Learning From Your Children: Multiracial Parents’ Identifications and Reflections on Their Own Racial Socialization

Abstract

Despite the growing importance of racially mixed people and families in Britain, in demographic terms, relatively little is known about the life experiences of multiracial people at disparate stages of their lives, as most studies focus on their identifications at one point in time. In fact, we know very little about how multiracial people are influenced by the life-changing events of partnering and becoming a parent: How may multiracial people’s racial identities be shaped by the experiences of having children? To date, the extant literature has focused on how parents in interracial unions racially identify their multiracial children or how multiracial individuals identify themselves, especially in adolescence and young adulthood. However, little is known of what happens when mixed people themselves become parents or how their own sense of selves may be impacted by their second-generation mixed children and their children’s own identifications and experiences.