioning some of the things she said in this article from Ebony magazine in 1992. I wonder if she still feels the same way today. I wonder if Nahla has had an impact on Halle’s concept of black, white, and biracial. I wonder if I’ll ever get to have a conversation with her about it!
Norment, Lynn. “Halle Barry: strictly business about show business.” Ebony. 1992
Confronting life’s obstacles is nothing new for Berry, who overcame the potentially damaging problem of being born to a Black father and White mother in a racist society.
Berry’s father left when Halle was 4, and she and her sister, Heidi, were raised by her mother, Judith. Race was never a problem, Berry says, growing up in Cleveland’s inner-city neighborhoods. All that changed when they moved to a racially mixed suburb and young Halle began hearing the taunts–“half-breed,” “mulatto” and “Oreo cookie”–and wondered what it all meant.
Judith Berry didn’t mince words.
“I’m White, and you are Black,” was her mother’s explanation. “Sure I can say that I’m biracial and technically I am,” says Halle, “but, as my mother said to me: ‘What do you see when you look in the mirror? You see what everyone else sees. They don’t know who your mother is, and they aren’t going to care.””
Since that conversation, Berry has called herself Black and now sees benefits from both of her heritages. She has little sympathy, she says, for individuals who use their biracial backgrounds as excuses for their troubles.
“I think the problems are made worse when people get on talk shows and make statements like, ‘I had a hard time because I was caught in the middle,” she says. “It doesn’t have to be that way. I think being biracial is one of the best things in the world.”
Norment, Lynn. “Halle Barry: strictly business about show business.” Ebony. 1992
I don’t really appreciate the “potentially damaging problem of being born to a Black father and White mother” statement. To me it seems like Norment had “tragic mulatto” on her mind when she wrote this. When I look at that picture of Halle Berry and her mother, I can see the resemblance. I wonder if what other people see and care about still matters more to people than what they as an individual see and care about in terms of their own sense of self. I mean, my retort would be “when I look in the mirror I see you somewhere in my reflection, and why should I not care who my mother is because ‘they’ won’t?”
the dark tenth
Here’s another gem from my highbeamresearch.com excursion. An excerpt from a Time Magazine article published in 1931. My favorite parts of this one are: “practically from the beginning acquired white blood”- like it just magically happened, “conditions imposed by their maternity”- now it would most frequently be imposed by their paternity, and the 80% thing. People often say (or throw in my face) that “we’re all mixed, we’re all biracial- get over it.” I completely understand that we’re all mixed, but before reading this article I imagined that all blacks are mixed because of the aforementioned “acquiring” of white blood. And when I imagined that I thought of it coming directly from a white person. But this old article points out that the white blood often comes from “Negroes and mulattoes…marrying mainly among their own color and so distributing the primary blood mixtures more and more evenly throughout the new race.” It seems obvious (it is obvious), I just never thought of it in that way.
Browns
“biracial”
I’ve noticed in my latest research that in the ’50s and ’60s “biracial” described committees, boards, commissions, councils, governments, mediation teams, towns, schools, and groups. Not people. People were “mulatto” and things were biracial. Actually groups of black and white people were biracial. Now we’d say interracial, I guess. It is interesting to notice the shift in the language. I think the definitions are ever-changing. That’s why I have a love-hate relationship with words. I love them, but they can be fickle and misleading.
Kinda like, I know that when I say “monoracial” all the time that the proper term is “uniracial.” But to me uniracial is the big prize. It’s the word we get to use when the illusion of race has been globally recognized for the fallacy that it is and we’re uniracial. Belonging to the human race. We have various cultures and all, but basically we’re people and there’s only one race of us. So I’m saving uniracial. We don’t get to use it yet.
I totally did not intend to bring that up in this post.
Anyway, the first instance I found of a person being labeled biracial was in The New York Times on March 1, 1987- “LIVING IN TWO WORLDS. By Maxine B. Rosenberg. Photographs by George Ancona. A low-key and affecting photo essay about the fewer than two percent of children in the United States who are biracial.”
Biracial shows up thrice more in 1987 in reference to foster/adopted children. Through the early ’90s “biracial” is used mostly for the aforementioned groups with a noted increase in the use of the word as a racial categorization as the articles become more recent.
This brings me back to my defense of my use of the word “mulatto.” Most of my childhood was spent in the 1980’s when people were still referred to as mulatto and “things” as biracial. But “mulatto” was a bad word not to be spoken, so I was either nothing, “other”, or black. Everyone like me was. As I see it, this validated and perpetuated the one-drop rule. And threw shadows of shame onto my true identity. It gave me no chance and no choice to form an identity from a foundation of wholeness. I think this word “mulatto” is a larger piece of this race puzzle than most people think.
I mean, I definitely don’t want to be associated with that and if that‘s what people think of as “mulatto” I’d rather deny my whole self and be black which is exactly what “they” wanted when “they” created the system because the system will crash if too many people come to know that there is no great divide between the two races and that a person can actually be both black and white simultaneously.
The system is crashing.
mulatto in history
Lately I’ve been perusing articles tagged ‘biracial’ and ‘mulatto’ on a research website. I’ve found some interesting stuff (not this particular photo tho). Most interesting to me in this story is the white woman/black man combo, the fact that Rose has no last name, and the description of mulattoes as “children of such unnatural and inordinate copulation.” I think we’re still combating this notion, just as blacks are still combating the “soulless, less than human” one.
On the petition of Rose the Mullato Daughter of Mary Davis of ye Province of Maryland against Mr. Henry Darnall about her Freedom Consideration.
Rose Davis is a mulatto woman, born to indentured servant Mary Davis from London and a former slave, Dominggoe, who were married at the time of Rose’s birth.
Rose Davis has been bound-out until the age of 31. On Aug. 11, 1715, Rose turned 31 and was not given her freedom as prescribed by the Laws of Assembly in the Province of Maryland.
The law states that “Issues of such or children of such unnatural and inordinate copulation, shall be servants till they arrive at the age of Thirty One Years.” Her owner Henry Darnall, of this County, has determined that he will not release her from servitude and will keep her as a slave for life.
With so many interracial relationships in the Province between whites and African Americans, the laws were especially harsh against white women and African-American men, in order to keep a larger free African-American population from rising in the Province of Maryland.There are numerous stories and court cases in all counties of Maryland where free people were unjustly held as slaves because of their color and inability to fight against wealthy planters. There also were lawsuits brought against owners because parents felt servitude was harsh, or that their children were being abused. In the case of these children of two races, the females suffered as they could be used as courtesans not unlike the quadroons and octaroons of New Orleans and the mulattoes of Africa.
Maryland manumission records for the Darnells and their cousins / in-laws the Carrolls, show that providing freedom to slaves or mulattoes, regardless of their status, was rare.
What evidence could Rose bring to the courts that would help her win her freedom? Would the family who loved her be there to support her claim?
Only one could make this claim to her birthright and loved her more than anyone: her mother, Mary Davis. Mary a former indentured servant, provided Rose with the family Bible to use as evidence for the upcoming trial.
On 13 March 1716, the Court proceeded with Rose’s petition and her counsel provided the following opening statement:
“The petition hereby showeth that your petitioner being a baptized Mulatto descended by the mother of Christian Race as appears from the evidence of her said mother is ready to provide as well as other testimony’s if need be to confirm the same, and being arrived to the age of thirty one years the 11 day of August 1715, at the time she supposes the servitude imposed in such unhappy issue, expires. They humbly pray the benefit by Law allowed to those in her unhappy circumstances and that she may accordingly receive a free manumission from the said servitude which hand-scribed evidence mentioned in ye petition follows, in the words of her mother.”
“I Mary Davis of Richard Davis, of Mark Lane in the City of London in England where I was born do give this Bible unto my son Thomas, begotten in wedlock on my body by a Negroe called Dominggoe, once a servant to Joseph Tilley of Hunting Creek in Calvert County where I was married to him…. that you may know she my said daughter came of a Christian race by her mother, a true copy take out of the aforesaid Bible.”
What Mary really said was she had come to love and marry a former slave, entered into holy wedlock because of their love for one another and gave birth to two free children. Or so they thought.
On the 8th day of November, in the year of our Lord, 1716, the decision of the Court was read:
“Mature deliberation It is thereupon considered by the Justices that the said Rose the Mulatto and the petitioner aforesaid, serve during LIFE as a slave and that her master, Mr. Henry Darnall pay court fees.”
Rose Davis was one of many family members who could not be rescued from slavery, even in accordance with the laws.
Janice Hayes-Williams. “Our legacy: Mulatto children often kept as slaves despite laws at time.”Maryland Gazette. 2006.
Fmylife
My Twistori obsession has subsided and I am now fond of wasting my time at Fmylife.com. I’m still flying high from the news in yesterday’s post, so I’m not feeling particularly schadenfreude-istic right now. That being said, I still get a kick out of FML.
According to the site…
Fmylife.com contains a daily dose of short anecdotes, based on a simple recipe: in a few sentences, users can tell everyone the shitty moment which ruined their day. These short stories must begin with “Today” and end with “FML”. On top of being a huge release for the person telling their story, delightfully proving that “f*** ups” happen to everybody every day, fmylife.com also aims to be funny for everyone involved, as well as a way to share your misfortunes with other unlucky individuals, bearing in mind that self deprecation and a sense of irony are essential!
Many of them cause me to lol and smh. Here are a few random fmls.
Today, while at the Golden Gate Bridge, I spotted a large group of asians trying to take a picture. Trying to be a diplomat, I slowly say “You... want me... take picture?” while using hand motions. The man looks at me and says “No thanks asshole. I got it.” in plain english. FML
Today, I was mowing the lawn of my brand new house, located in a very nice neighborhood (I am a hispanic male), and a lady in her nice white cadillac drove up and asked me, in extremely broken spanish, if I could mow her lawn too. FML
Today, the girl whom I have loved for 4 years told me that she loved me too and would like to spend her life with me. This was before she told me that God did not want us to be together. FML
Today, at lunch I ordered a coke. The waiter replied “diet coke?” and I corrected him saying, “No, regular coke.” He shook his head and said again, “diet coke.” FML
Today, I babysat for two little girls, who wanted to play ‘mermaids’. I smiled, and said that I would love to play with them. The older girl laughed, saying “You can’t be a mermaid. Mermaids are pretty.” FML
Today, I got a letter from Princeton that said i got accepted. I jumped for joy screaming at the top of my lungs.My little brother walks in laughing with his camcorder on record. He played a joke on me and gave me the real letter. I was denied. FML
Today, I texted my college boyfriend to tell him how terrible I felt about cheating. He replied saying he was so relieved because he had been cheating on me with a girl in his dorm. I was talking about my math exam. FML
If you’re feeling blue, check it out. Someone is bound to be having a worse day than you.
mulatto diaries 