Lebanese/Syrian | Ivorian
I spent most of my childhood in West Africa (where my Mum is from) where I lived in an affluent mixed-race family, going between my Arabic relatives, my French relatives and my African relatives was commonplace, and this diversity of people was what I knew/ was exposed to. Interestingly being mixed or from a mixed family in Western Africa in my opinion holds a certain privilege as this identity becomes a sort of badge that affords a certain advantage and to some extent for some entitlement.
In Western Africa I am seen as mixed but, in the West, mainly seen as ‘Black’ which is difficult because I don’t have a great relationship with the term ‘Black’. Being of African descent you are first and foremost identified as your ethnic group, not your colour. So, I guess my difficulty comes with the term Black or the Black experience as a ‘Black man’ because my Dad is not Black culturally or racially so that experience is a little tricky to me.
The most challenging part of my mixed identity has been the issue of dealing with colour; being ‘Browner’ as a mixed person. I find that as much as people can tell I’m mixed because of my hair texture or the shade of my skin they also don’t because they often associate being mixed with lighter shades of Brown or having one parent who is White. This can be quite difficult to deal with from an identity standpoint because you often find yourself having to negotiate your identity. Being Black passing vs. not looking Arabic enough for me.
The other aspect was colourism in my own family where lighter skinned relatives would be viewed or treated differently to darker skinned ones. Due to how I look I always stood in the middle of this omnipresent conflict which gave me a very rich and objective view of the debate.
I recently came out as bisexual and this was another layer of identity to unpick, this led down a very dark path but the courage it took me to come out in the current situation I was in was quite huge. I was able to come out, keep my life almost intact and move forward. My focus in this life is building resilience and strength through my identity, and my biracial/ bisexual identities really help me do this.
Going to church recently when trying to reconcile different parts of my identity and where I fit in with my faith. I have an underlying issue with the concept of race and religion namely Christianity and how the two collide and my bisexual identity comes into it, about how to reconcile this in the eyes of the church. My tears were mainly about this continuous journey to find places where I belong, especially within established places or organisations.
The benefit to my mix is that I got the best of both worlds looks wise, I love my hair, and my skin tone. Also being a third culture kid and a polyglot also add many layers to my identity that in addition to being biracial give me such a vivid kaleidoscope of experiences and avenues to turn to in my life. I can find commonalities with many different people, adapt to a breadth of realities, mentalities, and ways to conceptualize life.
I am fortunate to have my immediate family in the UK. As for my African/French or Middle Eastern family, seeing them is a great opportunity to travel which I do quite frequently. It is quite easy for me because I grew up in all my cultures, so I embrace my French, Arabic and West African cultures whether it’s in the music, the food, clothing, languages that I speak. Which can be confusing to others but makes perfect sense to me.
In today’s society I feel even more able to be seen and express myself as a ‘browner’ mixed man. The concept of identity has really evolved. The conversations around identity and visibility of identities that were pushed aside are now taking center stage and that is the reason why I feel more comfortable claiming my mixed identity and making a point of it.