A View from the Middle

“What are you?” People of color have so much beef with this question and for good reason. At its heart it is an inquiry rooted in ignorance and misunderstanding of race, culture and the scope of human diversity. Regardless, it is a question that I have asked myself time and time again as a part of a long process of developing my identity as a mixed-race person. That being said, I am not mixed in that my parents are of different races. As I have thought about who I am, I have started to redefine what it means to be a mixed race person.

Phenotypically I am brown skinned, black haired, and brown eyed; and while I lived in Ecuador as an exchange student, friends and family referred to me as “negrito” from time to time. By this standard I am a person of color without a doubt. People still ask me “what are you” or “where do you come from” because of my initial appearance and I have come to understand the implications of my being a POC as I navigate PLU.

On the other hand, my learned culture is that of the dominant class. I was adopted from Colombia at 3 months by Caucasian parents (whom I love very dearly) into a rural town in southern Minnesota; and while they did their best to help me connect to the other side of my heritage as a Colombian (bilingual schooling, culture camps, attempts at cooking cultural cuisine) there is no replacement for truly being a part of that community. As a result, I grew up in an affluent, upper middle class household that afforded me all the privileges and socialization of Caucasians.

What am I then? Who do I owe allegiance to? How can I balance my identities when I know the horrible extent to which one has oppressed the other? How much of the struggle can I claim? Does this make me an ally or a leader in the struggle? There are no simple answers and I am still (and always will be) in the process of figuring it out. These questions are not only important to me but will be a topic of discussion that increases in relevance as the demographics of the US begin to undergo massive shifts due to trends that indicate a Latino majority by 2043. Acculturation and assimilation will create a generation of young people who will have to deal with these same issues and questions. Being able to incorporate these new identities into our communities and developing models that are applicable to their experiences will be essential to helping us understand what it means to be a POC in a changing world.

Theo Hofrenning

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