“You think you’re Black?” Exploring Black mixed-race experiences of Black rejection

Karis Campion

doi:10.1080/01419870.2019.1642503

Abstract

ABSTRACTUtilizing interview data with thirty-seven British people of Mixed White and Black Caribbean heritage, this paper draws upon the concept of “horizontal hostility” to describe how Black mixed-race experiences of Black rejection impact on self-perceptions and expressed ethnic identities. In demonstrating the effects of being excluded from a relatable collective Black identity, the paper argues that horizontal hostility is critical in the project of theorizing mixed-race. Experiences of horizontal hostility represent significant turning points in mixed-race lives as they can prompt reconsiderations of mixed-race positionings within the broader Black imagined space. Beyond the benefits that horizontal hostility offers to mixed-race studies, it provides insights into conceptualisations of Blackness – as a collective racial identity, community and politics. The article unpacks how, when and why its boundaries are policed, adding to debates relating to the future formation and maintenance of ethnic group identities and categories more generally.

Highlights

This paper draws on the concept of “horizontal hostility” to explore and describe the complex ways in which Black mixed-race1 people can, on occasion, encounter discourses of Blackauthenticity in interactions with their Black counterparts and as a consequence, feel rejected from a collective Black identity
A great deal of research shows that Black mixed-race subjects tend to be racialized as Black and experience very similar social locations to their Black counterparts (Brunsma and Rockquemore 2001; Song and Aspinall 2012; Joseph-Salisbury 2018), much less is known about the occasions when Black mixed-race people feel rejected from a collective Black identity
Utilizing data from a larger study (Campion 2017), this paper aims to expand our understandings of mixed-race experiences by asking how Black mixed-race people negotiate being rejected from a collective Black identity they feel invested in

Summary

Introduction

This paper draws on the concept of “horizontal hostility” to explore and describe the complex ways in which Black mixed-race people can, on occasion, encounter discourses of Black (in)authenticity in interactions with their Black counterparts and as a consequence, feel rejected from a collective Black identity. A great deal of research shows that Black mixed-race subjects tend to be racialized as Black and experience very similar social locations to their Black counterparts (Brunsma and Rockquemore 2001; Song and Aspinall 2012; Joseph-Salisbury 2018), much less is known about the occasions when Black mixed-race people feel rejected from a collective Black identity. The paper applies horizontal hostility through an intersectional lens, utilizing gender and social generation as central analytical frameworks. Both emerge as key variables that affect how acutely the experiences of Black rejection are felt.

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Conclusion