The “White Umbrella” Project and Survey

After writing so many posts about my own experience of growing up mixed (black, white and Jewish), after reading about the biracial experience of so many other writers and bloggers, I am excited to launch a new project involving the varied experiences of black or biracial (black/white) people, who were raised by at least one white parent. The working title, White Umbrella, refers to the orbit of the white parent—in which many of us navigated the world, at least part of the time.

(The reason I’m only including black and white in this project–at first at least–is to understand whether parental “white privilege,” dilutes the very specific biases directed toward blacks.)

I have created a survey for adult people of color to reflect on their experiences growing up in the care and company of a white parent, to learn whether–and how–any of us benefited from the day to day privileges our white parents might have experienced. (In the intro to the survey, I include a working definition of “white privilege.”)

If you are between the ages of 18 and 70, who identify as biracial or mixed, who are the product of a white parent and a black parent, as well as people who are adopted, are either black or biracial/black-white, and raised by white parents, interracially married parents (one of whom is white), or by a single, white parent), I would love to hear from you. Please note, I have no hypothesis to support and no political agenda. Here is the link to my survey.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/WYK32R9

You can read more about my inspiration for the project in this post.