Is being in a relationship with someone of a different ethnicity still fraught with difficulty in this day and age? You betcha, says Christelyn D. Karazin, author of Swirling: How to Date, Mate, and Relate Mixing Race, Culture, and Creed.
Christelyn answered a few of our questions about interracial dating and marriage as it stands now. She also speaks from firsthand experience: Christelyn is black, and her husband is white. Read on!
1. Are interracial relationships still controversial, even in 2012?
Yes; interracial relationships are still controversial, but not necessarily for the reasons you might think. The controversy often depends on the race and gender of the people “swirling.” For example, Pew Research data recently revealed that 24 percent of black men marry interracially, while only 9 percent of black women do. That’s huge! And…there’s a reason for that. Call it a displaced racial loyalty, social conditioning, or the curse of patriarchy, but black women take on all kinds of burdens when they venture out of their race to find partners. Immigrant children — particularly Asians and Indians — also face extreme family pressure if they intermix or intermarry.
2. What’s the one piece of advice you’d offer people in an interracial relationship?
Best piece of advice I could give anyone? Leave your issues about racial identity, historical oppression and/or contempt for “The Man” at home. The person you are dating should not be burdened with being the representative for an entire race, people! It takes more brain cells, but you’ve got to judge people on a case-by-case basis.
3. Do you have a tip for interracial couples dealing with unwanted attention, like stares or pointed comments?
Why yes, I do. In fact, I dedicate an entire chapter to it. First, don’t assume that the people staring at you are doing it because they’re card-carrying members of the Aryan Brotherhood. We’re programmed to notice things in our environment that are different for what we’re used to seeing. Some folks stare out of curiosity. Some stare because your girlfriend or boyfriend is hot-looking, and they’re running it through their minds how they can get a guy/girl like you have. Some look out of longing. Some look out of contempt. But whatever the reason, I advise couples to focus on each other, not other people.
4. What’s the best thing, in your opinion, about dating someone outside of your own ethnicity or culture?
The best thing is the hybrid of culture you get. At our wedding, we sang Dean Martin and ate a chicken dish my Southern-raised father had never heard of and jumped the broom and danced the Electric Slide. Great times.
Sounds like the kind of wedding we’d love to attend! Swirling will be available in bookstores May 15, or you can pre-order it from Amazon here.
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