In THE MIXED RACE EXPERIENCE, the founders of the anti-racist platform Everyday Racism share their experience of growing up mixed race in Britain, how they continue to process, understand and learn about their identity and use their privilege to advocate for change, as well as addressing the privileges and complexities of being mixed race in Britain today.
THE MIXED RACE EXPERIENCE
by Natalie and Naomi Evans
Square Peg, February 2022
(via Mushens Entertainment)
In the last census, Britain recorded over 1.2 million people who identified as mixed race. 6% of children under the age of 5 identify as mixed race, a higher number than any other Black and ethnic minority group in the country. So, why is it so hard for mixed race people to navigate their identity?
Weaving in real life stories from people in the UK who identify as being mixed race, are in a mixed race relationship or are raising mixed race children, practical advice and research to dispel common myths and stereotypes, this book is for anyone who needs help navigating a world that still struggles to understand mixed race people. From what it’s like to grow up in a majority white area and handling racism in your own family to understanding colourism, navigating mixed race microaggressions and internalised racism, this book is a thought provoking, sensitive, challenging and deeply moving look at identity and belonging.
Natalie Evans is a 31-year-old Events Manager, an anti-racist educator, speaker and writer from Kent. She has managed various festivals and is currently the Events Manager for a new youth festival, which will launch in 2021. Natalie is of Black Jamaican and White British heritage and has experienced racism both overtly and covertly throughout her life. She grew up in white majority town before moving to Brighton in 2015. She has recently moved back to her hometown and reflected on her experiences of racism both growing up and in her workplace. She co-founded Everyday Racism in May 2020 with her sister Naomi, after a video of her confronting two men racially abusing a ticket conductor went viral on twitter.
Naomi Evans is a 37-year-old Head of Drama at a secondary school in the South East of England, an anti-racist educator, speaker and writer. She has been a teacher since completing her PGCE at the London Institute of Education in 2005 and has a wealth of experience in training and leadership within the education system. Naomi is of Black Jamaican and White British heritage and has experienced racism both overtly and covertly throughout her life. She is working to influence change in education to ensure the curriculum is not just taught through a white lens. She is also interested in the representation of parenthood in the UK since becoming a mother herself. She has been married for 10 years and is the mother of two young children.
Samantha Johnson is a forty-year-old, American influencer who runs a wellness empire – Shakti. With an Oscar-winning adaptation of her NYT-bestselling memoir under her belt, a powerful brand as a nononsense motivational speaker, and a booming business which she is about to sell in a multi-milliondollar deal, she has the world at her feet. She’s also launching a new book, CHASTE, in which she talks about her relationship with her sexuality. After writing a viral essay about her teenaged sexual awakening with her (female) best friend, she comes off stage after a sell-out event to some shocking news from her manager. That female best friend, Lisa, is demanding the magazine retract the essay – she never consented to this experience being shared, and what Samantha sees as a powerful erotic moment she sees very differently. She sees it as abuse. Samantha decides to return to the small town she grew up in, to confront Lisa, and convince her to drop the allegations. Once she’s back home, however, Samantha finds herself immediately wrongfooted by Lisa, now married to her high-school sweetheart, and the perfect suburban mom. Forced to confront the past she has whitewashed for years, she finds herself questioning her own memories. For both women have very different versions of how their relationship ended – so whose ‘truth’ is really a lie?
When Saffy’s beloved grandmother, Rose, goes into a care home Saffy learns that she has inherited her Cotswolds cottage. But as work begins on much-needed renovations, the body of a young woman is uncovered in the garden. Who is she? During Rose’s more lucid moments, she reveals snippets of information that Saffy pieces together. And then another body is discovered. As she delves into Rose’s past, Saffy uncovers dark secrets, calling into question everything she thought she knew about her family.
Sydney, 2019. Twenty-five-year-old Asha, who has grown up in Australia, knows very little of her mother’s past in India. As far as her Amma is concerned, the past doesn’t matter, it’s their future that counts. But when Asha’s paternal grandfather is taken ill, her beloved father requests that they return to Madurai to see him, and he wants the whole family to go. Asha is fascinated by what her mother is hiding, and determined to discover the truth about her background: knowing all the while that she is also hiding something from her family.
After a near-death experience in Snowdonia, journalist Cecily Wong swore she’d never go to the mountains again. But when she’s offered the career opportunity of a lifetime – to interview world famous mountaineer Charles McVeigh as he completes his record-breaking mission in Nepal – she has no choice but to take it. There’s just one caveat: she has to summit the mountain first. It’s a mammoth task that Cecily fears she cannot handle, especially when disaster strikes before they’ve even left for base camp in the form of an earthquake that seriously injures one of the team, and an anonymous note left pinned to her tent, warning her there’s a murderer on the mountain.