RACE|PSYCHOLOGY|POLITICS
Mixed Like Me
What it means to me as a biracial woman to feel seen, supported, and celebrated on a global stage
Mulatto is a word I heard over and over again as a child growing up in the streets of Philadelphia. I didn’t know what it meant at first since my family never referred to me as such. They just called me mixed, half black, half white. I actually thought that the word mulatto sounded cool and exotic, but I hated the fact that there were so few of us.
It wasn’t until I was in middle school or high school that I, along with other peers, became more racially aware and sensitive that the word mulatto had some negative connotations associated with it, so I stopped using it.
By the late 20th century, in the wake of the accomplishments of the civil rights movement in the 1950s and ’60s, the number of persons of mixed “racial” ancestry was rapidly increasing and the term mulatto had come to be regarded as offensive. Instead, Americans of mixed Black-white ancestry often preferred to identify themselves as biracial, mixed, or simply “other.
Throughout my school years, I filled out countless forms for various reasons. When it came to filling in the circle or checking the box to declare my race or ethnicity, I always chose Black…
