Black and White and Married in the Deep South: A Shifting Image

[no_hypocrisy]

-snip-

In the first comprehensive accounting of multiracial Americans since statistics were first collected about them in 2000, reporting from the 2010 census, made public in recent days, shows that the nation’s mixed-race population is growing far more quickly than many demographers had estimated, particularly in the South and parts of the Midwest. That conclusion is based on the bureau’s analysis of 42 states; the data from the remaining eight states will be released this week.

In North Carolina, the mixed-race population doubled. In Georgia, it expanded by more than 80 percent, and by nearly as much in Kentucky and Tennessee. In Indiana, Iowa and South Dakota, the multiracial population increased by about 70 percent.

“Anything over 50 percent is impressive,” said William H. Frey, a sociologist and demographer at the Brookings Institution. “The fact that even states like Mississippi were able to see a large explosion of residents identifying as both black and white tells us something that people would not have predicted 10 or 20 years ago.”

Census officials were expecting a national multiracial growth rate of about 35 percent since 2000, when seven million people — 2.4 percent of the population — chose more than one race. Officials have not yet announced a national growth rate, but it seems sure to be closer to 50 percent.

-more-

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/20/us/20race.html?_r=1&hp=&pagewanted=print

[callous taoboy]

1. Absolutely beautiful! n/t

[hadrons]

2. I remember a woman who went to Raleigh, North Carolina 5 years ago and ...

noticed all the large - or larger than expected - number of White male/Black female couples (more so than she saw in NYC)

[no_hypocrisy]

3. My cousin married her husband, an African-American, in the 70s.

Some family rejected their marriage; some family welcomed him.

I was a child and not told about who my cousin married but was left with the impression it "wasn't good". When our mutual cousin shared me a photo of her (5'1") with her husband, (6'2"), I didn't see "a problem", and rhetorically asked "Is it because he isn't Jewish?"

I got to know my cousin-in-law and he's really a terrific person. We've always been able to talk, joke together, you know, mutual friendship.

They raised their family in Columbia, Maryland in the Eighties as it was a community was "progressive".

Unfortunately they're divorced although they remain on good terms. Both their daughters and I are close. They all live in the same city. I'd say that society welcomed them as a family better than our family did.

[Courtesy Flush]

4. It's not uncommon at all here in South Louisiana

It's ironic that the region most known for racism is the place that has embraced interracial marriage more than anywhere else. People don't even raise an eyebrow at mixed unions, and I'm in a small town.

[old mark]

5. I am interested to see such numbers in the South...I lived in North Carolina and Georgia

in the late 1960's till 1971, and it was quite different then. It used to be that people were shunned for marrying outside their religion or ethnicity. I am very happy to see this falling away...there might be hope for us here in the US yet...


mark

[Tuesday Afternoon]

6. This is news, only if you live outside the south and under a rock. K&R