Race Confusion!?!

Hello CC,

I am filling out the race portion of my college applications and I have an issue.

I recently got a genetics test done by 23andme which determines I am 71% Asian Indian, 23% African, and 6% a Mixture of other races.

I have a relatively Indian Ethnic Name and I thought I was at least 95% Asian Indian up until now (Although I do have curly hair, dark skin, and I am 6 '3).

Also, my school records say that I am Asian Indian.

What do I put on my college applications?

  1. I do not want to seem like I am lying on the application
  2. I do not want to disregard my relatively significant African background (This would also technically be lying)

Should I put mixed race (African and Asian Indian) or Asian Indian only?

I know this seems stupid but I don’t want to get in trouble or be accused of academic integrity because of this.

This question comes up every year it seems.

What do YOU identify as?

That is what you put – and no one can ever, EVER, accuse you of anything.

You’ve answered your own question; check what you identify as.

Answering the question is optional, but just checking the box(es) does not mean that the college will classify you accordingly.

The reality is twofold:

1/ If we all too a DNA test, most likely the vast majority of us will be mixed.
2/ You are as black (or mixed) as Mindy Kaling’s brother and could risk the same blowblack as he had.
https://www.cnn.com/2015/04/07/living/feat-mindy-kaling-brother-affirmative-action/index.html

If the boxes allow, put both Indian and African. Let the college decide how to enter you into their statistics.

I would base none of it on the DNA results. How do YOU identify? It may well be that you now identify as African, so mark that. If not, if you only identify as Indian, go with that.

I agree with twoinanddone.

AncestryDNA, for example, recently revised their DNA ethnicity estimates, and a friend of mine had substantial changes. View your test results as estimates.

How do you self identify for purposes other than checking boxes on college applications?

How do others identify you?

@AboutTheSame @skieurope @BunnyBlue @twoinanddone @chercheur @ucbalumnus

As for racial identification.

Although I used to identify as Indian alone, I now identify as mixed race because over a quarter of my DNA isn’t Indian. So, in my application, I will identify as both Indian and African.

Also, if it makes any difference, around 50% of the people I meet (that aren’t related) tell me that they thought I was black due to my curly hair, dark skin, tall and relatively muscular figure (I play on Varsity Basketball). This happened before my DNA test a lot and I didn’t think much of it, but it makes a lot more sense now.

Around 70% of my DNA is still Indian, so it makes sense that my school lists Indian as the race.

Thank you for all of your help!

Having African DNA doesn’t mean that you have African ancestry in standard meaning. And ancestry without cultural background doesn’t define race. 23andme explains that most people have genetic mixing and typically have ancestors from other continents.

If you have aver felt association with African culture and society then surely you would be mixed race. But redefining your racial identification only after seeing that you have 23% African DNA and sometime after already reporting Indian to your high school doesn’t sound right, and may not look right combined with other components of your application.

I hope that I wouldn’t have to tell an Indian how common curly hair and dark skin are for Indian people.

There is a simpler way to avoid Asian classification, which is declining to state your race.

See below two articles;

“Remember that all of us have deep ancestry in East Africa; the proportion of our variable DNA that falls into that category is about 85 percent. This means that about 15 percent of our “recent” DNA could potentially be differentiated by continent or region within a continent.”
https://www.tolerance.org/magazine/summer-2015/race-dna

“But most people’s ancestors come from many places. The technical word for this is admixture — the genetic mixing of previously separate populations. For example, it’s common for people of European descent to have ancestry from all around Europe, and Latino people typically have ancestors from the Americas, Europe, and sometimes Africa.”
https://www.23andme.com/ancestry-composition-guide/

Note, however, that some south Asian people have curly hair, dark or very dark skin, and height. Some can be mistaken for black people, even without recent African ancestry. This is likely why south Asian people report more trouble with police than east Asian people (page 8 of https://cdn1.sph.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/94/2017/11/NPR-RWJF-HSPH-Discrimination-Asian-Final-Report.pdf ). Also, some African Americans have hair that is not as curly as you expect, and relatively light skin (e.g. http://theundefeated.com/features/isaiah-hartenstein-nba-draft-2017/ ).

What do your parents say about their (your) ancestry? 23% African would almost be like one African grandparent, or two African great grandparents. Seems like that much recent African ancestry would likely have been noticed in family history.

@SculptorDad @ucbalumnus

I’m not even trying to avoid asian classification.

I just want to report as accurately as possible so I don’t get in trouble later (and so that I am not lying).

So far I think Mixed Race (African/Indian) Makes the Most Sense. If anyone asks, I’ll explain it to them.