Half Middle Eastern Multiracials
Half-MENA Multiracials like Kim Kardashian & MLB Pitcher Yu Darvish are unaccounted for… much like their monoracial MENA peers
MENA = Middle Eastern/North African
MENA Monoracials
The Arab American Institute ( Arab American Inst., 2021) estimates the MENA population at roughly 3.67 million, highlighting how the U.S. Census Bureau estimate of 2.05 million undercounts the MENA population by ~1.62 million.
Table of Contents
· MENA Monoracials
∘ Providing a MENA Option
· MENA Multiracials
∘ SoCal Lab Data
∘ Half MENA — Half White
∘ MENA Interminority (i.e., non-White Multiracial)
∘ Racial-Religious Decoupling — Saugher Nojan, 2023
· Sidenotes
∘ Cohabitation, Sex, & Sexuality
∘ Cohabitation, Length of Relationship, & Interracial Relationships
∘ Cohabitation, Interethnic, & Interracial Relationships
∘ Blasians in China (VICE Asia, 2022)
· “0” > “ ” (Zero is larger than Nothing): ∘ Jarryd ∘ 🤖Chloe GPT
· Heritage Knowledge
∘ Asian Heritage
∘ White Heritage
· Tweets to Revisit
∘ Chocolat
∘ East Asian Males’ Height
∘ Multiracial Elf-Hyur & Hypodescent in Final Fantasy 14
∘ 9–24–1957: Little Rock
Providing a MENA Option
When a #MENA option is provided, 78.8% of MENA respondents select it & only 20% select White; however, when no MENA option is provided, 85.5% select White (Mathews et al., 2017; U.S. Census Bureau).
Given that the vast majority of MENA individuals would prefer to not identify as White (or be identified as White by others), the current coding system utilized by the US Census is leading to the erasure of MENA individuals as they are inaccurately being subsumed into the White ethnoracial category.
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MENA Multiracials
Given that monoracial MENA identities are being erased via inaccurate categorization as White, it should come as no surprise that there is little data on Multiracial MENA individuals.
SoCal Lab Data
Half MENA — Half White
= Kim Kardashian (half Armenian — half White)
MENA Interminority (i.e., non-White Multiracial)
= Yu Darvish (half Japanese — half Iranian)
— Among half-Middle Eastern Multiracials, those who are half-White were more likely to be in partial-racial interracial relationships (86.7%; mostly with White or part-White lovers) whereas non-White MENA Multiracials were more likely to be in 100% interracial relationships (81.8%; mostly with White or part-White lovers), χ2(1, N = 37) = 16.84, p < .001.
— This reflects Multiracials’ overall dating patterns as half-White Multiracials across all half-White groups are more likely to be in partial-racial relationships whereas non-White Multiracials across all interminority groups are more likely to be in 100% interracial relationships
Racial-Religious Decoupling — Saugher Nojan, 2023
“Unfortunately, the White racial designation included people from European, Middle Eastern, West Asian, and North African backgrounds despite their different social experiences of racialization, and it could not be disaggregated with the data available.
The UC application automatically sorted Multiracial students into racial groups with the lowest number of students.
Muslims face racism based on their racialized religious identities, yet few address their experiences through critical race theory or campus racial climate.
Hegemonic Whiteness embedded in higher education includes Christian normativity, which racializes non-Christians as outsiders who have to justify their needs and resources for their communities.”
Sidenotes
Cohabitation, Sex, & Sexuality
— Bisexual women & men were descriptively (though not significantly) more likely to live with girlfriends than with boyfriends.
Cohabitation, Length of Relationship, & Interracial Relationships
— Cohabitation is more likely among those in intraracial relationships (15.1%) than among those in partial-racial (11.0%) or 100% interracial #relationships (8.1%), χ2(2, N = 1229) = 11.05, p = .004.
Cohabitation, Interethnic, & Interracial Relationships
— Race matters more than ethnicity as daters in same-race relationships are more likely to live together than those in interracial relationships.
Blasians in China (VICE Asia, 2022)
Being #Multiracial is often considered a privilege in China, yet Blackness can be stigmatized. Wasian models are prolific on Chinese social media, but the same preference isn’t given to Blasians, even though they are a growing demographic.
“0” > “ ” (Zero is larger than Nothing)
Jarryd
When sorting values in SPSS & Excel from largest to smallest, a value of 0 (zero) is higher than a cell with nothing.
Thus: Zero is larger than Nothing. “0” > “ ”
🤖Chloe GPT
“Zero is a form of nothingness, but not all forms of nothingness are zero. An empty cell could be seen as a form of nothingness that is even “emptier” than zero, because it lacks even the presence of zero.”
Heritage Knowledge
Asian Heritage
Latinasians are more likely to know all of their ethnic heritages (84.6%) than Wasians (30.3%) & Blasians (8.3%), χ2(4, N = 229) = 48.06, p < .001. Note that Wasians (60.1%) & Blasians (66.7%) are equally knowledgeable of their East Asian heritage.
White Heritage
Descriptively, majority-White Multiracials are more likely to report knowledge of their White ethnic heritage (57.1%) than half-White Multiracials (32.3%) or majority-minority Multiracials (28.1%).
Tweets to Revisit
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Chocolat
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East Asian Males’ Height
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Multiracial Elf-Hyur & Hypodescent in Final Fantasy 14
It’s easier for someone half-Hyur/half-catperson to identify as Hyur whereas one drop of Elf blood leads to social ascriptions of Elezen identity for #Multiracial Elves in a way that reifies the Hyur-Elf binary & elides positionalities that disrupt monoracial essentialism.
When other npcs only acknowledge Hilda as an Elf it reflects the microaggression of hypodescent, a racialization process in which Multiracials are socially ascribed their most subaltern identity.
9–24–1957: Little Rock
— President Eisenhower sent US soldiers to escort 9 Black students past threatening White mobs & integrate Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas.
— News cameras broadcast the event nationally & newspapers ran photographs worldwide (Metcalf, 1983).
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More To Revisit
Kris Yi, 2023
— “The election of a racist president, DT, & the deadly waves of anti-Asian hate attacks exposed the Model Minority Myth. The illusion of inclusion obscured recognition of the sexualized objectification of Asian women & feminization of Asian men.
— Young Asian-Americans are suffering from eating disorders to achieve White thin body standards (Akoury et al., 2019; Ijima Hall, 1995), & are going to the extreme measure of creating double eyelids through surgical means (Ouellette, 2009) to achieve the Western look.”
College & Identity — Chong & Song, 2022
“Cultural conditioning can be at odds with ascribed racial identity. Seemingly contradictory identifications can coexist (Tashiro, 2011).” Multiracials can contest and defy racial boundaries, and even the meaning of race, by defining their own identities, including as Multiracials — even if those asserted identities are not always validated by others (King and DaCosta 1996; King-O’Riain, 2004).
Twine (1996) discusses a case study of Black-White #Multiracial females who co-constructed identities as White girls during adolescence & then re-constructed a Black or Multiracial identity after moving to a university campus.
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Multiracial Immigration Laws
The Amerasian Immigration Act of 1982
— AIA granted preferential immigration status to Amerasian Multiracials born in Vietnam, Korea, Laos, Cambodia, or Thailand between 1950 and Oct 22 1982, fathered by U.S. citizens.
The Amerasian Homecoming Act
This law allowed Vietnamese applicants to establish a #Multiracial identity by appearance.
Essentially, US Immigration used the “What Are You” question to grant refugee benefits.
#Multiracial Immigrants — Thomas, 2015
“The process of determining which Amerasians qualified for the AHA based on their physical appearance forced American authorities in Vietnam to racially categorize the Amerasians into their own subjective concept of an American appearance.
The reliance on racial rationale by American interviewers to determine which applicants “looked” American formally designated approved Amerasians the children of American fathers.
For those Amerasians whose physical appearance was less distinctly Black or White or whose fathers were non-Black or non-White Americans, the hyper-reliance on race was also a tool of exclusion [as] interviewers denied valid Amerasian applicants.”
Tweets For Future Commodification Article
Blasians in Japan — Washington, 2017
— Organizers of Miss Japan wanted to present Ariana Miyamoto to the global audience of the Miss Universe arena to market Japan as a globalized country as embodied by “their obviously transnational contestant.
— This is based on the ways in which Multiracials’ bodies are ascribed with notions of tolerance & pluralism, which are among the default norms for international interaction/business in the era of globalization.”
Spain & #Multiracial Commodification — Natalie S. Ohio, 2023
“Many praise being mixed with White for the palatability that it engenders since it’s not too big of a departure from the standard. It feels like they’re saying:
“You’re beautiful because you’re not too Black.”
Multiracials in Disney — Paloma Larson, 2016
The media, as a business, has turned the #Multiracial identity into a commodity.
Young audiences are more likely than older audiences to watch television featuring Multiracial actors. Multiracial actor Vin Diesel (The Fast and the Furious ) stated that he publicly shares his Multiracial identity to better relate to his young fans.
Ignoring Multiracial presence in the media allows producers of television programs to shape and construct expectations that are projected onto the Multiracial community.
Santa Ana, 2008
The #Multiracial face has become an icon for America’s global economy… Its use is particularly obvious as a lucrative commodity in multinational apparel & beauty industries, [suggesting that] there is significant profit to be made by “cashing in on that mixed-race look”
In today’s fashion industry, to be #Multiracial is an aesthetic of diversity, in which the “ethnically ambiguous” face now represents the “new American beauty” Multinational corporations commercialize racial mixture in their advertising as a stylization of global commerce.
What’s interesting about this corporate deployment of multiraciality is its use of Asian hybridity to fuel desires for a planetary market. [Ads for] global tech frequently use models with Asian features to advertise products promoting the borderlessness of information technology.
Multiracial iD Card (Tweet)
Anna on Twitter:
“I’m so fed up with how many questions I get about mixes that I made a card like this and always carry it in my commuter pass.
HafuTalk, 2020
Yoko Wakatsuki & CNN International, 2020
— “Anna made small “meeting cards” to give to nosy strangers with info on which one of her parents is Japanese & American, and stating that it’s rude to ask someone you’ve just met personal questions about their race and appearance.”
— “I prefer the term “mikusu” (mixed) because it involves more people, but I’d just prefer not to be called anything.”