The nation’s mixed-race population is growing far more quickly than many leading demographers estimated, according to this thought-provoking article in the New York Times.
In North Carolina, the article says, the mixed-race population doubled, while in Georgia it grew by more than 70 percent. Similar growth was seen in Kentucky, Tennessee, Indiana, Iowa and South Dakota.
The statistics are even more impressive when you consider how much ground has been covered in the days since the Civil Rights Movement. In 1967, after all, it was still illegal for blacks and whites to marry in Mississippi. Today, the state is seeing substantial growth in the number of interracial marriages and in children who are identified as multi-racial.
At the same time, older people, who were not always as proud of their mixed ethnic heritage, are increasingly likely to identify themselves as being multi-racial. This self-identification represents a dramatic shift in thinking for many of these adults, particularly those who grew up in the Jim Crow South.
What do these shifting demographics mean for those of us who are advocates for educational and social justice?
Will race become a less divisive factor, as more people identify themselves as being multi-racial?
Will discrimination wane as the racial lines that all too often divide us become less clear, or will we simply find that society finds new ways to judge and discriminate?
The changing attitudes and relationships represented in this latest batch of statistics seems promising.
But truly, only time will tell whether we are able to move beyond ugly racial divisions and tension, to a place where, as Dr. Martin Luther King implored, people are judged by the content of their character instead of the color of their skin.
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