Feb 5, 2008 7:32 pm US/Eastern
Obama Race Spurs Questions Of Biracial Identity
MIAMI (CBS4) ―
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Barack Obama, a Democratic presidential candidate addressed an overflow crowd of supporters on the University of Denver campus Wednesday, Jan. 30, 2008.
CBS
The face of our country is changing and never before has that been more apparent than this presidential election. Barack Obama has been touted as the man who could become the first black president. An honor that might replay itself every February for black history month, but Obama is part of another group of people-biracial Americans-one of the fastest growing segments of the population.
Tisha Hyter comes from a blended family much like CBS4's Tiffani Helberg.
"My mother is white with a Scandinavian background and my father is black," said Hyter. "And we had exposure to kind of both of those the benefits of both of those as we were growing up as kids."
But if you ask the Miramar woman her ethnicity, she will tell you. "Nine times out of ten I'd say I'm black," said Hyter. "I think that's how I self identify and it's clearly how the world around me identifies me as well."
It's how society identifies most biracial people, including presidential candidate Barack Obama.
If elected many say, Obama could become this country's first black American president. Forgetting the fact that the fact he has black mother and a white father. He describes himself as a black man of mixed heritage and it's that mixed heritage that puts him among the rank of some other high profile celebrities.
Pop star Mariah Carey, Halle Berry- biracial, but dubbed the first black female to win a best actress Oscar. There is also Tiger Woods, part black, Thai and part Native American- a man who's refused to be labeled as any one ethnicity.
Marvin Dunn is a former FIU professor and historian. He said America has always tried to pigeonhole inter-racial people into one neat category.
"It's a throwback to the time when the fact of being white was a privilege to be shared by those who had genetic apparency in their whiteness so that privilege is denied to those who have mixed blood therefore they're all considered to be black," said Dunn.
But researchers believe pretty soon this country could be predominantly multi-racial, just like Hyter.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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