Maya Soetoro-Ng Quotes

I always wonder if my kids will say they're mixed or black.

When you're biracial, people sort of make you gray - you're not black, you're not white, you're sort of gray; you're 'other.' And I'm fortunate to have parents that were strong enough to say, 'You're not 'other.' You're special.'

I'm tri-racial: African-American, Native American and Euro - that's the Scotch-Irish part.

I am half Puerto Rican, a quarter German and a quarter black. That was always a big issue for me - being mixed race - because casting directors tended to be very like, 'OK, are you Hispanic for this role?' 'Or is she going to be African American?'

I have always, or for the most part, identified myself as a biracial person.

The majority of my blood is Asian.

My blood's not red or blue - it's brown.

My dad is Caucasian, and my mom is African American. I'm half black and half white. Being biracial paints a blurred line that is equal parts staggering and illuminating.

I'm a white girl and not a white girl, identified by other people as black and not black for as long as I can remember - which, in mixed-people speak, means biracial.

I always felt culturally adrift as a child because I'm mixed race. I've had to deal with that since I was little. Who am I? What makeup do I have? What are the black and the white?

When you look at me, you can't really tell what I am, but I'm black, white, Native, Spanish, and a little bit of Filipino.

My mum is black, my dad is white, and when I was a teenager, people would say, 'So what are you? Are you black? Or white? What are you more of?'

Later on in life I was like, "Wow!" because that's exactly how it was. They don't care that you're mixed. They see you as one color.

My mom is Jamaican and Chinese, and my dad is Polish and African American, so I'm pretty mixed. My nickname in high school was United Nations. I was fine with it, even though I identify as a black woman. People don't realize it hurts my feelings when someone looks at my hair or my eyes, and says, "But you're not actually black. You're black, but you're not black black, because your eyes are green." I'm like, "What? No, no, I'm definitely black." Even some of my closest friends have said that. It's been a bit touchy for me.

I'm black. I'm Latina. My mom is Cuban. Afro-Cuban. My dad is white and Australian.

Most of my background is Filipino and partly Chinese, but mostly Filipino.

I mean, people don't know what race I am. They never know if I'm Hawaiian or Italian or Mexican or Spanish or white. I could play Jewish, I could play anything.

When people first meet me, they're always like, 'What are you?' as far as ethnicity. And I've been pegged as 'ethnically ambiguous.'

My father has fair skin, and my mother is dark, and I'm kind of cafe au lait.

To make an absolutely gross generalization, I think a lot of people feel like if you're mixed, more often than not you're quote unquote white. So if you're mixed, you embrace the mainstream culture more than the African-American culture.

My family is part Creole, and we're Indian, and we're also very, very black. My father was so black, he was blue.

All of us are so mixed. My great-grandfather was white.

My mother is Irish, my father is black and Venezuelan, and me - I'm tan, I guess.

My theory is because I'm Asian and white I sort of look like the future. I'm the melting pot.

To describe something as being black and white means it is clearly defined. Yet when your ethnicity is black and white, the dichotomy is not that clear. In fact, it creates a grey area.