Unveiling Hidden Truths: How Dorothy Roberts’ Memoir Challenges Everything We Think About Race and Family
The reason The Mixed Marriage Project is a memoir and not just an exegesis is that it traces the evolution of Roberts’ thinking about her identity and her father’s research — not only what motivated it, but its efficacy. As a child Roberts was encouraged to eschew racial identity and embrace her parents’ emphasis on social equality and shared humanity. She was proud of her mixed family and thought of it as a “living symbol of racial harmony.” As Roberts individuated, she formed her own opinions about identity and race. She came to view her father’s dream — that one day integration alone would dismantle racism—as naive. She joined a Black student union at Yale, began to identify as Black, was inspired by the Black Liberation movement and, for a period of time, tried to erase her white identity. She married a Black activist and became one herself.
