Mixed-race U.S. Americans are one of the fastest-growing populations in the United States, according to The Pew Research Center. In 2017, 10% of all children in the U.S. were mixed-race, up from just 1% in the 1970s. Evidence from The American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry indicates that this number will only go up: In 2016, they reported that “47% of white teens, 60% of black teens, and 90% of Hispanic teens said they had dated someone of another race.”
It is for these reasons that interviewees Justyn Melrose’s and Danielle Douez’s experiences are becoming more common. Justyn is Costa Rican and Irish, while Danielle is African American, Colombian, and white. Both of them are mixed-race, and both of them have lived in several states up and down the east coast. Danielle, especially, has traveled back and forth from the U.S. to France, where her father, who is white and African American, lives.
Justyn Melrose is a mixed Latinx writer and journalist. A product of a queer, interfaith, and multi-racial family, he came into news writing to share the common stories that are uncommon to the spotlight. Melrose was born in Tampa, Florida, grew up in Northampton, Massachusetts, and now lives in Greensboro, North Carolina. Here, he discusses his own experiences being mixed and from a mixed-race family:
Danielle Douez spent three years as a politics editor for The Conversation, where she focused on covering immigration policy, the criminal justice system, and race. Douez, the daughter of immigrants, is originally from Washington D.C.
This episode was produced by Julián Esteban Torres López, Aïcha Martine Thiam, and Nicole Zelniker.
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