Milli mála - 01.06.2016, Page 133
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Milli mála 8/2016 133
González-Mena and Dora Pulido-Tobiassen study the arduous task
that adolescents have in forming their identities and explain how
these difficulties increase for young people of color, because they
must in some way “reconcile the conflicting messages about who
they are and their value in a society that grants privileges to people
of white skin and devalues people with dark skin”.47 Identity forma-
tion, González-Mena and Pulido-Tobiassen argue, becomes ever
more complex when the individual is multiracial, since multiracial
individuals, in addition to having to tolerate racist remarks in the
same way as ‘blacks’, suffer other kinds of discrimination. Unlike
mono-racial youngsters, those of mixed race are condemned to live
at the margins, because “the common uses of racial categories do
not take into account a child that is not ‘one’ or ‘the other’, but is
‘both’ and ‘many’”.48
It is precisely this ambiguity that characterizes the racial classi-
fication of multiracial people which is the core of the social and
psychological dilemmas experienced by such individuals. Dominique
Michel-Peres has explained that this can cause profound problems
for the process of identity formation and says:
Their multi-affiliation increases the complexity of their identity choices
because their multi-isms are not partial identities but central to who they
are at all times. However, their counterparts in social interactions often
deny the totality of their identity validation.49
Social pressure to choose and identify with only one of their racial
origins can be, as Rossi’s literary works demonstrate, very distress-
ing. Yet this choice becomes inevitable if the person wants to belong
47 González-Mena, Janet and Dora Pulido-Tobiassen, “Apoyando el desarrollo de una identidad
sana”. http://teachingforchange.org/files (022-B.pdf), 1999; “reconciliar los mensajes conflictivos
acerca de quiénes son y su valor en la sociedad que concede privilegios a la gente con piel blanca y devalúa
a la gente de piel oscura”, p. 1. [Accessed August 2016].
48 González-Mena and Pulido-Tobiassen, same; “los usos comunes de las categorías raciales no toman
en cuenta un niño que no es ‘uno’ o ‘el otro’, sino que es ‘ambos’ o ‘muchos’”, p. 4.
49 Michel-Peres, Dominique, Understanding the Identity Choices of Multiracial and Multicultural Afro-
European and Black Women Living in Germany. Identifying a Model of Strategies and Resources for
Empowerment. Dissertation, 2007. University of München, edoc.ub.uni-muenchen.de/6489/1/Michel
Peres_Dominique.pdf. Also available on http://worldcat [Accessed August 2016]. Here p. 62.