going back to wv always messes with me. while the rose colored glasses of my youth are definitely broken, i always feel drawn to that town, that ridge. I'm thinking a lot about my family history and current events.

I won't pretend to Know what black people are going through right now or what they face every single day. I'm majority white and definitely passing. but my family is a "racial hybrid" apparently and part of a "tri-racial isolate" and race/ethnicity is deeply confusing

and messy in my family. both of my dad's parents are listed as "negro (black)" in the 1940 census. I grew up knowing people would find me lacking because of my last name and I became well aware that people would comment on my ethnicity/appearance.

there's no point to this thread really except I'm thinking and want to get it out. my parents talk about how they were denied a lease in the 80s whenever the owner saw their last name. I listened to my best friend talk about how her dad fired a distant cousin of mine

because she wasn't a very good employee and "really what could he expect from those people who've never worked a day in their life." I've been called the N word and so many strangers feel entitled to know my ethnicity. I've listened to people be surprised at my academic

accomplishments and in school, I was one of two people who weren't totally white but I was "okay" and "acceptable" because they knew me and I went to that school k-12. my sister has definitely been treated worse at high school jobs because of her skin tone.

my aunt went to the colored school before 1965. I'm reading a thesis right now on my family and I find the language this scholar uses to be incredibly suspect. a quote: "The whites tend to relegate these people to the status of Negroes, a status which most of them resent."

another: "Although the Gu*neas are for the most part very white in appearance, as will be noted in a later chapter devoted to a description of their physical characteristics, the whites in the area resist accepting them as social equals largely on the basis that “one drop of

"Negro blood makes a Negro." In spite of a substantial number of whites acknowledging “Indian blood”, and many more, not being quite certain as to what racial strains have gone into the make-up of these people, it seems to matter very little, for as one white Informant summed

"it up: “That one drop of n*gger blood never washes away.” The Gu*neas then, are referred to as “colored people.” In the areas where they reside and by virtue of this classification are subject to differential treatment by white society."

this is only the introduction and I've heard the G word and my dad always gets so angry whenever he hears it. I knew it was a slur against us but to see it in these terms... it's been really interesting to research my family history a little tonight

even though it makes some of my family members who act totally white-- even some who were alive during this study-- just totally confusing as to why they don't support blm. like i said i don't have a point to prove. I'm just

a little lost in thought about my family and thinking about our place in what's going on/what our place should be. as a history major and someone who knows our history in a more personal/informal oral history way, this research is really cool and definitely giving me more insight