Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
The ignorance in this thread peaked here and could only be spoken by someone who isn't black. This was a rather prejudicial statement as well, assuming "typically" black means what you're alluding to. Describe to me what is typically black?
I don't know about anybody else, but I've known plenty of women who self-identify as black who carry similar features as Vanessa or Halle. The fact of the matter is that nearly all "blacks" are MIXED, so there is a wide, wide, wide range of physical characteristics of people who look and self-identify as black. You can't look "mixed", when we all ARE mixed, but I guess you mean, look as if you have one white parent? Again I'd say that's a very narrow view...
I found out through 23andMe that I'm over 26% European, and no one would look at me and say I'm "mixed". But I was raised with a countenance to understand racial history and identification, so while I was surprised to see it as high as 26%, I knew I would have double digit European ancestry...
Most Black Americans are generationally mixed, usually 65-95% African. In the 1800s white slavemasters used to rape female slaves, that racial mixing between slave and their masters isnt only a Latin American thing, it happend in the US too just not as much. As compared to recently mixed people, who have parents or grandparents of different races. People like Mariah Carey and Halle Barrey are probably around 40% black anyway, they resemble the average Dominican/Puerto Rican more than the average Black American.
Most Black Americans are generationally mixed, usually 65-95% African. In the 1800s white slavemasters used to rape female slaves, that racial mixing between slave and their masters isnt only a Latin American thing, it happend in the US too just not as much. As compared to recently mixed people, who have parents or grandparents of different races. People like Mariah Carey and Halle Berry are probably around 40% black anyway, they resemble the average Dominican/Puerto Rican more than the average Black American.
Mariah Carey is likely significantly less than 40% black. Her mother is white, which would mean her father would have to have been around 80% black to be approximately 40% black.
Her father passed away from cancer, but the few pictures of him make it clear he was very mixed himself.
Most Black Americans are generationally mixed, usually 65-95% African. In the 1800s white slavemasters used to rape female slaves, that racial mixing between slave and their masters isnt only a Latin American thing, it happend in the US too just not as much. As compared to recently mixed people, who have parents or grandparents of different races. People like Mariah Carey and Halle Barrey are probably around 40% black anyway, they resemble the average Dominican/Puerto Rican more than the average Black American.
Actually, when even looking at people that identify as black with a range of 20-100% Black, African Americans are of 80% African ancestry. This is according to a Scientific American article in regards to race I read from several years ago that included information from geneticists Kittles from Howard University and Shafer from Penn State.
Most Black Americans are generationally mixed, usually 65-95% African. In the 1800s white slavemasters used to rape female slaves, that racial mixing between slave and their masters isnt only a Latin American thing, it happend in the US too just not as much. As compared to recently mixed people, who have parents or grandparents of different races. People like Mariah Carey and Halle Barrey are probably around 40% black anyway, they resemble the average Dominican/Puerto Rican more than the average Black American.
I don't know. Halle Berry doesn't look as if she should have a white parent--she looks "typically" black by many standards...
I myself am 71% African descent. I was raised with the knowledge that there really are no pure, 100% blacks in the Americas--my mother raised me with that, so I've never had the allusion of being "fully" black, and I never bought into the "this person looks mixed" thing. Not even as a child or teenager. I grew up in Virginia with people as light as Mariah who had two black parents; I grew up with people a shade or two darker than Halle who had a white parent; I grew up with people of various skin tones, from very light to very dark, who had colorful eyes and atypical hair texture. So maybe my upbring prepared me differently than others...
Nobody to me "looks mixed", not after I met people my skin tone who had a white parent and met people who other people would say "look mixed" bit had two black parents (like Steph Curry)...
Actually, when even looking at people that identify as black with a range of 20-100% Black, African Americans are of 80% African ancestry. This is according to a Scientific American article in regards to race I read from several years ago that included information from geneticists Kittles from Howard University and Shafer from Penn State.
My experience has been that somewhere in the range of 15%-20% African ancestry is the point where, within the U.S. context, someone passes for white.
Benjamin Jealous, the former head of the NAACP, has a white father and a light-skinned black mother. As part of Finding Your Roots, he had his DNA tested. He was 80% European and 18% African by ancestry (Henry Louis Gates joked he was the whitest black man he had ever tested). He self-identifies as black, but honestly I think he passes as white in an American context, particularly when his hair is short.
Nobody to me "looks mixed", not after I met people my skin tone who had a white parent and met people who other people would say "look mixed" bit had two black parents (like Steph Curry)...
If you're talking about Steph Curry in particular, it's pretty clear both his parents are mixed themselves, even if it was from many generations back.
Anyway, time for a little genetics 101.
Physical phenotype can vary a lot for two reasons. First, because every generation, genes "recombine" and secondly, because only a small percentage of the genome is actually coded for traits we associate with racial differences.
To illustrate the first point. When someone who is pure blooded African has a child with someone who is pure-blooded European, the result will always be someone who is exactly 50/50. But when that child in turn has children, the genes from their "African" chromosome copy and their "European" ones shift around during the process where sperm/egg is generated. As a result, while the offspring of two biracial people will be 50/50 on average, in actuality they can vary quite a bit. The British press loves covering stories about twins who come out where "one is white, and one is black." This dynamic happens in large part due to recombination. The "whiter" looking twin just happened to have more of their DNA inherited from their white grandparents, while the "blacker" looking one did not.
But if two groups mix together for centuries, the "white" and "black" portions of their genome get smaller and smaller. Eventually the genome gets so mixed that phenotype and genotype no longer really match. This is the case, for example, with the Uighur people in China, who formed about 1,000 years ago through a roughly 50/50 mixture of a European-like population and an East Asian one. Sometimes you will get someone who looks Western European (complete with light eyes and blond hair) in the same family as someone who looks East Asian. Only a handful of genes code for traits we consider to be associated with race (IIRC 80% of skin color variation is from only three genes) so if you inherit these genes alone you will be read quite differently.
African Americans have not been mixing long enough for genotype and phenotype to have been totally split apart yet - lighter skinned black people who look like they have more white ancestry generally speaking do. But this has happened to a limited extent, which is why you can get fairly dark brown people with blue eye or straight hair, for example.
My experience has been that somewhere in the range of 15%-20% African ancestry is the point where, within the U.S. context, someone passes for white.
Benjamin Jealous, the former head of the NAACP, has a white father and a light-skinned black mother. As part of Finding Your Roots, he had his DNA tested. He was 80% European and 18% African by ancestry (Henry Louis Gates joked he was the whitest black man he had ever tested). He self-identifies as black, but honestly I think he passes as white in an American context, particularly when his hair is short.
He looks like a lot of the Creoles you see in New Orleans. You will find light skinned people who proudly identify as African American and who technically had two Black parents, though they will also proudly say they are Creole. Check out New Orleans first two black mayors, especially Sidney Barthelemy. https://medialibrarycdn.entrata.com/...c012fa1888.jpg
That is why I am always surprised to learn when people come from actual one white parent and one black parent, like the discussion about Halle Berry, they are seemingly just your average black person if I didn't know any better, like Key and Peele.
He looks like a lot of the Creoles you see in New Orleans. You will find light skinned people who proudly identify as African American and who technically had two Black parents, though they will also proudly say they are Creole. Check out New Orleans first two black mayors, especially Sidney Barthelemy. https://medialibrarycdn.entrata.com/...c012fa1888.jpg
That is why I am always surprised to learn when people come from actual one white parent and one black parent, like the discussion about Halle Berry, they are seemingly just your average black person if I didn't know any better, like Key and Peele.
I have heard before that Mitch Landrieu's father, Moon, had a half-black great grandmother, and thus the entire Landreiu family is black under the "one drop" rule.
Certainly, it's plausible. The percentage of "white" people with black DNA was found back in 2014 to be highest in Louisiana and South Carolina (around 12% of the total population, IIRC).
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
