Dear Sylvia,
How did you manage the ramifications of your racial identity
seeing as you lived in two vastly worlds in different parts of your life? Mixed
race identity is something I’ve been interested in my whole life, and you lived
as a mixed race individual in a black family, but still were able to pass in
white society. I want to know how this affected you psychologically. Did you
feel like you fit into the worlds you inhabited or did you feel like an
impostor? I always feel a little uncomfortable with my level of blackness and
my level of whiteness. I feel like I have a hard time feeling comfortable in either
race group in homogenous situations, and I wanted to know how you countered
these issues, or how your identity played a role in your life. I am deeply sorry
about the tragedy that struck your life when you lost your family, but I am impressed
by your willingness to continue to fight for education for Black children and
equal treatment. It was an interesting
experience to learn about your experience as a child, and then your adult endeavors
and passions that you were able to pursue even as a mixed race women in the
early 20th century. I am glad I was able to gain some insight about
what you went through, and I hope I can learn about myself from your existence.
Excellent post! I really like the questions that you raised about Sylvia's identity and the ways that you connected these questions to your own experience. It is likely that Sylvia did not identify as mixed race given the strict segregation of her time period. She likely saw herself as black but certainly experienced some level of privilege by being light-skinned. We can imagine that she was well aware of the privileges that she had compared to those of her darker-skinned family members. Terrific post!
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