Bill of Rights for People of Mixed Heritage

I

HAVE THE RIGHT...

Not to justify my existence in this world.

Not to keep the races separate within me.

Not to justify my ethnic legitimacy.

Not to be responsible for people’s discomfort with

my physical or ethnic ambiguity.

I

HAVE THE RIGHT...

To identify myself differently than strangers

expect me to identify.

To identify myself differently than how my parents

identify me.

To identify myself differently than my brothers and

sisters.

To identify myself differently in different

situations.

I

HAVE THE RIGHT...

To create a vocabulary to communicate about

being multiracial or multiethnic.

To change my identity over my lifetime--and more

than once.

To have loyalties and identification with more

than one group of people.

To freely choose whom I befriend and love.

© Maria P. P. Root, PhD, 1993, 1994