I am not here to deny the profound significance of black-white racial relations to the nation’s history.
In California and other western states (including Hawaii), the black-white scenario has never been the governing model. For the eastern half of the United States, especially the Deep South, that model has been dominant throughout most of the country’s history. I suppose Harris is called a “black woman” because it reflects an old black-white paradigm of U.S. That makes Tiger Woods more Asian than black, yet, according to most news-media labeling, he is black. Some stories about Woods’ ethnic background say his father has a mixture of races and ethnicities, including Chinese. His father is only partially African-American.
#Black hair brown eyes female aisin professional#
In most early stories about him after his meteoric rise as a professional golfer, he was called an African American. The same thing happens to Tiger Woods, the golf superstar. But why is she mostly “a black woman” to some Bay Area reporters and editors? Why don’t most press stories, when they choose to label her ethnically, tell the whole truth? With that kind of racial and ethnic diversity and with many political, social, and cultural issues related to race and ethnicity still largely unresolved, it is no surprise that the local press makes it a habit of identifying a newly elected public official like Kamala Harris by ethnicity. MORE FROM POYNTER: Joe Biden is about to pick a female vice presidential running mate. People with West Asian roots (Persians or Iranians, Afghanis, and so-called Middle Easterners) are in California in growing numbers too.
Asians and African Americans are also a significant, but less numerous, presence. So, of course, are people who trace their ancestral roots to Europe. Latinos, or Hispanics, are a major presence in California. What about now? Even more so, California and San Francisco are “multicultural” to a fare-thee-well. (Native Americans and Spaniards were numerous before the Gold Rush.) Its population - and that of the region surrounding it - became more “multicultural” in a matter of months, but power resided with white men who took charge of the major public and private institutions. San Francisco (then called Yerba Buena) ballooned from a sleepy little village to a rousing, wild frontier city almost overnight. That monumental event attracted fortune-seekers from around the world. The Golden State has a rich, and racially and ethnically contentious history, ever since James Marshall discovered gold near Sutter’s Mill in the California foothills in 1848. Why may ethnic labeling be needed? Well, it’s California in the early 21st century. Now one sees such labels creeping back into stories. Once it was common to put a racial or ethnic label on criminal suspects. The press has been somewhat schizophrenic on this particular practice. That is certainly the case with slapping a racial or ethnic label on crime suspects. It is worth noting that racial and ethnic labeling is a journalistic tradition, usually loaded with controversy. I even recall reading that Harris is proud of her partial Asian heritage.īut most stories, when they used an ethnic label, limited her to being a “black woman.” Why was that? Doesn’t that simplistic - and misleading - label deny part of who she is? And why is any kind of ethnic labeling needed, in the first place? Racial labeling is controversial Her father is black her mother is of South Asian descent. It’s either a sign of social progress or “political correctness.”īut how accurate and how relevant are such ethnic and gender labels? In Harris’ case, not totally accurate and somewhat relevant.Ī minority of the stories I read about Harris leading up to her election provided information about her mixed ethnic background. It is common journalistic practice to note pioneering facts about prominent public figures - the first woman this, the first black that, the first Latino whatever, the first openly gay something or other. When Kamala Harris was elected as San Francisco’s district attorney in December, local press accounts made special mention that she was the “first black woman” to win that high office. This article was originally published on February 10, 2004.
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