The Politics of Mothering in a “Mixed” Family: An Autoethnographic Exploration

Abstract

Interweaving excerpts from her personal journal with research and literature about mixed race, interfaith, and bicultural experience, Nora Lester Murad uses autoethnographic methods to explore the experience of mothering in an American-Jewish and Palestinian-Muslim family. She pushes theoretical discussion beyond the experiences of "mixed" people to consider how the identity of otherwise monoracial/ monocultural parents may be transformed through the experience of parenting across socially/politically significant differences, particularly, national origin, culture, and faith. She also extends theoretical discussion beyond the confines of identity to consider parenting as a political process with an impact within and beyond families.

Parenting, Family Processes, Relationships, and Parental Support in Multiracial and Multiethnic Families: An Exploratory Study of Youth Perceptions

“…Research shows that MR/ME youth report lower levels of neighborhood cohesion than monoracial and monoethnic youth (Bolland et al, 2007). Many youth turn to their parents for guidance and advice (Crawford & Alaggia, 2008;Laszloffy, 2008;Lester Murad, 2005), and biracial and biethnic children may not always receive the guidance and support they need from their parents. MR/ME children may have parents who are not biracial or biethnic themselves or who have limited understanding of what it means to be a racial or ethnic minority in the United States (Crawford & Alaggia, 2008;Laszloffy, 2008).…”

“…MR/ME children may have parents who are not biracial or biethnic themselves or who have limited understanding of what it means to be a racial or ethnic minority in the United States (Crawford & Alaggia, ; Laszloffy, ). Parents who are not racial or ethnic minorities or biracial or biethnic themselves may not have the tools or understanding to guide and help their children at times during which their children experience difficulties unique to their MR/ME status (Crawford & Alaggia, ; Lester Murad, ). As a result, multiracial and multiethnic youth may feel unsupported and not understood, which may increase their opportunities for loneliness and a reduced sense of belonging.…”

Rethinking hybridity: Interrogating mixedness

“…Mixed-race studies are now a recognised multi-disciplinary field, where, in addition to theoretical discussions, empirical research has included the interrogation of census categories and questions (Aspinall, 2012); ethnographic research (Ali, 2003) and the qualitative investigation of identifications among mixed-race young people (Tizard and Phoenix, 2002;Song and Aspinall, 2012); and autobiographical explorations of faith mixing (Lester Murad, 2005). Despite a recoiling from hybridity's genetic referents, the questions of genealogy, inheritance and the upheaval to binarism that the original formulation of hybridity connotes have been taken up in the social sciences.…”

I Am Roha’s Emaye: A Critical Autoethnography of Mothering in Liminal Spaces

“…In scholarly and popular discourses, Kara raising Roha is described as "interracial parenting," "mixed-race parenting," "multiracial parenting" (Donnella 2016;Murad 2005). But the language used to categorize and record personal backgrounds intertwines into ideological and political debates (Caballero 2005).…”