Figure 11.1. Multiracial American Voices: Identity – Pew Research Center [YouTube Video]. Please start this chapter by watching a short video where people share their experiences being multiracial in the United States.

“What are you?” This question carries a number of meanings and can put additional pressures on nonwhite people as they navigate the balance between their identities, family history, and how others perceive them. To learn about how others respond to the question “What are you?”, you can refer to this short clip: Multiracial American Voices: What Are You – Pew Research Center [YouTube Video]

As you learned from the stories shared at the beginning of this chapter, identities are complicated. At times the perceived status of one’s racial or ethnic group creates additional pressures for people to explain who they are. For those that are multiracial, there can be an additional amount of emotional work involved in explaining who they are, particularly if their appearance doesn’t align with what others may expect for a given racial category. For example, Roo shared the struggles he faced with the need to prove his racial category membership by using a narrative that outlines his connections to the Catawba Indian community.

Roo’s story also highlights the complexities of intersectionality as he reflects on his identities and how they fit together. Rather than stacking categories of experience, he encourages us to think about how he has to understand what it means to be a man who is Native American, white, and gay.

Almost seven percent of all U.S. adults identify as having at least two races in their background. Studies from the Pew Research center indicate that most Americans are proud of their multiracial background and find that their experiences help them be more open to other cultures (Parker et. al. 2015). With interracial marriages on the rise and the increasing diversity in the United States, we can expect these numbers to grow. For instance, the number of multiracial or multiethnic U.S. infants has nearly tripled since 1980 (Livingston 2017).

How can we use our sociological imagination to understand the complexities of race? How can we use theorectical perspectives on race in sociology to help us understand patterns in interaction and practices of discrimination? How do we develop racialized identities – and how does this process vary for whites and non-whites? What is institutionalized discrimination and why does it persist? These questions about race, identity, and inequities are the focus of this chapter.