Jamaican/Irish | Indian/Irish
I'm a Brummie through and through; I was born in Birmingham, and so were both of my parents. However, my Grandparents are from further afield.
My Mom had an Indian Father and an Irish Mother, and my Dad had a Jamaican Father and a British-born Mother of Irish heritage. My parents both grew up in the same Birmingham neighbourhood, Small Heath, which has long been a melting pot of immigrants from all around the world. However, they never actually met until college. Within a few weeks of dating, my Dad knew she was ‘the one’, and he proposed soon after by offering her his last Rolo on the bus. The rest is history. My Grandparents all arrived in Birmingham in the 1940s - 50s. In a new city, far from family and surrounded by young people of all backgrounds who were chasing better lives, there must have been a sense of freedom, of being able to follow your heart without so many eyes watching.
Still, in the 50s and 60s, being in an interracial relationship came with immense societal pressure. I don’t think that’s the only reason my Grandparents’ relationships eventually broke down, but maybe it played a minor part? Children like my parents, born of these ‘doomed’ mixed unions, were often seen as failed experiments; ‘half-breeds’ raised by irresponsible, White single Mothers, burdens of the state. Simply because their parents had believed in the possibility of love across racial and cultural lines.
Despite coming from different cultural backgrounds, my parents both shared the experience of being mixed-race, of living with a foot in more than one world, and I think that mutual understanding helped to bring them together. They never had to explain or justify their Jamaican-ness, Indian-ness, or Irish-ness to each other. They simply embraced it at face value. And unlike their parents before them, their relationship has withstood the test of time. They’re now approaching their 40th wedding anniversary.
I feel a special bond with my Irish heritage, partly because I'm half Irish on both sides of the family, but also because it’s the one part of my heritage I’ve never had to justify or suppress. I’ll never forget visiting Dublin with my Nan. Hearing old family stories; the places they lived, places where our family history intersected with Ireland's history. For the first time in my life, I felt a profound connection to a land and its history, something I have never experienced at home in the UK. I feel it every time I go back to Ireland. I haven’t been to Jamaica or India yet, but I’d love to visit one day and hopefully feel that same sense of connection.
Despite being mixed-race, my Dad usually self-identifies as a Black man as that's how most of society viewed him in his formative years; Black by default. He always found more community and acceptance amongst black peers than white ones, bonding over shared experiences, ranging from celebrating Jamaican culture at Notting Hill Carnival to being racially profiled by the police. As a result, when I was growing up, the environment at home was strongly influenced by my Father's Black British and Jamaican culture. However, the fact that I don’t necessarily ‘look’ Black to most people can make it hard to express my Jamaican side openly.
Having two mixed-race parents means I’ve been surrounded by mixed-race people since the day I was born. It’s always felt completely normal to me, and for most of my early childhood, I never thought to question it. As I got older, I started to notice the differences more clearly. Subtle things, like how my parents were treated in public or the casual comments strangers made about my hair, nose, or skin. They might have seemed harmless to others, but something about them always felt off. Then, one day, a kid on our street called me and my sisters a racial slur. It wasn’t directed at my parents, it was aimed at us. It was confusing, devastating, not just because it was the first time I experienced overt racism, but because it shattered the naive, ‘colour-blind’ bubble of my childhood.
Today, living in London, I mostly fly under the radar. Honestly, I could probably have blue skin and still not draw a second glance. In some ways, that anonymity is freeing, but it can also feel lonely, like I’m not really seen. I can’t exactly go around telling strangers, ‘I’m not actually Brazilian, or Egyptian, or South African, or whatever it is you’re assuming I am. I’m actually Irish, Jamaican, and Indian, isn't that cool!’. So it just remains hidden until it either comes up naturally in conversation or I get the classic, dreaded question: ‘What are you?’.
When my first niece was born, I had great fun shopping for diverse toys she could play with as soon as she was old enough, feeling a quiet pride whenever I found dolls that looked like me or my sisters, with light-brown skin and dark curly hair. To my dismay, my niece was never really interested in them. She always preferred the dolls with blonde hair and green eyes, dolls who looked like her. I totally get it. That’s what all children want in some way. I remember my own childhood, all the arguments I had with my big sister over whose turn it was to play with our one and only mixed-race Barbie, a rare find in the 90s. Looking back, I realise I wasn’t just buying those dolls for my niece. I was fulfilling my own childhood fantasy of being seen, represented, like every other kid seemed to be.
Sometimes I wonder if passing on our cultural heritage will be a bit like those dolls I bought for my niece: a curiosity laying half-forgotten at the bottom of the toy box. It is what it is though, and I'm still determined to do my best to help teach my nieces and nephew about their special cultural heritage.
As mixed-race people, we often feel pressure to prove that our connection to each of our cultures is deep and authentic, especially when we start thinking about how to pass those cultures on to the next generation. It can feel like each culture needs to be carefully preserved and cultivated with precision and respect, like little bonsai trees of Jamaican, Indian, or Irish culture. However, in my experience, culture doesn’t work like that. My identity has never had neat boundaries. It’s a tangle of vines; a messy, living chimera. At times, I’ve felt self-conscious about that, like my limited knowledge and many cultural faux pas were blasphemous and somehow made me less worthy of claiming or championing those roots.
The truth is: cultures evolve. The Jamaican culture of my ancestors is vastly different from the West African cultures of their ancestors, but that doesn’t make it any less meaningful or valid. The same goes for the unique blend I carry.
I learned to code-switch early, avoiding patois words at school even though they came naturally at home. I was already considered a bit of an oddball by others, in addition to looking different to other kids, it turns out I was actually neurodivergent all this time. It's sad, but I found it safer to code switch and hide those parts of myself to avoid drawing any extra attention to myself.
In my first year of university, someone told me they'd overheard my housemates gossiping about me, saying I was basically just White with a tan’. These were people who had met both of my very obviously not-White parents when I moved into dorms, but I guess that didn't matter. It felt completely dismissive and invalidating to me. However, if I’m honest, I'm pretty sure many people of every ethnicity have likely thought the same about me throughout my life, and are just polite enough not to tell me to my face.
I’ve worked in the tech industry for fifteen years, and I can count the number of mixed-race colleagues I’ve had on one hand. While there are now more initiatives aiming to improve representation, and I actively support these through mentorship and advocacy, the reality remains that true diversity is still lacking. I remember speaking with a junior Black colleague once who shared how isolating it felt to see so few people who looked like her in tech. A part of me wanted to say, ‘But I’m right here!’, but then I realised that I’m not visibly perceived as part of that representation and I never will be, and honestly that kinda stung. These days, I focus on using my tech skills to create meaningful impact in communities I care about, and I try to use my voice to advocate for others who often go unseen: mixed-race individuals, neurodivergent people, LGBTQIA+, carers, and those from working-class backgrounds. Maybe I can't be a visible role model for others, but that doesn’t mean I can’t make a difference.
If I could package aspects of my culture in a time capsule for the future, rather than picking specific elements from Irish, Indian, or Jamaican culture, I’d choose things unique to the micro-culture that exists only within my family: our strange blend of Irish and Jamaican idioms; our rich family lore, stretching from Kolkata to Kingston; and of course, our improvised, hybrid cuisine, equal parts inheritance, invention and sheer hubris. Jazzing up an Irish coddle with curry powder? Why not! Sunday roasts served with both rice and peas AND roast potatoes? God tier!
So my advice to the next generation is this: be proud not just of each individual culture in your heritage, but of the way they come together in you. Your experience is authentic, unique, beautiful, and just as worthy of being inherited.