Browse Items (21 total)

  • Collection: American Identity

On Whiteness: A Video Essay (Videos)

Jamil Khoury explores the meanings and ramifications of whiteness, its promises and pitfalls, beneficiaries and victims, and his own complicated relationship to whiteness (existing somewhere between white and not quite white).

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Visualizing Race, Identity,and Change

Proof copy of a feature in National Geographic‘s October 125th anniversary issue that looks at the changing face of America in an article by Lise Funderburg, with portraits of multiracial families by Martin Schoeller, that celebrates the beauty of…

Don't Listen To Me (Music Video)

This is the first song on the album Excellent by LA native, Propaganda, a poet, political activist, husband, father, academic, & emcee. Propaganda is a part of Humble Beast a family of creatives, pastors, writers, theologians, and musicians who…

Convictions About Racism in the United States of America

In 1968 several individuals, including Horace Seldon, created Community Change Inc. (CCI). With its mission of working against racism and for racial justice, CCI has focused on institutional manifestations of white racism.

As founding director for…

My Race Problem - A consideration of touchy matters -- racial pride, racial solidarity, and racial loyalty -- rarely discussed.

Randall Kennedy asks a challenging question: What is the proper role of race in determining how I, an American black, should feel toward others? He rejects the usual responses of kinship and solidarity based on race and discusses their inherent…

American Identities: Reflections and Provocations from SUNY-Fredonia and Students

These are student blog posts from AMST/ENGL 296: American Identities taught by Professor Bruce Neal Simon at SUNY-Fredonia (Spring 2006 - ?)

Infographic: The American Identity According To Social Media

The Atlantic Monthly article highlights what social media strategy firm Hasai put together, an infographic, not focused on individual bits of information -- phone numbers and movie preferences, email addresses and gender -- but what a bunch of data…

Why do some poor kids thrive?

Researchers tracked hundreds of students in Baltimore to find out what top achievers had that others didn’t and they found this: "kids who found what researchers call an “identity project,” essentially a passion or hobby that helped motivate them,…

The Power of 'Identity Projects' in Launching a Life

Can it be that a hobby makes a difference? That a passion for dance or raising pigeons or Shakespeare can help kids from poor families in Baltimore finish high school and get on track for a life better than the one they were born into?

The…

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Baltimore Teens Find A Path Away From Violence Through Identity Projects

Ofori-Atta reports on a pair of sociologists who explain how nurturing kids' passions — whether for anime, customizing cars, or raising pigeons — has the power to reduce illegal behaviors.

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Choose Your Own Identity

Bonnie Tsui in this essay in The New York Times Magazine describes her struggle to explain the concept of race vs. culture and heritage to her 5-year old son, triggered by his comment, "You're Chinese. I'm not. But I eat Chinese food." Tsui is a…

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The Four Hijabs (Videos)

The Four Hijabs is an animated short film that uses an Arab-Feminist lens to explore the multiple meanings of four hijabs mentioned in 16 Quranic verses. The goal is to help American Muslims construct an anti-racist identity that does not oppress or…

The Difficulty of Being Simone Biles

According to O'Neale, Simone Biles might be the best gymnast ever. But her hardest trick may have been tuning out issues of family and race. In doing so, the young Simone Biles is also emerging as a torchbearer, thought leader and inspiring role…

The Immigrant's Fate is Everyone's

In this short essay, featured in Time's Reasons to Celebrate America special issue, the writer Nguyen asserts the power of choice in the shaping of an American identity. He writes: I am an immigrant. I am also a human being, an American, a…

Secular and Liminal: Discovering Heterogeneity among Religious Nones

This study examines the stability of religious preference among people who claim no religious preference in national surveys (i.e., religious nones). Using data from the Faith Matters Study, General Social Survey, and American National Election…

More than enough: Embracing multiple identities

Alanna Aiko Moore, Interim Assistant Department Head for Information Services and User Education and Librarian for Ethnic Studies and Gender Studies for the Social Science and Humanities Library, University of California, San Diego, shares a…

Asian-Latino Identity And Cultural Exploration Through Travel…And Food

Cynthia Mari Orozco, Librarian-in-Residence, Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, California writes about the role of food in her own identity. "Food is a powerful and subtle way in which communities share their culture, history, and identity…

Fielding The “What Are You?” Question

Anna Coats, Children’s Librarian at East Rutherford Memorial Library, Rutherford, New Jersey recounts a set of real-life conversations about the confusion her multi-ethnic and multi-cultural origins usually invoke. Coats, who is half Indian Guyanese…

What Racial Terms Make You Cringe?

This is the March 26, 2017 version of the Race/Related Newsletter from The New York Times, Some of the words that are aimed at are: Diversity hire. Ethnic. Exotic. Person of color. Urban.

Identity in America

IdentityinAmericaMarch2019.pdf
Using American Census data and story-telling, Anita Coleman shares how an American Identity is also an Anti-racist Identity. The US Census categorizes people using skin color labels but we're under no obligation to do so (e.g. "white" and "black"…

Social Identities and Systems of Oppressions

Systems of oppression are individual, institutional, and societal and their effects on people have a long history deeply rooted in American culture. American identity is nuanced and intersectional. Racism is only one of the ways in which inequities…