One-half, one-quarter, one-eighth, one drop. For centuries, Americans have used the one-drop rule as the deciding factor when determining someone’s race. No matter how little the amount, if there was any amount of black blood in your heritage, then you were considered black. But with younger generations seemingly discarding long held beliefs about race, does the one-drop rule still apply?
For the second time in its history, the U.S. Census has allowed participants to check multiple races and millions of Americans have responded positively. On the 2000 Census, 7 million people or 2.4 percent of the population identified themselves as more than one race. Of those 7 million, 784,764 identified themselves as both black and white. With the latest census results looming, experts are expecting those numbers to increase and with good reason.
Like many members of the younger generation, Gerald Yates, the 29-year-old son of an interracial relationship, embraces the concept of a multiracial identity. “I identify myself as biracial, I checked white and black on the census form, because I don’t feel society should tell me what I am. I just feel like if my mom is white and my dad is black, then I’m black and white. I relate more to the black culture, but that’s just because I’m a product of my environment, I really wasn‘t around white people at home. I tried to identify with white[s], but I wasn’t fully accepted, but, if you’re a product of two races, then you just are,” he said.
Although many seem to share Yates’ sentiment, others of multiracial heritage are choosing to identify as only one race, as did President Barack Obama, who checked “black” on his census form.
“It’s not as if I’d have been able to drink out of the white … water fountains during Jim Crow. And I most assuredly would’ve been a slave,” explains Steve Bumbaugh, a 43-year-old foundation owner born to a black father and a white mother. “As far as I’m concerned, that makes me black.”
Most experts on the other hand, explain that race is not a scientific concept but rather a social one and as social norms and structure alter with each generation, so does the concept of race. “[With] the complications of the classification system, the resistance that people are mounting, the weight of immigration and marriage mixing, young people are checking more than one box,” explains Nell Painter, a Princeton University history professor. “The system might just fall away.”
With America seemingly leaning toward becoming a society that’s more inclusive of multiracial identities, racial classifications will undoubtedly shift. The question is, is black America as a whole ready to embrace the idea that one drop can simply mean one drop? –nicholas robinson
Pictured above: Barack Obama Sr.; young Barack Obama with his mother, Ann Dunham.
