Review by Choice Review
The author, a psychotherapist treating interracial children and their parents and herself a partner in an interracial marriage with two children, conducted a preliminary empirical study of how it is that interracial people achieve a sense of identity in a society with a still-rigid system of racial classification based on the rule of one drop of black blood. One hundred nineteen interviews were conducted with American-born, black/white young adults among whom "identity consolidation" would have occurred--largely middle-class college students, 18-20 years of age, whose parents are equally divided between white and black. The research focused on the function of the family, community, and schools, as well as phenotype and personal characteristics. Analysis and interpretation of the findings were informed by the relevant theoretical and historical literature in the social sciences and psychology. Although significant changes have occurred involving the nature of racism in the US with t he emergence of multiculturalism, the personal and public identity of an interracial person continues to be affected by the one drop rule--vague as it has become--and the cultural differences between the black and white communities. All academic collections. A. A. Sio emeritus, Colgate University
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Choice Review
